Looking to improve and learn how to draw

[Audax]

im tired of never improving and wallowing in mediocrity, if someone has time to waste in helping me out i would greatly appreciate that.

In a month i can also pay for lessons so yeah keep that in mind.
https://aryion.com/g4/user/Audax
my page, send me a message if you want to help.

[Dekkard2]

you're honestly not that bad at drawing. Best thing I can tell you is to just keep practicing. For extra help there's a few youtube people I can recommend and a stash of tutorials that I Favorited on deviant art https://www.deviantart.com/dekkard2/fav ... /tutorials

sycra has the best in depth tutorials on youtube that I've seen so far https://www.youtube.com/user/Sycra

[KnightleyPaine]

im tired of never improving and wallowing in mediocrity, if someone has time to waste in helping me out i would greatly appreciate that.

In a month i can also pay for lessons so yeah keep that in mind.
https://aryion.com/g4/user/Audax
my page, send me a message if you want to help.

Hi. I'm a guy who draws stuff. You probably won't be impressed by my gallery because I'm not dedicated to it (I just practice mouse drawings).

I have neither the time nor the crayons to make you good, but there's tutorials and courses for that. But there's something I can help you with, and that is wisdom and structure in approach. Think of it as knowing how the biology of building muscle works vs blind exertion, the latter can very well focus on the wrong things, actually just burn your muscles, or cause negatives like thin skin (the literal sort) even if you seem to improve overall and it's 'generally a good idea' - don't get me wrong, practice is good whether you follow my advice or not, I'm just trying to show you the way to make the most of it and what tutorials to look up.

1.) People who can't draw are impressed by most things that don't look too dissonant, so there's a base crowd that will be always impressed just because you can animeface reliably and didn't completely fuck up the rest of the anatomy. It's best to tune out your ego's need for 'positivity' in your quest for improvement. Accepting positivity is good when you are pleasing a certain audience, but hobbles progress.

2.) People who can't draw are also impressed by flashy stuff like coloring or shading. This is why you can't trust admirers, adding lipstick on the pig base is extra effort that will be seen, but can distract you from fundamental issues.

3.) People who are significantly naturally talented at drawing sometimes don't comprehend certain struggles, like what is needed for improvement on something they were always just good at. Sometimes it's not natural talent, but a naturally good approach that occurred to them intuitively while it doesn't for people who struggle. Much of my advice tries to rail you to avoid potentially bad intuitions.

4.) Avoid starting off with a 'style'. Simplicity such as ponies, Sonic OCs and generic animeface are consciously appealing designs that are easy to produce, relying on them can mask fundamental flaws. You can use them to feel good about yourself and please the fandom, but unless you plan entirely on sticking to those specific fandoms and need to show off everything you make, it's best to let go of things that seem to give you a natural edge for the end product. Pablo Picasso was perfectly capable of drawing an anatomically correct human, Vincent Van Gogh knew what borders are first before blurring them so he knows how to blur them to create the aesthetics he wanted. Ponies are, whatever you think of the show, designed by someone who knew what they were doing in terms of creating a simple to reproduce, recognizable and aesthetically pleasing shape. Ignoring this advice just makes you into Snapesnogger.

5.) "Draw a bunch of lines." This is an interesting piece of advice from the guy who made Kenshin, he's not actually that good, but acquired what he has. Making lines is much of drawing, and what the first half will focus on. At any given time this involves hand-eye coordination. I lucked out and started off with some of this on a natural level, but after not training it for a long time I can see where my limits are and compensate with my eyes and head (as long as you can erase, you can redo). But for someone aiming to practice, if you have nothing better to do, just fill a page of paper with nothing but attempts at making straight lines per hand, or lines with a very specific curvature, attempts at perfect circles, etc. You don't produce anything that receives likes or upvotes or favorites that way, but you're getting your hand used to precision. This will make things easier.

6.) Begin with perspective. It lets you start with simply shapes that are easy, but you can also recognize how abstract shapes can become difficult, get a feel for the nonexistent 3rd dimension when working with only 2.

7.) Anatomy. Most people want to draw people at some point. Learn subtle details, like how arms aren't just straight lines. Learning how to draw a hand goes here. Also, facial expressions. These are 'individually complex things'.

8.) Anatomy 2. Chances are you practiced how to make arms, eyes, hands, heads, etc. Now you need to think of the body as a whole. When first doing this, you might notice you're just lego-ing up body parts you've individually succeeded on drawing (this is a natural and intuitive instinct. In fact, judging from your gallery you've done this already). Start with a habit of making a sketch first so you see the thing you're making as a whole.

9.) Perspective + Anatomy. This is it now, this is the big leagues. If you manage this, you have half the battle down. Comprehension of a form as complex as a body in every angle at every perspective. At this level, you can draw a diagonal top down perspective with no shading and a three-dimensional face, and people will innately still be able to recognize the angle rather than feel you fucked up the legs due to them being short and ending in tiny feet compared to the large head. This is because at this level, every line sits and conveys perfectly what you're displaying.

10.) Learn how to display materials. Leather has different properties compared to linen cloth or knitted stuff. Crack open a fashion magazine like Araki, the guy who makes Jojo does and draw a bunch of odd fashion choices.

Optional.) Using your now acquired competence, pick a style. You've worked your way up, and intimately familiarized yourself with drawing, and likely some personal tendencies. You might actually find you can draw in other people's styles if you felt like it, but unlike before where you were copying off their skill, you now have a measure of your own. Use it to make something you find pleasing.

11.) Learn to draw some other stuff. And animals. You'll find all that effort put into drawing a person can be put to use in making for instance, your first horse or dog or cat.

Optional.) Now try making them in your style.

12.) Gain a sense for visual aesthetics. For instance, draw an empty, blocky room and place one guy sitting somewhere in there. Notice how he seems to be floating in the void. If you lack other stuff, there's too little to go by for whether he's standing or really just levitating off the ground. Akira Toriyama, the guy who makes dragonball will tell you to draw a pillow for him to sit on - this grounds his position slightly better (but now you might just have a levitating pillow isntead because Toriyama is not a smart man). Images need a sense of grounding and balance for the observer. Also, I'm almost willing to bet you put different levels of effort into drawing faces, dogs and material, so at any given time with all three in one picture there might be a quality dissonance. Correct that. Remember all that stuff about seeing the body as a whole? Now you need to apply that to the entirety of the picture you're making.

13.) Coloring. A lot of people skip here the moment they make something that's not entirely butchered to the lay eye. They then blindly 'practice' and spend years in mediocrity but since people will still commission them they don't 'need' to do much better and acquire improvements in an erratic manner based on personal whim or if they ever bother with certain tutorials.

14.) Shading.

15.) Coloring and shading with regards to materials. Metals, fluids and textures are the high end of detail.

16.) Make use of your free time. Do you know what advantage you have over all the people who make cartoons and anime? Lack of actual deadlines. Certain low end budget anime styles or the basic Teen Titans or MLP design have a certain simplicity. Matt Groening made the Simpsons to not just look drawable, but their designs gained adherence to basic geometries in order to make drawing them on model easier for the countless animators doing the legwork. Steven Universe has a lot of criticism because they omitted this step, making a lot of shots not being on-model, but it will still look good to many people due to 1.) and 2.)... You have as much time as you're willing to use. Pouring effort into works you feel are your magnum opus at the time refines you from the practice and gives you perspective on effort.

Optional.) Now that you have a perspective on effort, you can refine your style to be the right economy between aesthetics and effort you're commonly willing to put into it.

17.) Congratulations, you now have achieved basic competence. You can still explore tutorials for little knacks, or use your more discerning eyes to recognize still existing quality dissonances and more importantly, you know what it's like to improve on something to get where you are. You can now choose to display what you wish to display, and pick the right tools for the job and simplify and increase complexity at will. And whenever you notice something you still don't know how to do, you have a very solid foundation of learning to acquire these new skills.

Do you absolutely need my method to git gud? No, not really. Especially not if you're into fast results that crank out views and fans, and as far as I know nobody has been physically harmed by using crutch styles and whim-based mindsets and inspiration-based work. It's ultimately a side activity, a hobby. My advice aims for the state of 'you are putting focus on the git gud part first' and railroads you into improving technique, but it might feel like a lot of work, and is presented uncompromisingly because it's not the intuition of most hobby artists. Pick what works for you, or balance as you like.

Feel free to PM me if you have very specific questions regarding this post.

[Audax]

1.) People who can't draw are impressed by most things that don't look too dissonant, so there's a base crowd that will be always impressed just because you can animeface reliably and didn't completely fuck up the rest of the anatomy. It's best to tune out your ego's need for 'positivity' in your quest for improvement. Accepting positivity is good when you are pleasing a certain audience, but hobbles progress.

2.) People who can't draw are also impressed by flashy stuff like coloring or shading. This is why you can't trust admirers, adding lipstick on the pig base is extra effort that will be seen, but can distract you from fundamental issues.

3.) People who are significantly naturally talented at drawing sometimes don't comprehend certain struggles, like what is needed for improvement on something they were always just good at. Sometimes it's not natural talent, but a naturally good approach that occurred to them intuitively while it doesn't for people who struggle. Much of my advice tries to rail you to avoid potentially bad intuitions.

4.) Avoid starting off with a 'style'. Simplicity such as ponies, Sonic OCs and generic animeface are consciously appealing designs that are easy to produce, relying on them can mask fundamental flaws. You can use them to feel good about yourself and please the fandom, but unless you plan entirely on sticking to those specific fandoms and need to show off everything you make, it's best to let go of things that seem to give you a natural edge for the end product. Pablo Picasso was perfectly capable of drawing an anatomically correct human, Vincent Van Gogh knew what borders are first before blurring them so he knows how to blur them to create the aesthetics he wanted. Ponies are, whatever you think of the show, designed by someone who knew what they were doing in terms of creating a simple to reproduce, recognizable and aesthetically pleasing shape. Ignoring this advice just makes you into Snapesnogger.

If i was content with the simpler style stuff i would not be on this thread tho, and whilist i understand the rest of the things, i need a method to learn those things other than the books i read and registrations of lectures as they are too inpersonal and i cant judge what im doing wrong.

[KnightleyPaine]

If you're still somehow without help I can offer a limited extent of it since your reply seems receptive enough for my to work with.

Acquire up to which step on my list you've gotten to with competence (meaning you reliably won't screw it up at casual effort).

PM me which step that is, how representative your gallery is of your skill and formulate a goal into words if you can manage that. I'll answer if and how far I'm willing to help and we can go from there.

[merlovinit]

If you're willing to pay money then there might be courses available near where you live. I'm taking classes at my local community college and they're fairly cheap (about $300 for an entire semester) and they're night classes which is nice since I work full time. They even have a class based only around figure drawing.