For as long as I can remember, I have been drawing. The earliest of the memories inside my head involve doodling with crayons and colored pencils on sheets of plain white paper. I drew whenever I felt inspired, and as a child, I was inspired by pretty much everything I saw. I drew my favorite characters on TV, scenes of rock bands playing on stage, and even cars smashing into each other! Basically, whenever something came to my mind, I tried to copy it onto paper. This is how I spent most of my time during my earliest days.

Never did I own a fancy art set or use high-quality drawing equipment; my art arsenal consisted of regular white paper and whatever pencils I happened to find lying around. This meant that I could draw with no restrictions, as I could create satisfactory works of art regardless of the quality of the materials used.

I drew a wide variety of things as a kid, but one of my main interests was in drawing comics. I was probably around five years old when I started drawing comics - reading age, I am sure; I knew how to write sentences, albeit very bad ones, but I still wrote words in my comics. I can recall some of my old characters and stories, like the adventures of a superhero and his sidekick dog, and a story of a lost robot who was searching for his home. That was a pretty heartbreaking concept, now that I think of it! Oddly enough, as much as I used to enjoy drawing comics, I never actually read any comics at the time. It was almost as if drawing comics was an interest that generated itself within me on its own.

Although I loved to draw all the time, I never really thought of myself as an artist until that fateful day in kindergarten when a group of my classmates was drawing pictures. They were all lying on the floor, circled around in a small group, tracing over pictures of Pokemon characters. I decided to join in, but instead of tracing over the pictures like they were doing, I drew next to the pictures for reference. When we shared our drawings, they admired my work and were surprised by the fact that I didn’t even have to trace it. I even remember that one specific kid shouting out “Did you trace it?” I tried to remain humble and make it sound like no big deal, because to a kindergartener this was apparently a pretty big deal, but it was at that moment when I made the grand realization that I was skilled at drawing.

Aside from comics, another interest I had from a young age was drawing cars. I was fascinated by cars, but just like the comics, I developed my interest in cars entirely on my own, as nobody I knew was even remotely interested in cars. I created lots of drawings of cars from all sorts of different angles and perspectives, but I almost never drew real-world cars; all my designs were fictional ones that I came up with on the spot. This means that I was one of the world’s youngest car designers! Whenever I shared my creations with my family, a very frustratingly common question I used to receive was “Which car is that?”, to which I always angrily responded “I don’t know! It’s just something I made!” Those were obviously questions of encouragement rather than genuine curiosity, but little kiddos never realize that.

I never planned on pursuing an art career, but I did run a little business during elementary school where I used to sell my drawings for 5 cents each! It worked like this: I get a request to draw something, like a specific car or character. I go home, draw it, and come back the next day to exchange my work for well-deserved money. On a good day, I typically earned around 25 cents and spent the profits on a juice box or a tasty snack down at the cafeteria. That was pretty good money for a kid!

Just because I preferred to draw on paper didn’t mean it was the only way I knew how to draw! Back in 2009, I went beyond drawing on flat paper and began drawing in 3D using a computer program called Google Sketchup, now known as Trimble Sketchup. Over the years, I created a variety of 3D models, such as cities, random household items, action scenes like police pursuits and some humorous snapshots of moments before tragedy. I uploaded my creations to the ‘3D Warehouse,” where all fellow Sketchup users showcase their content. As you may suspect, I was mainly interested in modelling cars. Along with a bunch of friends that I met online with the same interest, we came up with fictional car companies and modelled our own cars in 3D. We used to share our cars to the 3D Warehouse, exchange designs, draw cars for one another and hold a regular “Crash my Car” event where we drew wrecked versions of each other’s cars for pure fun!

As an example of how my work progressed, here is a “work in progress” that I sent 5 years ago to a friend while I was creating a Mustang/Camaro mashup car. I completed it a while after, and named it the 2013 Tiger Giaguaro. Later on, I decided to wreck it in a drawing, because why not?

Much like writing begins with a first draft, designs start with an early concept.

After many revisions and with a lot of dedication, the 2013 Tiger Giaguaro was finally complete!

Picasso once said, “Every act of creation begins with an act of destruction.” For Adam however, destruction came afterwards.

To date, I have uploaded over 400 models to the 3D Warehouse. Now that is progress!

During middle school, I used to tear some pages out of my notebook and draw on them whenever I felt bored in class, which was pretty much the entire time. And, of course, I almost exclusively drew cars and comics. Although my car drawings never received the recognition they deserved, two of my classmates found out about my comic drawings, and it turned out that they were also avid comic drawers. And that was when the fun began. Starting from 7th grade all the way up to high school, we spent all of our time in class just drawing comics. We took inspiration from whatever events happened in class or where ever else in school, so we had an endless supply of ideas to draw about. We had our own array of characters, some of which were ourselves or portrayals of other students and pop icons. We used to complete portions of the comics and exchange them in the midst of lectures to continue each other’s work. Over the years, we accumulated stacks upon stacks of comics, all neatly organized in “maximum security” binders. Now that we have separated after college, each of us are in possession of a portion of the collection. The only way to make the collection complete again would be to meet up again, but sadly that will have to wait until next summer.

The remarkably intricate drawing of myself which I used in all our comics.

To express my gratitude, I provide my friend with a preview of his special “birthday comic.”

We proudly display our massive collection of comics during our one last gathering, while I chow down on chocolate.

Another one of my most prominent creations in high school was “the duck.” It was basically a duck carrying a slice of bread with his hands and expressing his pleasure by saying “aww yiss.” I drew this duck on every desk I happened to sit on after moving between different classrooms. Depending on the holiday, I used to theme the duck. For example, on Christmas, I drew him with a santa hat, alongside a christmas tree and an unwrapped gift box out of which he received his bread. Whenever my ducks got worn out or erased, I restored them to their old glory. As you can tell, I took good care of my ducks.

I demonstrate my comprehensive knowledge of duck anatomy by drawing a specimen on the desk.

The duck gained popularity in school, as students from other classes tried to draw the duck on their desks as well. I became officially known as “the guy who draws the duck” after some students witnessed me drawing on the desks. Even the principal found out that I was behind the countless ducks, but she was very cool when she confronted me about it. Gladly, I didn’t get into any sort of trouble at all. I believe she liked the duck! The desks started being wiped clean every month or so because of all the scribbles, but all that did was provide blank canvases for me to draw more ducks.

I never really had an obstacle that prevented me from drawing or achieving a particular goal in drawing. However, this led to a different kind of conflict related to drawing; that is, refraining from drawing. Because I spent almost the entire time in class drawing and exchanging drawings with my friends, I paid almost no attention at all to class, and my grades unfortunately reflected this. My classes were not getting any easier as I approached high school, which demanded a lot more of my attention in class. This called for a change.

In order to solve the problem, I had to save all my ideas and draw them at home; that is, if I even had the time for it. My friends and I had to decrease the output of our mad comic factory and steer more focus toward our studies. It was painful for all of us, but we had to do what we had to do. Everyone used to know me as the guy who was constantly churning out drawings, but things became really still, and boring. It may have been worth it in the end, considering that each one of us got A’s in our standardized tests. Although I am currently in college with a part-time job and even less time than ever to draw, I still do manage to sneak in some drawings of cars and ducks next to my class notes. I guess old habits die hard!

Looking back to my history of drawing, I have come a very long way since I started, but I never drew because I wanted to master the art of drawing, create an eye-popping masterpiece, become a world-acclaimed artist, or any of those ambitious visions. I only drew because I enjoyed drawing. I did not need motivation from my parents, my friends, or anyone at all; I just liked to do what I did, whether I was good at it or not. And this is what kept me drawing all these years, learning and improving as I go. I have seen very impressive artwork online, things that require a skill set that I could never imagine myself even remotely having, but that never mattered. I learned to appreciate other people’s work, even if it was better than mine, and simply enjoy what I do rather than make it a chore. A healthy positive attitude like this can be applied to many other aspects in life as well, and I only managed to learn it through my favorite hobby: drawing.