Window into my Brain

[isokarhu]

I'm done the bones of the arm and hand! Next up is the pelvis and leg.
This anatomy project is tedious as all hell... effective, though.

I drew some hands this morning too. (skin and flesh included, heh)

[§Hy9oD]

Took a look through your sketchbook ,got nice charcoal and chalk drawings! the girl is awesome . just keep those anatomy studies Im sure you'll get better.
KEEP PRACTICING

[kitfox]

Hello!

Your ability to render is really good. Nice surface anatomy on the last set of hands, and the toned paper sketches with charcoal and chalk are very nice.

Your life drawings seem to suffer from bad proportions. When you're doing your anatomy studies, are you constanly marking down and measuring proportions? If not, start doing it. Measuring proportions and learning to remember them is much more important than learning the names of all the bones and muscles. When you learn all of it, it's just going to be obvious that they are there, so the names really aren't important. Just make sure you learn to remember the proportions and relationships between bones and muscles.

Keep it up!

[isokarhu]

Thanks for the support from those who have posted replies!

Kitfox, thanks for the advice. You're right, I should really take a closer look at proportions and try to commit them to memory. As for the bit about learning anatomical names for everything, I've sort of been waiting for somebody to point that out. I realize that it's not important to know all the names, at least not for drawing purposes. My reason for doing such detailed/labeled studies is that I'm trying to learn this stuff partly for general interest and partly for school (I'm a biology student). Of course, the names are just arbitrary labels we've placed on body parts. Knowing them has little effect on my ability to draw them, but I still wish to know this stuff for a better/deeper understanding of anatomy as a whole. The way I see it, if I'm going to draw all of the bones and muscles, I might as well slap the names on while I'm at it and maybe actually remember a few.

Anyway, I think I'm overdue for an update... so here's something.

The first one is a quick study of a monkey.. I got tired of it pretty quick so it's not nearly finished.
The second one is a couple of skulls I drew using my plastic skull for reference.
The third one is a photo study of a cat done with charcoal/chalk on greyish blue paper. That one definitely took several hours, though I'm not sure exactly how many.. maybe 3.. ish?

[isokarhu]

Well, I stayed up way later tonight than I expected. I was determined to finish this thing.. and I'm quite happy with the way it turned out. It's another charcoal/chalk drawing on grey paper. This one's a self portrait, and I think it actually looks quite a bit like me. Huzzah!

Here's a link to the reference photo: http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/822/024rwc.jpg/

[Jr.Molcak]

hi, the latest portrait is very nice. Is it based on photo ref? Obviously you have a patience for the details. My suggestion would be to use less rendering on studies from time to time and focus more on shapes to define the subject. Keep on drawing.

[isokarhu]

Thanks Jr.Molcak. Yes, the portrait was photo reffed. I added a link to the photo in my last post if you'd like to see it.
I totally agree with your advice. I spend way too much time and effort obsessing over minor details. In the time it takes me to do one painstakingly detailed study, I could do ten rough sketches of the same thing and end up understanding the form of whatever it was ten times better. All I'm learning rendering all this detail is how to render lots of detail... not necessarily such a bad thing but I think I need to know more than that, yes? Note to self, focus on the big picture!

That said, here's some more of my detailed bone drawings! hah

Also a lizard done with pen/watercolor. This is my first stab at this medium and I quite enjoyed it. I think it came out kind of messy and I overworked it with the pen but I'm still pretty happy with it. This certainly won't be the last watercolor you see from me... unless of course you don't return to my sketchbook. In which case, shame on you.
=)

[Delay]

first of all thanks for stopping by my sb great studies going on here
i realy love your rhino from the first page! keep it up

[m0uS3r]

wonderful studies, very inspiring

[isokarhu]

Thanks Delay and m0uS3r!

Here's something a little more imaginative (though I did use some reference, especially for the bear). I'm new to having color as part of my arsenal, so this piece was pretty much about playing with color. I'm not crazy about the end result but it was fun to paint. The lighting is off I think... the bear's shadow isn't right.

[Lightpunk]

Hi Isokarhu - thanks for stopping by my sketchbook! You have some nice stuff here, solid pencil rendering on those studies - keep at them, and keep drawing from the imagination too! Good luck, will stop by again!

[towy]

good studies keep it up : ]
and you can use ref on my pictures of course

[thegrayslayer]

There are some nice works here. I think the life drawing is slightly weaker, but I believe that is the area you can learn most from. There's nothing better for observation skills / drawing the human form and it will feed back in to everything you do. Good skills, keep them coming.

~Slayer

[habrok]

You seem to be improving really quickly! Wow.

You have nice studies. Keep it up! Can't wait to see where you're at in a page or two.

[isokarhu]

Thanks for the encouragement everyone!
thegrayslayer: You're right, my life drawings are a weak point. I think it might have something to do with there being a time limit. When I'm doing a photo study, I have a habit of correcting the drawing over and over until it looks good and I'm satisfied (often takes a while). With a live model and limited time for each drawing, I don't have that luxury. That's probably a good thing.

Here's some new stuff. I'm trying to do quicker, messier, looser drawings. It's not going that well so far... hah
More studies and some doodles.

[Overworlder]

Great stuff, bro. Your photo studies are definitely better than mine. Guess I don't quite have the same patience and eye for detail.

[isokarhu]

Thanks Overworlder! Please convey my warmest regards to the overworld and all of its wonderful people and creatures.

More studies. I picked up some conte and I'm quite enjoying it.

[kidult]

Your doing great on your studies, don't forgot to try some things you studied from memory. Learn and apply!

[mariposa213]

Wow, I see so much improvement in these sketches! Some very polished finished works on the colored paper as well. Keep on doing the studies, they're really paying off!

I like your faces done without reference, because they are so diverse in their looks. I see some improvement there too.

Overall you're doing wonderfully!

[isokarhu]

Here's my last update until late November. I'm leaving the country and will have little to no access to a computer and/or scanner so this thread will sit stagnant for awhile.
It's only one image, done in photoshop. I did this for one of the daily sketch group threads. The topic was: "child is really too small to wear mechanical armored suit."
Bear in mind that I'm still a total photoshop noob and I've never before drawn any kind of walking mech.

Bye for now!

[Overworlder]

Nice mech. I like the big water-colory splotches. I do feel like there's a bit of a discord between the clean lines on the counter/cabinets vs the hand-drawn lines on the mech/child.

[isokarhu]

I'm back!
I was pretty busy for most of my trip so I didn't have much time to draw, but here's what little I did.

1. Sketches at the airport
2. I spent a lot of time in front of this statue every day for 26 days.. I became quite fond of it and decided to draw it
3. Tree monster inspired by a piece of driftwood
4. =/
5. hands!

[billakong]

Nice sketchbook. Amazing hands! I love the water color! The bear could use some shade on his right foot, but I think it's still a cool picture. Cookie robot, lol.

[Istmin52]

I can definitely see improvement in your work but tend to notice your faces are a bit wrong proportionally and seem flat. Especially in the eyes. I think it's because you outline the eyes really dark. Your anatomy studies are good and I disagree with something that was said above. You should learn the names of the muscles and bones. Not all of them but the major ones. Knowing the names is important because it does help you understand how they look from different angles when looking at an anatomy book. I don't know. Learning the names did help me.

[isokarhu]

Thanks for coming by Istmin and billakong.

Istmin: Hm, fix proportions and remove eyeliner. Noted. Thanks =)
I think faces are a weak point for me. I see so many people that can convey so much character and emotion with such simplicity... here I am shading and agonizing away and coming up with.. well, you know.
Also, I've yet to have a good look at the muscular anatomy of the face. Some time soon I think.

Speaking of muscular anatomy, here's some muscular anatomy.
Cats too.

See? I still draw sometimes!

[isokarhu]

Bird head studies and dragons.
Every wanna-be fantasy artist has to draw some dragons once in a while right??

[Istmin52]

I like the angle you chose for the last dragon drawing. I would say you can push the lights and darks some more. I know you were doing the shading quickly but there are about two tones so it appears flat.
There's actually a really good animal drawing book called The Art of Animal Drawing by Ken Hultgren. He was a disney animator and draws animals from insane angles. It's really cool.
Anatomy studies are always helpful but try to really understand the skeleton so you know how the muscles work. I know you did some skeleton drawings before but keep doing them. It will def help in the long run.

[Blueflies]

Well I love your rendering skills, there is so much rich texture there that draws the eye in! Definitely agree with some of the other comments about figure drawing proportions, etc. I would recommend doing some studies with the Loomis mannequin type bodies and get familiar with how those move and behave. If you combine that proportional knowledge, your knowledge of the human anatomy and your rendering skills I think you'd be unstoppable. I'll give you a piece of advice that I've received a couple times myself for my own figure drawings since you seem to go about them the same way I did. You don't really want to be in the habit of drawing the full outline and then just shading the inside. Instead, knowing the construction of the body, rough out the proportions using a simplified form to nail it down before moving on. Then also be aware of the weight of your lines and how their thickness or thinness can convey form, etc. You wouldn't want to have an arm, for example, that's being lit with a strong highlight have a thick pencil outline.

Ok, that was longer than expected. We're all here to learn and I really like the direction you're going!

[isokarhu]

New semester, lots of stuff to do, but also new life drawing sessions.

[SoulReaper]

Love your studies and those latest ones are lookin' pretty good. Keep up the great work!