learning to draw - 10,000 hours

[lohes]

This is loosely based on the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to master a skill..I'm a complete beginner and starting from 0 hours

[Naidy]

Hmmm. Nice to see another begginer!
You heard of Loomis yet? I think he'd definitely help you with your faces. He's written some bloody good art books. Anyways, Here's some links you'll find helpful in the mean time.
http://www.stanprokopenko.com/blog/2...ead-any-angle/
http://www.stanprokopenko.com/blog/2009/05/draw-eyes/
http://www.stanprokopenko.com/blog/2009/06/draw-nose/

Good luck!

[ancientdrake]

Have fun!

[p sage]

It's good you've started.

A little advice: Stay away from "magic words". One of those is "10,000 hours". Another is "journey" or "artistic journey". The reason is that these are nebulous goals in the end, and because of the simplicity of a simple word or phrase it tends to hide the tremendous hard work required to get where you want to be.

In other words, it's really easy to say "10,000 hours"... and that fact or effect tends to try to brush away hard work.

Get good instruction, and remember to draw for fun along the way. Don't just do studies, or you'll lose interest.

Good luck and have fun!

[MisterBrown]

Good Luck!

hoping to see you progress

[lohes]

Naidy I've heard of Loomis but I have yet to check his books out Thanks for the tutorials, they were very helpful!

ancientdrake Thanks!

p sage aye, I think you might be right about that I know how much hard work it takes and I'm willing to give it a try, so we'll see where this goes
Thanks for the advice!

MisterBrown thank you!

some doodles before I start studies:

[lohes]

Attempting to draw hands

[Leonor]

There's already some improvement in the last hand comparing to your first post, as there's an attempt at understanding structure. Here's a simple tutorial on hands that might help you understand more:
http://cedarseed.deviantart.com/art/...ands-124092168
This might be useful as well:
http://vilppustore.com/vilppublog/20...ture/#more-525

[lohes]

Leonor Really helpful links, thank you

[lohes]

[Sushy]

I wonder how this will develop, I never have kept track of the number of hours I spent drawing.

[maXmood]

keep it up!

i'm gonna start my Sketchbook soon.

[lohes]

Sushy Heh Your work is great!

maXmood Thank you! I look forward to visiting your sb

Updaate!
Went to the library and picked up "The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain". I'm not sure if I buy into the left/right brain malarkey but the "negative space" and "sighting" exercises are great

[mutestar]

One thing that I'll say is that you're tending to draw symbols rather than the way things actually look. For example, if you look at the eyes of all three people, you'll notice that they're the same. This is completely natural, so don't feel bad about it. One of the biggest steps in drawing you can take is to really look at an object and try to figure out what shapes it's made of. The problem is that the shapes are three-dimensional so you have to actually think of them as boxes or orbs as opposed to rectangles and circles.

One thing you can try to do is to draw using only three dimensional shapes. Look for an object around your house like a bottle of pop. Try breaking that down into big shapes (might be a cylinder with two sphere like shapes). Do this until you're feeling comfortable with it and then try breaking it down a little further. Shape is more important than detail.

That being said, I think you're starting to see that already! When I look at the stuff in your last post, I can tell that you're starting to think of these things as three dimensional objects rather than flat shapes. One thing I will recommend is that you look at how shapes work in three dimensions. For example, a circle in perspective becomes an ellipse, but you don't get corners on it like you have in the bowl.

I can tell that you're improving! You can do it!

[AirCoaster]

Keep at it lohes. The key, as Julie G said, is shapes. Big shapes first and progessively smaller as you approach the details. This works not only in organic or geometric shapes, but also in color shapes. The outline of a hand is one shape, the fingernails, knuckles, and shadows are other shapes within the hand shape.

I remember doing an exercise in school long ago, and we had to count the number of shapes that made up a certain object. The concept was to recognize all the shapes, not the count. I am so glad my teacher explained that to us before hand as it made the exercise easier.

So, it doesn't hurt to sit down and pick any object and see how many shapes you can see within that object, it might help with the recognition of shapes.

John

[fenixx]

Agree with Julie G as well. Practice forms, like boxes in different angles. And try to draw what is, instead of what you think is.

Anyway, hope to see you keep drawing and posting in this sketchbook !!

[thebluepuppy]

at this point from what im seeing in your artwork, anything you learn will defently be helpful. the main things i would study right now are fineart.sk this is a link to the LOOMIS BOOKS!!!! they are the best books in my opinion. one thing i would do also is trace photographs. it may sound silly but it helps a lot. once you feel good about tracing photos then move to looking at them and drawing them freehand. Mix some life drawing into this too. also perspective, color, and human anatomy are the best things. well great luck and i cant wait to see some more posts!

[lohes]

Julie G Wow, fantastic crit I agree completely with what you said, I'll definitely work on perspective and 3D shapes later today

AirCoaster Great idea! I will try it, thanks

fenixx Thank you!!

thebluepuppy Heh yeah, I have a long way to go Thanks!

Negative space exercises:

[Leonor]

I wouldn't advise "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain".

Because drawing is not pure observation, you can't make yourself work like a camera and a printer. If you abstract yourself from drawing symbols and try to see things as contours or values of dark and light or negative space, you "print" something closer to reality. But are you drawing it?

Drawing is about understanding, improving on your "symbols", both their quality and their quantity.

For instance, in your first face your "symbol" or understanding of what an eye is was more or less as follows: An oval shape, round iris centered with round pupil centered on it, eyelashes are little parallel lines spread around it.

Which is wrong. That's not what an eye is. An eye is a 3D shape, spherical, the eye lids have thickness and wrap around it, they are not an even almond shape all along, the iris is flat but the in front the cornea is convex, etc. If you understand this and look for it when you draw from life, you'll draw better.

[Noun]

Great, I can see improvement here already. Don't be afraid to start scribbling in some basic values on objects. Even though these were contour studies, as Leonor pointed out it's important to understand objects as forms with 3 dimensions, and not just outlines translated onto a piece of paper. Practicing representing how light falls on objects will help you visualize things in 3D. Breaking them down into basic shapes like cubes, spheres, cylinders, etc. can also help with this.

Keep it up, and don't forget to draw something fun/from imagination every once in a while to break up the work periods.

[CLANLESS]

Studies are great, but even without them, just keep drawing! I remember the 10,000 hours reference. Perhaps you've read "Outliers"?

[lohes]

Leonor Hmm, very interesting points... I can see where you're coming from - I can't see how negative space, sighting etc can help *at all* when drawing from imagination!

Noun Yes! I will do Thanks!

D.M. I will Yeah - Malcolm Gladwell? I only skimmed over it though, I admit


Hands using this tutorial Leonor posted earlier:
(More stuff to come but no time to scan now so I will post em later )

[Leonor]

Huge improvement on your hands already!

[SemperOne]

Wow, very impressed with the improvement on those hands! good on you for starting a book early too!

Don't give up!

[lohes]

Leonor Thanks!

SemperOne Thank you! I'll never give up drawing, it's too much fun


My copy of "Drawing Essentials" arrived! Perspective stuff:

[Marlo]

another good book is perspective made easy its 9 dollars paperback.

[Naidy]

Good to see you're still keeping at it! Not much to say, really, but I do like the last batch of hands.

[lohes]

Marlo I'll look into it, cheers for the suggestion!

Naidy Thanks

Reading Loomis today. Heads:

[lohes]

lalalooomis and hands

[p sage]

Your last couple of updates are looking a LOT better. The volumes you are showing look great!

Yeah, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain is pretty much a terrible book... the information is so misleading. Check the link in my sig on it.

And by all means, keep doing what you've done in the last couple of posts. Get that kind of understanding, and you'll be able to draw convincing figures from your imagination.