David Anthony's ~Sketchbook~

[David Anthony]

Hello Everyone! Ive finally decided to to make thread for my sketchbook. I will attempt to finish one whole page a day, thats my goal! Don't be to hard on me lol i'm completely up for constructive advise. Though it seems at times i'm drawing and i feel its completely going my way and the next drawing is a total flop lol and you will know what i mean when you see. Ill also be posting my previous works and high school and the ones that i drew before i ever thought of being a artist. I'm 25 and I've been an artist since i was 14, but in the past year is when I have really wanted to advance my skills and go further as an artist and career. These are sketches form this week, and I would really like to know some good resources that i could start to sketch from along with what i see around me. Thanks guys looking forward to getting to know you. Let me know what yall think!

[rem92]

are those your own hands and limbs? cool man, keep it up

[David Anthony]

yes they are lol and thank you very much

[David Anthony]

Here are a few sketches I drew yesterday on the skeletal system. I really enjoyed drawing these. I haven't drawn any kind of bones since high school I was really an exciting thing during and after I was finished. Because I love to create stuff weather it be drawing sculpting it don't matter. Well guys I was just joking you can be hard on me lol so please don't be easy on me!

[David Anthony]

This is a picture of my grandmother I drew a few months ago. It was a test to see where i was in my skills because i had not drawn in a few years. so i tryed this portrait. Let me know what yall think.

[CakeFACE]

The proportions on your hand and leg studies are a bit out (the second picture). Try doing some studies of individual body parts, start by using construction lines to map out the joints and bones then flesh it out

Burne Hogarth has some nice books on constructing muscles and proportion control, I'd recommend it

Your portrait is really lovely though and I love your skull studies, good work

[David Anthony]

The proportions on your hand and leg studies are a bit out (the second picture). Try doing some studies of individual body parts, start by using construction lines to map out the joints and bones then flesh it out

Burne Hogarth has some nice books on constructing muscles and proportion control, I'd recommend it

Your portrait is really lovely though and I love your skull studies, good work

Thank you very much CakeFACE for first taking an interest in my artwork and for telling me what you see wrong. If I would have taken longer they might have turned out better but I really desire to draw what i see pretty fast. and thats what i was doing lol And I will defiantly be trying just different parts of the body.

As for the books, thanks for the recommendation I found a few but wasn't sure which one specifically you where talking about that would help me so I ordered "dynamic figure drawing" by Burne Hogarth it had a lot of good reviews.

And thank your very much for your kind words towards my drawings, I appreciate it!

[David Anthony]

This drawing is probably the single most important drawing of them all, it's not great, it's not even original. but do you know what it is? Was it my first drawing ever? NO! Did it win a art contest? NO! This picture has a lot of history and heartache to it. Sit down and I'll tell you about it.

In 8th grade I began tracing this new thing that I discovered. At first I thought it was dumb but as I watched it, it just captured me and as time would go by I would be obsessed with it (that's another thread). It was called, "Dragonball Z". I also thank the creator Akria, because I feel if I hadn't started watching this I would have never drawn. Ok sorry back to my story, I started drawing whatever characters I could print and trace them. Though I traced them I was very proud of myself. After about 12 drawings that were traced the kids around me were impressed, yet I knew in my heart that I didn't really draw them, and I would tell them, "oh well, I traced them". After awhile I started to ponder where I was going to go with this, would I just keep tracing or actually try to draw something for myself. So I said to myself I'm going to draw a picture and I'm not just going to draw it, I'm going to draw it PERFECTLY! So the picture I'm going to post is not the drawing I'm talking about right now but it is the same image I drew then. I started this drawing and I took it everywhere, to every class, home, church even the dentist. LOL I worked so hard on this drawing the paper became so thin and brittle from all the erasing. I could barely hold it. It took me exactly 2 weeks to draw that 8 x 11 drawing, whew was I ever relieved when I was done, a satisfying feeling came over me. A smile filled my heart because I had done what I wasn't sure I could do.
Well, as time went by, I guess a week. I was in math class sitting next to a friend (who's name I wont mention). We were sitting next to each other. No one else was around, everyone else was on the other side of the room. I was showing him my drawing because we both liked DBZ. I put my folder in my back pack started working on my assignment. When I looked in my bag before we left and it was gone. Panic stroke my heart, all my hard work gone! Where could it have gone? I asked my friend if he had seen it? He just said no so calmly and without care. No one else was around. I knew I had put that folder in my bag! I began to slightly accuse him of taking it and to stop messing around and give it back! He said he didn't know, with a little more feeling this time. Trying to convince me he had no part in it coming up missing.
I began to feel anger rise out of nowhere (if you had known me then, I wasn't prone to anger.) I began to tell him as we left the room, "Let me see in your bag"!! He said, "no" ,and that he didn't have them. I'm like, "Well, if you dont have them then just let me see and it will be over end of discussion". He persisted to say, "No! I'm not going to let you see in my bag I don't have them". So I took things in my own hands. I don't know what came over me! I took him by the shoulders and pushed him in the wall! I told him ever so firmly, "Give me your bag I want to look inside!" He told me to back off before things got worse! So I backed off angry, upset, confused, and lost.
I went home so angry! I didn't know what to do. I just sat in my room and literally cried my eyes out! All the time and effort to draw that drawing. As I was crying and angry, my mom asked me what happened and I told her what happened. I told her, "I'm giving up i dont want to draw anymore." Everything I had worked so hard to draw was all gone! I felt it was just wasted time. My mom just said, "Son, you have to understand something, you really shouldn't give up drawing. Because I know you love it. That boy stole them out of jealousy." I told her that he was going to go around telling and showing everyone saying that he drew them. She said, "Well, your just going to have to draw stuff better than what you drew before and then those drawings won't be able to stand against them."
Well, believe it or not I must give all credit first to God but also to my mom. Because if it hadn't been for her I would have probably given up that day and never would be able to enjoy the talent I have been blessed with. I said all that to say this. This picture I've posted is definitely the same image as the first one I drew. But the difference is that it was drawn way better than the first one, and while the first one took me 2 weeks to draw this one only took me a day to draw. And that when my confidence came and I took off from there and I have loved every moment of it!

[David Anthony]

This is a portrait i drew of a girl in school. It was probably one of the best drawings i did in high school. Please tell me what you think, if you spot some problems and there are i know about them but please tell me what you think. sorry for the quality its all i have left till the owner gets some pictures of it for me. This was from the newspaper.

[David Anthony]

Here is my first attempt at gesture drawing. I would really love to learn to appreciate gesture drawing, but its a little aggravating at first because i know I'm not doing it just right. You know drawing those lines just right and straight and where they need to be real quickly. Well I would appreciate your opinion and help to master this, I'm confident i can master it and I will! But no man is an island. So let me know what yall think so i can take your advise and get better!

p.s. these are also my very first nudes to draw.

[yogeshj25]

This is a portrait i drew of a girl in school. It was probably one of the best drawings i did in high school. Please tell me what you think, if you spot some problems and there are i know about them but please tell me what you think. sorry for the quality its all i have left till the owner gets some pictures of it for me. This was from the newspaper.

I really like this drawing david! You seem to have a nice start in your work. If i could give some suggestions, you need to be more loose with your lines. Especially your figure drawings. You seem to not be thinking volumetrically. Draw as if you are wrapping your hands around the form. feel the form. Think of spheres, cubes, and cones. Also work on your gesture. Look around this site and you can find some helpful tutorials on this material. I hope you dont take my suggestions as an offense, I am merely helping you improve

[David Anthony]

I really like this drawing david! You seem to have a nice start in your work. If i could give some suggestions, you need to be more loose with your lines. Especially your figure drawings. You seem to not be thinking volumetrically. Draw as if you are wrapping your hands around the form. feel the form. Think of spheres, cubes, and cones. Also work on your gesture. Look around this site and you can find some helpful tutorials on this material. I hope you dont take my suggestions as an offense, I am merely helping you improve

Hello yogeshj25, Thank u very much for your kind words. And also on the advise. And i'm not offended one bit no one can improve if there not told. Maybe you can kind of explain what you mean and how i can do what your saying i need to do to improve. Im all for it just want to get better. Looking forward to your reply.

[David Anthony]

i drew this upside down a few years ago.

[David Anthony]

here something i just was working on, and im having a hard time getting those ribs to come out just right. Can anyone help?

[rem92]

The portrait of the girl is pretty cool man, very nice hands

[David Anthony]

thank you very much man!

[David Anthony]

Here are a few more gesture drawings i drew today, just practicing any advise on doing them better would be very much appreciated!

[David Anthony]

Here is a drawing I did back in 2006 for my mom. At this time in my life i was trying to keep my art up since leaving high school.

[ChisLu]

Loved the last two, your lines are getting more and more confident, keep it up

[Randomeister]

I love the poses you express in your drawings, and I can tell that day by day you're making amazing improvements. The only thing I have to suggest is that perhaps you work on making your lines more concrete and not so messy?

[depingo]

As other people already mentioned, you should probably work on your lines a bit. Try to draw just one solid line instead of scratching over the same area multiple times. It might be intimidating at first because you'll have trouble getting it right, but it'll get better with practice.
A good technique for that is to look at exactly what line you want to draw next, then try to imagine it as clearly as possible on your sheet of paper. Basically just think about what you want to put down before you do it, rather than trying to find the form while you are drawing it.
I hope that made sense ^^;

Anyway, you've definitely been improving a lot, so keep at it!

[David Anthony]

ChisLu - Thank you very much i really do try. and i will!

Randomeister - Thank you yes i will work harder on that. Thats all i want to do is to improve.

depingo - Thank you for your advise on my lines, i will definatly be working harder to get it right. I tell you im having a hard time with gesture id love to get it down but im so used to being steady and slow and using my eyes to measure out and map my drawings then just quickly jot down a gesture, it may seem weird but when i try to gesture draw i really feel like im wasteing time and paper. i dont know if any one else feels this way? I will still continue to work on it and pray i master it. And i do believe i understand.

[artchina]

pencil works ,so nice .thanks for sharing.

[Ghast]

for the figure studies avoid the chicken scratch line. be confident and get those curves in one gestural sweep as oppose to a hundred tiny marks. Also, ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS think of the underlying structure. The structure of the woman laying back is pretty good (you can see the ribs, the hips, etc.) but your figures will greatly improve if you think about the direction of the spine, and the angle of the shoulders and hips. You'll find your figures will look a lot more proportional if you think along these lines

[David Anthony]

for the figure studies avoid the chicken scratch line. be confident and get those curves in one gestural sweep as oppose to a hundred tiny marks. Also, ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS think of the underlying structure. The structure of the woman laying back is pretty good (you can see the ribs, the hips, etc.) but your figures will greatly improve if you think about the direction of the spine, and the angle of the shoulders and hips. You'll find your figures will look a lot more proportional if you think along these lines

Hello Ghast, Thank you much for advice. Yes i will def work on that you will have to excuse those gestures I've been an artist for a long time but never messed with gesture drawing to help set up my drawings, but while i was researching on it i was misinformed about how to draw it quickly and so thats why those are like that. I researched it a little more and found out its just like you said to draw in one sweep. And i will def put your advice to work. I only want to get better.

[David Anthony]

Its about an Hours worth of work. Needs alot more work, so i will update later tonight after i work on it some more.

[David Anthony]

Its been a while since I've posted. Will be trying to post everyday again. Please give your feedback, don't be easy on me! Here are a few quick sketches I drew yesterday. Thanks everyone!!