I think my chops are actually getting worse rather than improving as I thought they would on this site.
Of course it's totally my own fault, I've been rushing through the chops just for the sake of entering them rather than learning how to do new things in photoshop. I think I need to slow down a bit and focus more on tutorials and building my knowledge.

I just thought I'd share that with you and wondered if anyone else has had a similar experience.

It's normal around here, but there is much to learn on techniques used by others and what they can accomplish. The good thing is that with membership you have access to images a month ahead of time, as well as getting to vote on future images.

I recall back when I joined I went full into tutorials all over the place learning. Also asked questions like how the hell did you do that with that image????

People don't mind too much around here.

are you addicted to psc? rushing to enter? ;-b you could do your speedy chop, but then do another one for yourself and take your time on it, or give yourself a project, like maybe you want to try to duplicate the look of someone else's chop, see if you can do it yourself.

getting into doing gifs is a good way to practice - Marty and I used to do A LOT of gifs, uh, Marty?! I think for a long time there every entry of his was a gif....

well don't worry. I left here for a while (had a lot of life to deal with) and coming back isn't easy, even if I do great stuff at work and usually have to do it a lot faster, it's still not easy pleasing everyone here with chops.... even if you're just trying to please yourself!

I think I know what you are going through there. When I first joined I pushed out a lot of chops that I had no interest in, and I still do that occasionally. Many of those chops that I had no real interest in turned out horrible and am not sure what I was thinking when I did them, much less to publish them. Though now I do think that I will slow down, maybe do one a week if that. Don't think I will do chops just to do them, especially if they don't inspire me. Aside from the chops that I may do that will never see the light of day that are just for practice.