14R Official Journey

[14R]

April 30th 2008, it will be a day long remembered. Art-Noob here. Besides a strong background in Human Anatomy and approximately 20 years saying that one day I will learn how to draw seriously, no formal training in arts whatsoever. My desire? Have fun with some character concepts I have in mind, maybe do some comic strips, see where that goes (without any professional/financial endeavors for now). Let's start with arts one-O-ZERO:

Chapter 1 - Workspace & materials. I might be moving, but the furniture/workspace will be the same. I noticed most (if not all) hard core artists work on an angle. I tried that, didn't work for me. Back pain, heavy arms, not enough support for my ignorant desires. Is it OK to go flat? besides some more intense light (I'm left handed, might add more than one source of light) I'm quite happy with what I have.

Sketching tool - Just drop me your opinion on what is your favorite sketching tool (conventional or mechanical pencil, red, blue, etc..). I really like mechanical pencils, but I also have a hard time erasing the regular graphite and the red one is not pleasing to my eye. Is there blue graphite for mechanical pencils? What about paper? On my way to the art store for final investment before hitting the basic exercises, just wanted some first hand opinions before having things pushed my way from the local store.

To test my attaching capabilities, here is a picture of my workspace (and also my play station, work station, comm. center, ...)

Thank you for your help. Let's start now.

[Ohaeri]

Hey man,

Get ready for a looong reply because that's kinda how I do things. :^^;: heh sorry . . .

Wow! I totally didn't expect you to make a thread. :D Most people sorta go "Wellllll, I'm definitely pumped, so I'll do it tomorrow" and then never come back (heh--it's what I did for a long time). So kudos to you!

I've gone ahead and subscribed to your thread so I can help you as much as possible. :D

As for working at an angle, I've heard different things about that. My art teacher (for the brief time that I had him) actually turned into a frothing-at-the-mouth loony if anybody so much as slightly worked on an incline. However, he preferred us to work on easels set vertically, which was very very uncomfortable for me because of a tendon injury. Other people swear by working on an incline. So what should you do? The most important thing, of course--do what works for you. You must ALWAYS do this. Yes, you should try critique until you're sure it doesn't work, but once you're sure, don't hesitate to throw it away.

As for materials, I know this sounds strange, but right now a #2 pencil and a sheaf of computer paper are all you'll need. Mechanical pencils . . . I really can't help you there, sorry. xD I screw up royally when I use mech pencils and they do some awful things to my hand. But, that said, I bet if you post in Art Discussion (tell them I sent you so they can flame me if it's the wrong place :D) you'll get a pretty thorough response, especially about the blue graphite. I never even knew there were different colors. :D It's always good to try the sketchbook first though, in case someone closer actually knows :wink: so good for you. :D

As for my favorite medium? Charcoals. Easy to put down, easy to erase. Easy to smudge for smooth value transitions. However, they're messy, and in the long run I've heard it's better to learn how to put bold strokes down without erasing to help train your eye.

If I may also recommend some books, I REALLY strongly urge you to pick up a copy of "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" if you've got the cash to spare. It is one of the BEST resources you can pick up for understanding the crucial first step to learning how to draw--and that is, learning how to see properly. If you want, I can explain more, but I really recommend buying the book over my limited expertise . . . the author can explain things much more beautifully and thoroughly than I can. :) I also highly recommend picking up a compilation of Bridgeman's books on anatomy. Everybody praises him and Loomis (but you can't get Loomis anywhere--he's out of print--so download his stuff online would be my best suggestion :)). You can search for Loomis's PDFs or see them here: http://www.fineart.sk/

Another great resource is Posemaniacs (http://www.posemaniacs.com/blog/). I really recommend starting up using their 30-second drawing utility. Now, I know what you are thinking. "30 seconds?! That's not time enough to do anything!" But it is. It's enough to get down the essence of what the figure is doing in stick-figure form. What I usually do for these is draw a rectangle for the chest, a triangle for the pelvis, lines for arms/legs, and circles for hands/feet.

The thing about this is, that it forces you to go so fast that the side of your brain that usually forces itself on you when you're drawing goes "WAAAH! I can't handle this!" and lets the correct side of your brain take over. Unless you've just really got a stubborn left side of the brain. :wink:

These 30-second drawings, also called gestures, will also help you keep your anatomy loose and lifelike. I hear it's pure 100% torture to have to go back and do gestures after you spend long enough drawing, so I really recommend starting these out early.

Don't worry about how bad they look right now. Don't worry about how weird it feels to be drawing like this. Just draw like a maniac. I recommend doing 20 gesture drawings at a time (10 minutes of work) to warm up.

Or if you don't feel like doing them right now and want to jump into something else entirely, then do so. I just want to mention gestures early because a lot of people make the mistake of not getting into them until waaaaay late and by that time it's really hard for them to change their patterns and lot more painful than it needs to be. And, well, also because I'm a mutant freak and think gesture drawings are fun :D and I'm hoping somebody can come be a mutant freak with me.

I'm looking forward to seeing what you do and support you 100% in this endeavor! :yayca: So I've subscribed to your thread in the hopes that I can help you.

Sorry for the long introductory post, I'm just really excited to see somebody go after drawing with a vengeance like this and I really want to encourage you as much as I can. :) GO GO GO! :muscle:

[Ohaeri]

Also: for those of you who don't know: he migrated over from this thread (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=124526).

(I'm assuming you're a he? I'm a she so . . . I now it's not a safe assumption :D)

[Dave_]

Workspace looks fine to me, comfy chair, pc and a nice desk. And about the 'drawing at an angle' thing, don't worry, its how you like to draw.

Since you want to be a character artist, i'd tought i'd giv you some 'pointers' there.

First, learn proportions. stick figures are the best way for this thing.
Second, add mass. get some (google?) pictures of naked men and women and draw those. muscular, skinny and fat.

And the characters start to live when they have a design. Something i used to do a lot, is get a picture of some neat character (concept) art and draw those, and understand how the armor or layers of clothing work together and fit around the body.

3rd, final and most important rule when drawing, HAVE FUN ^^.

[14R]

Another great resource is Posemaniacs (http://www.posemaniacs.com/blog/). I really recommend starting up using their 30-second drawing utility. Now, I know what you are thinking. "30 seconds?! That's not time enough to do anything!" But it is. It's enough to get down the essence of what the figure is doing in stick-figure form. What I usually do for these is draw a rectangle for the chest, a triangle for the pelvis, lines for arms/legs, and circles for hands/feet.



Well, I would like to thank you fanficbug and everybody else for your time and attention to my first steps. I decided to follow fanficbug's recommendations and did a 10 figure exercise.

I started thinking I would have time to do the stick figure and then "flesh it in"...well, as you can see only after the 5th I changed the approach. Some of the positions were very challenging...the first one, as an example, is a male body kneeling down with a posterior point of view...took me a nice 10 seconds just to figure out how to start.

And, for the record, I'm a he. :)

[Ohaeri]

Man, those look way better than mine. I'm jealous. =p Keep up the good work! :D

[14R]

One thing is for sure: the style that I want is (after some research and investment) known as FUSION (American with Manga influence) and Christopher Hart is one of my strongest inspirations (well, you know, after the hard core people, Alex Ross, Joe Mad, Michael Turner).

After checking the Simplified Anatomy for the Comic Book Artist by Chris Hart, this is my 5 minute, bored-with-TV-and-drawing-at-the-same-time sketch of the evening with some of the main character concepts I have in mind.

[14R]

I finally finished some readings about drawing. I believe it was important to bring some more juice to the table. Now back to drawing. Another 30 second warmup exercise:

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Following the guidelines from both Parks (realistic faces) and Hart (Simplified Anatomy for the comic book artist, I started with eyes:

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My main problem so far is to identify "my style". At the same time that I want to do something very simple like this image:

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I catch myself looking for details and the last thing I see is far from the cartoonish style that I want to head that way.

Any coments are more than welcome.

[Smoke]

Life drawing. If you want to draw comic book characters, fish, birds, environments, the best thing you can ever do to improve is to draw from life. Or the next best thing, good photo's.

Grab a picture off the net with decent contrast, and take a few hours to draw it. Draw it in as much detail as your brain can possibly handle. Don't overdo it or put what you THINK you see in there, constantly look at your subject and draw only what you DO see. Take time over it, labour over it, work on it until you're sick of the sight of it. Then work on it some more.

Then do 30 second poses.

[14R]

This is so frustrating. Year after year, for at least the last 20 years, it is always the same (somehow around the month of May, go figure):

I try, I put my effort, I devote time. I buy the books, I have every single ingredient between heaven and earth to make this happen, but I am yet to progress on my drawing skills. Typically, by the month of June-July, my interest is so low that I go back to something else that I am 1/2 decent at.

My frustrations come predominantly from my inability to deal with symmetry. I can do well with anatomy, I can do well with body proportions, but once one side is created, it is close to impossible to replicate the other side, specially if they are close to similar positions. The drama becomes intense when I try to do eyes.

Besides books (I have them all), what can you recommend me to completely destroy the concrete wall of frustration that is compromising my 20+ year old desire to just draw my simple character concepts that I have in my head?

Now that I am reading this it even sounds funny, but I would like some serious contributions. I have seen some amazing things from this place and I know I have artistic limitations. But I also know I am so far from my full potential that it got to be a method to make me capable of doing more than what I am currently doing.

Thank you for your time if you made it all the way down here.

[.:WoLf:.]

There is a quote: "Tommorow is a disease that will take your dreams away".

If you won't do it today, you'll never do it.
I had same problem 3 months ago. Just one single day, ONE SIGLE DAY i said to myself "i won't draw today. I'll do it tomorrow". BOOM and 3 months passed away without drawing anything.

You need ~30 days to get use to that sort of discipline and only 1 day to break it down.

You are doing this for yourself and nobody else will make you do it. That's why you need self-discipline.

What i would suggest is:
- make schedule. Here is mine (made by myself so it probably won't work 100% for you): http://www.glowfoto.com/static_image/19-004142L/2999/jpg/05/2010/img5/glowfoto

- join our group (Crimson Daggers): http://crimsondaggers.deviantart.com/

- check this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OLN2k0b3g70&feature=player_embedded#


There is nothing more i could say except Good luck.

[14R]

Thank you for your contribution, Aleš. I do have the luxury of time, I can work on a "mandatory" schedule and force myself into it. It's not any different than getting a graduate degree, or working out, or any other field of my personal or professional life that I am quite successful at.

The group will actually be a good guideline. I am going to start it tonight. Crimson daggers, here we go.

Before starting to type this message, I watched the video you recommended. Nothing new there, but it is always good to see our fundamental values reinforced.

Once again, thank you for taking the time to steer my boat into the right direction.

We will be in touch.