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Something that I've always wanted to do is to be able to draw. Up until now I've sketched very little, but now I've got a shiny new Moleskine I'm gradually filling it up with inspiration and drawings, and I'm finding it amazingly enjoyable.

Anyone the same? Got any advice for a beginner?

Cheers

sA

Well since I studied Art in school, Graphics in college and now moving to Games art design in University and eventually make it my Career, I'd say practice is one thing you must do a lot of !

Sketch anything and everything, I got all my practice in when I was 3 years old onwards. It will take time for your drawing skills to become clearly better, but don't be downhearted as everyone was at this stage once.

A good thing to do is look around the web, through books, game art and so on to get inspiration material for you to copy from and try to learn basics. Proportion of the human body is a big problem faced by us drawers so get the practice in early ! There are many tutorials on how to get the human body right and so on.

Also explore different styles of drawing, cartoon based, heavy realistic based, sketchy (mine is a sketchy style)
You will eventually find one that your drawing skills fit in nicely with and works well for you.

I did make some posts a while back with some 40k
drawings I had done quickly if you want to have a look.

Hope this helps, and I would like to see some of your sketches/drawings as well.



Cheers
Wolf

Do it!

Advice would be to think about the whole figure before worrying about details.

Try to get the proportions right

pretty much what Wolf said- put up some pics for a gentle crit won't do any harm
above all - have fun.

Practice! Practice! Practice!

As Wolf says look at reference books.

Human proportions are hard to get right first time around but the more you put pen or pencil or brush to paper the better you will become.

I am starting a new sketchbook myself just to get back in the habit of drawing the human figure. Once that is locked in anything else you create will be a doddle.

First was taken from an old French absinthe advert. Didn't do the left eye.



This one was a Marlboro. Got the angle completely wrong but not too dissapointed.

Don't laugh, ye artistes

sA

Heck Laugh !? I think you're off to a great start !!

The human face is one of the most difficult human parts to draw along with the hand and yours don't look too bad at all and with a lot more practice you'll have your facial expressions and angles sorted.

Looks like your also starting to dabble in shading as well.

Generally this is a great start.

Practice, practice, practice!

I'd recommend cruising a used book store for books about how to draw, and doing one exercise from the book each day. When you've done it, start at the book's beginning again or find another how-to-draw book so you can do the same thing with it.

Draw from life.

Draw from memory.

Draw from imagination.

Keep at it, over and over again, every single day.

Practice until you have practiced 10,000 hours.


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smiling Assassin wrote:

This one was a Marlboro. Got the angle completely wrong but not too dissapointed.

Don't laugh, ye artistes

sA

Kinda looks like Humphry Bogart had a love child with Neonard Nimoy...

(Not being critical or anything. It's probably better than what I could ever turn out...)

Cheers guys I have a lot on this week so might be able to get some more sketches down in the meantime. Focussing on the face, some other bit. Also a mit more creative stuff.

sA


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Few ideas inspired by a bit of Fallout. Sorta looking at cloth minorly. This stuff is pre-huge sketching spree.



Likewise. Muscle looks a bit off at the top but I like the tatts.

C&C welcome. Might see if moving drawing to my P&M Log is a better idea.

sA

smiling Assassin wrote:Cheers guys I have a lot on this week so might be able to get some more sketches down in the meantime. Focussing on the face, some other bit. Also a mit more creative stuff.

sA


Automatically Appended Next Post:


Few ideas inspired by a bit of Fallout. Sorta looking at cloth minorly. This stuff is pre-huge sketching spree.



Likewise. Muscle looks a bit off at the top but I like the tatts.

C&C welcome. Might see if moving drawing to my P&M Log is a better idea.

sA

keep going.

Concentrate on life studies and drawing what or who is around you. get in front of a mirror draw your hands or your feet look out of the window.

If you can or want to enrol in a life study class.

Anything you draw from life will be better than drawing from photos and will will give you a better idea for form, light and space. IIRC from my art classes you look at the space around the form you are sketching as well or something like that.

Keep going at your own stuff but drawing from life will give you a very solid platform and an important one for you to draw things from your imagination.

This is why I am going back to sketching stuff in my home and my family just so I can hone my sense of proportion and space.

Things helpful to learn.. Buy books (or look on google) explaining...

Anatomy -

1,2,3 point perspective -

Foreshortening -

I currently trying my hand at digital stuff. Its a hard slog at times as Photoshop seems so counter intuitive but yeah drawing is fun.

Also if you are humble no one will laugh at your work.. Its the arrogant with limited talent that get payed out.

Focus on the basics until you can move onto advanced techniques. I would recommend having a book just for scribbles and warm-up. Start with very simple shape studies; circles, squares, and triangles. Everything is made of these three (two really) basic shapes. Getting your head wrapped around that, will help you break complex objects into simple pieces. Depending on what your goal is, learning how to visualize layers can be very important. Three layers will give you a basic form, like that of a classic cartoon.

Like this...

Your layers will generally be: Structure (using approximations, you develop a very basic outline of your drawing), Outline, advanced (developing form, through both experience, and simple experimentation), Shading/Detail (pretty self explanatory).

Here is a fun blog, there are thousands out there.

http://radhowto.blogspot.com/

Learning how to use your hands to analyze line, also makes a massive difference, if only in speed. Don't say your going to draw an egg, just draw an egg. Much of what makes an artist stand out, is advanced technique that is little more than useless on it's own. Color is a great example of something that can absolutely drive you insane, and sticking with form is a much better starting point. Pick up some study material from your local library, and just pick a few interesting exercises from it.

If you get discouraged, I recommend using that as a way to figure out your progress, and what you need to focus on the most. You'll find that 99.9% of all amazing artists out there, started out drawing complete aesthetic garbage. Some even focus on that, and use the mess as a signature of their style.

Have fun!

my recommendations-based on a past art class
get a small table, and pile some random odds and ends on it (i highly recommend the weird crap that can be found at yard sales and fleamarkets)

now, do a few two minute sketches of the display, see how much of the setup you can capture
next, try a 5 minute sketch or two. Finally, try a half hour to an hour sketch.

now move around, find a different angle, and do it all again.


edit- almost forgot, for a nice change of pace, give charcoal a try

Im a good drawer, i got my picture printed next to the PMs speech in the paper when i drew a poster in Afghanistan once. I always just constantly draw, so i guess practice makes perfect. I carry a notebook around and when i stop for a moment i draw. In school and lectures i was always at it as well. I think if you enjoy it then you will get good. I dont think its hard to do. Ill see if i can find a link when i get home cos im sure ill be on google somewhere, i mean, i was in The News of the World! Thats a top quality rag! :-)

This is my favorite community art-blog.

http://gorillaartfare.com/

Updates are a bit sporadic, but the sheer awesomeness of some of the artists, is well worth the wait.

Mattyrm, you should share some of your stuff!
Maybe we should start a "What are you drawing" thread.

I found my picture on the mod website!

http://www.mod.uk/DefenceInternet/Templates/LargeImageTemplate.aspx?img=GenerateThumbnail.aspx?imageURL=/NR/rdonlyres/CC83FD94-E527-4A4D-86D7-290432589245/0/CATF9TOU.jpg&imgWidth=400&imgHeight=250&alt=Lance Corporal Matt Taylor RM

I love that picture Matty! That muzzy is an absolutely storming effort.

For those of you who might be using work computers, here's the pic:

As the other artists have said, all it takes is a lot of practice.

Work on drawing different kinds of things - faces, animals, plants, water, glass, metal, glass.

You guys are great

She ^ is a friend of mine who saw me drawing and asked her to draw her. I think I did a good job. Captured her personality, if not her hair

Still doing more. I love drawing people. Faces, that's always been my weak spot. I can rough out anatomy, I just want to learn this second how the face works. It's tough but so rewarding.

Thanks massively everyone for the encouragement, tips, and links. Nice tache Matty

My moleskine's bursting now because I have loads of inspiration inside - sadly mainly from the Fallout 3 VDSG which I printed out on nice old paper. It looks special. It inspires me a lot because lots of the vision sparks my ideas, and it's characterful.

sA

She looks nice mate, ask her if you can stroke her wet lettuce?

Thatsa weird thing to say about someone's friend.

Nice btw, better than alot of people, especially as you haven't had any particular training.

Nice Face-fungus.

Some quality drawing in here. Are there any tutorials for drawing wraithlords? I googled it, but couldn't really find anything.

S_P

Space_Potato wrote:Some quality drawing in here. Are there any tutorials for drawing wraithlords?

Tutorials?

I think it's easier just to draw one...



Yeah, it's supposed to be a Phantom-class Titan, but the style is similar.

I drew my avatar.
Does that count?

Hey SP
Just draw a weird skeleton type thing with a set of bagpipes sticking out his/her back. That should do it!

Same principles apply to wraithlords as humans.
Break it down into the various sub-sections; head, torso.
abdomen etc.

Keep thinking about the relationship of the parts to the whole and make sure the proportions look ok.

Should be good to draw because there are interseting forms.
Also easier to draw than the human figure because, lets face, how many do you get to observe walking down the high street?

That is a goodly portrait Smiling assissin. Keep at it

smiling Assassin wrote:

sA

That is pretty good. You should work with something besides pencil occasionally, though.

I recommend getting GIMP for online images. It will only take you a minute to adjust the contrast and what-not.

http://www.gimp.org/

If you have PS already, that is awesome. GIMP is FREEEEEEEE!
Try to start images drawn on paper, with the heaviest medium you can handle. Ink is the best, especially with brushes, but it can be next to impossible to use without experience. When you do a drawing you like, take some flimsy (tracing paper) and make a second draft. Alternatively, You can scan images into a computer, then print them out, so you will be able to transfer the image relatively quicker. Flimsy and Vellum, are an illustrators best friend; those that don't practice with them, will be at a technical disadvantage. PS/GIMP, skips that problem, and gives you the ability to work faster than many older artists.

Here is an animated color-study I did a while back. I need to put together a new sig, I have gotten bored with this one.



This was my last sig, but I never managed to completely finish it. There are way too many layers to go fix at this point, but popping that bastard was fun as hell.

Gimp is good
Found it a bit awkward to use at first, but I like it now.

Except for the name.

I've found that tracing another drawing helps. Gets you used to drawing shapes and proportions in whatever style you are tracing. I used to trace loads of the GW art when I was younger and when I was older I used to trace images in my computer using my graphic tablet.

I'm not the best artist in the world, but I found that it helped me.

Also, drawing a sketch using just shapes (circles, squares, etc) can help block out the main features and help with proportions (for example, a person will be 9 heads high, or their chest will be x heads high, their waist y heads high, etc).

Tracing's not so bad, but you don't really learn composition or proportion as well as building up from rough shapes.

Whilst true, it is a good tool you can use to improve and learn to draw. Particularly good if you are learning to draw in a particular style.

But as I said, I'm not the best artist in the world.

Check out George Bridgman's Constructive Anatomy (free for download http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=131117 here). You're off to a good start I'd suggest thinking more about the masses of shapes, start analyzing objects as basic forms ( cube, cylinder, cone and sphere).

Oh, and embrace learning perspective, don't fight it.

Sites that I find really inspiring/useful:

http://conceptart.org/forums/ (I'd try to point you in one direction here but it all pretty much rocks, tons of professionals posting work here)

http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/ (James Gurney painted and wrote the Dinotopia books, is a fount of knowledge)

http://www.autodestruct.com/thumbwar.htm (Paul Richard's pointers on designing for the entertainment industry. Insightful.)


Here's my (neglected) Sketchbook thread http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=62366
judge for yourself whether anything I've said has merit. I tend to swear sometimes just so you're forewarned.

Good luck and have fun.

SilverMK2 wrote:I've found that tracing another drawing helps. Gets you used to drawing shapes and proportions in whatever style you are tracing. I used to trace loads of the GW art when I was younger and when I was older I used to trace images in my computer using my graphic tablet.

I'm not the best artist in the world, but I found that it helped me.

Also, drawing a sketch using just shapes (circles, squares, etc) can help block out the main features and help with proportions (for example, a person will be 9 heads high, or their chest will be x heads high, their waist y heads high, etc).

NOOOOO! Burn the heretic!

no tracing
Only on your own drafts
Seriously imo it would be better not to rely on tracing.
It doesn't get your eye in. Developing your your own observation skills is preferable, if harder at first.
Also with tracing you are only ever dealing with outlines, and being mechanical will lack character.

Spot on with the shapes though.