Do you feel your painting skill has plateaued?

[Mr. White]

My skill and technique has definitely plateaued. After 30+ years of painting minis you'd think I'd be close to Golden Deamon level. Not even close. I do, however, have my technique down cold so can crank through minis faster than I ever have before. That's more important to me at the moment, so I'm good with where I am.

[sundayhero]

same thing here. I significantly improved my skills a decade ago, but now I paint with the same level I had then.

But I'm happy with this, I like the way I paint 

[Gibby]

A couple of years ago I realised that I was either a good painter who barely ever got anything done, or an OK painter who could get forces painted to a reasonable standard ready for gaming. When I try to do my best painting, I tend to find motivation dissipates very quickly - sometimes before I've even finished the first few minis for a project. I personally find it quite demotivating to spend many hours on one or two minis only to look and see a load more ready for their turn.

This is all probably because, the truth is, I'm not in this for the painting. The painting is a means to an end for me. I much prefer the playing of games, the telling of stories, and that sort of thing. I have painted some figures I'm really quite proud of. Some of them are on my bookshelf to remind me I can paint quite well. That's where I plateaued, and now I've sort of regressed in terms of overall quality. BUT, I am actually getting forces painted and projects off the ground!

Whilst I am a fan of small skirmish games, most of which would be a reasonable cure to my motivation issues when painting to my best standard, I am more of a fan of large skirmish games up to bigger battles. I tend to find that eventually many small scale skirmish games tend to feel very samey and bland, with historical ones particularly suffering from a lack of period feel. Even forces for "large skirmish" such as most Too Fat Lardies games (among my favourites) are too many figures for me to overcome my motivation/momentum problems. Tabletop standard is where I've had to stay, and I'm quite happy there.

I have to say though, I really REALLY admire the skilled painters here who not only achieve fantastic results, but seem to do so for larger forces at a pace I still can't match with my tabletop standard! I think the difference between myself and those painters (other than their overally superior talent) is that they love painting, whereas I don't LOVE painting. I like it, and that's about it.

Not sure how on topic I stayed here. Ultimately, I know my painting skill plateaued, and then regressed, and that's ok!