I've done some tinkering with graphics and gotten decent results. Then one day I saw a TV commercial involving some complex graphics and I got a little depressed, thinking to myself, Wow, I could never do anything that good. Later I stumbled across an article about how that commercial was made that said that 20 people worked on it for a year using $1 million worth of sophisticated computer software. And I laughed to myself. I'm frustrated because I, one person, using maybe $500 worth of software, can't reproduce in a day or two what a team of 20 took a year and $1 million to accomplish? Well duh, of course not.
I don't want to set expectations for myself that are so low that I can achieve them with minimal effort. But I don't want to set expectations so high that I can't possibly come close, either. Ideally, I want expectations that are difficult and require me to stretch my abilities to the utmost and work hard, but that are achievable.
I've done some tinkering with graphics and gotten decent results. Then one day I saw a TV commercial involving some complex graphics and I got a little depressed, thinking to myself, Wow, I could never do anything that good. Later I stumbled across an article about how that commercial was made that said that 20 people worked on it for a year using $1 million worth of sophisticated computer software. And I laughed to myself. I'm frustrated because I, one person, using maybe $500 worth of software, can't reproduce in a day or two what a team of 20 took a year and $1 million to accomplish? Well duh, of course not.
I don't want to set expectations for myself that are so low that I can achieve them with minimal effort. But I don't want to set expectations so high that I can't possibly come close, either. Ideally, I want expectations that are difficult and require me to stretch my abilities to the utmost and work hard, but that are achievable.