Transferring to sand art from manga took less time than Meng Fan anticipated. He had practiced the night before until 3:00 in the morning and felt that he transferred around +12 to +13 points to his sand art.
Aside from Meng Fan's crazy practice regimen, This was also because transferring his skills meant he didn't have to bottleneck his skills into one profession. As long as he put in the work and improved as he went along, there would be no obstacles.
With +15 drawing skills, Wen Wan felt he was already at her level when she saw his work. But realistically, Meng Fan's drawing skills had already exceeded Wen Wan's, but he was just lacking experience.
Additionally, creativity and storytelling could be compensated by his imagination, but creating the 'mood' wasn't something that could be easily learned. Life in experience and knowledge of the environment was something Meng Fan was lacking compared to Wen Wan.