Back to working on composition

Three stages right now.

I'm working through some common compositions, starting with the S. It's one of my favs. I like that it sweeps back into the environment.

At stage one I just sketch out an idea. It's pretty rough and kind of messy. I used to work directly off of this and, big surprise, I'd get confused and make something incoherent.

I also have a problem with just going with the first shape I make even if they don't make a whole lot of sense. So I did a little research on ocean, beach, and cliff shapes and went back in with line (which makes so much more sense to me than blocking in).

I then went back to only a few tones to make a more coherent image, following my linework.

It's not perfect and I could stand to go over it a few more times before starting in on any kind of rendering. It's not the more efficient working method but while I'm learning I'm going to do some struggling. Unfortunately!!!

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A lot of what I'm working on isn't just learning composition but unlearning bad habits and replacing them with good ones.

Some of said bad habits are as follows:

I rush everything. Actually this might be the core of my issues, other than just fear of failure/success in general. Pretty much everything fits under this heading such as: 

not taking enough time to identify problems. 

just GOING with something rather than revising to become the best it can be (every 'failure' seriously pushes up my stress level, so I have to figure out how to keep that from hijacking my system). 

Not knowing what method would be best at any given moment. I seem to work best if I move back and forth between line and larger shapes. I tend to lose my way otherwise. this may be unusual but it seems to be the only way I can balance between too much detail and too much generic shapes. 

Getting real stressed and bored as soon as things aren't going well and rushing it.  Not totally sure what to do with this. It might be burn-out. It might be that I'm tired of illustration. It might be that I'm tired of art! It can be hard to really get at the root of a problem. Takes a lot of introspection and trial and error. :C