sketches, C&C if you please - ~110k

[nil]

this is (imo) pretty much the best forum here at ca.org, its defintiely my favourite to visit, you all are so good at what you do. so i hope im not polluting it too much with my decidedly mediocre drawings. :)
so anyway, Comments and (especially) Crits are more than welcome.

(in the order they were done)
http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/crompton/images/sk040001.jpg

http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/crompton/images/sk040002.jpg
http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/crompton/images/sk040003.jpg
http://homepages.paradise.net.nz/crompton/images/sk040004.jpg

im trying to work on my rendering cause i have no idea what im doing :) im working from photos, which i know isnt good for me, but its better than nothing.
ill probably update this thread, but it might take a while, i just got my first job (40 hours a week) and im still getting used to it :)

thanks fer lookin'

[danteort]

Basically, I would hold off trying to draw the figure until you've gotten a little more used to how to draw what you see.

Since you are trying to learn by yourself, start with some simple objects at home. Before you even THINK about using value (what a lot of people call "shading"), learn how to give the sense of volume with only lines. This is going to take time, and will be very frustrating, but your drawings will NEVER look correct if you skip that step and move right into drawing with tone.

Some exercises to do at home:

Gestures. If you're not familiar with what gestures are, they are simply "high energy" drawings that convey the 'action' and 'movement' of the objects, rather than the form. That is, in 30-60 seconds, you QUICKLY describe what you see in front of you, without thinking about it at all. Spend about 95% of the time looking at the objects instead of your drawing. Draw THROUGH the form; don't outline it.

Contour drawings. This is basically the opposite of gestures. These are intense, SLOW drawings that use a single line to convey the "edges" of the form. Find some random objects around the house, then STARE at them and SLOWLY move your pencil as your eye moves down the edge of the object. The slower the better. You want to capture EVERY single detail of that edge.

Next, work on sighting angles and proportions. Find some simple shapes; boxes are very helpful for this. For this, you want your drawing board perpendicular to your line of sight, since otherwise you will distort things. Take a long stick, or a long pencil, extend your arm fully, hold up the pencil so that it is perpendicular to your line of sight of the objects, close one eye, pick one edge of the box you want to draw, tilt the pencil until it lines up with that edge, and carefully move your arm (without changing the angle of the pencil) towards your drawing paper. Make two marks to note the angle, and connect them.

So now you have just sighted an angle and made a coresponding mark on the paper. To draw the box correctly, the next step is to sight the proportion. Again, hold up your pencil perpendicular to your line of sight, with arm fully extended, close one eye, and this time compare the height of the box with the width. When you've determined the ratio of width to height, make coresponding marks on your paper. Do this for each edge of the box until you have drawn it completely. Always double check what you have drawn on the paper with the objects in front of you.

Now pick some more complicated objects, like a shoe, or some fruits and vegetables. Set them up how you'd like to draw them, and before you even think about drawing the objects themselves, start sighting the angles and proportions. Don't be afraid to make marks on your paper of what you see. These are the building blocks of drawing, so don't think you are somehow "cheating" by doing this. My figure drawing teacher is quite accomplished, and she even sights angles and proportions FOUR ways before making a mark. Once you've got some nice construction lines on your page, you can begin to describe the edges of the objects. Don't even think about adding value at this point. Your goal is describe the object only using line, and if it doesn't look three dimensional with only your lines, then somewhere along the way you made a mistake. Double check everything until you see what went wrong.

Some tricks for adding dimensionality to line drawings:

Use a lighter line for objects and edges that appear further back in space, and a darker line for objects that appear closer. Don't use the same line quality all the way around the objects. Heavy lines give a sense of weight, so reserve your heaviest lines for the areas you want to have the most weight (the bottom of your closest object for example).

Cross-contour lines. These are lines that go "across" the form that give the illusion of the shape of the object. If you want to draw a ball, the first step would be to draw a circle, but to add dimensionality to it (with only line), you can add a cross-contour line through the center of the ball that curves around, showing that the ball is round. Here's an example of cross-contour. (http://www.udel.edu/artfoundations/drawing/crosscontour.html)

Draw with your arm, not your wrist. You want to use big motions when drawing, and reserve your little movements for areas of detail. Don't draw a line with little flicks of the wrist, since that usually results in "hairy" lines that look timid and weak. Instead, draw from the shoulder and use your whole arm, which will give you bold, confident lines. At first, you'll be sloppy. That's ok. If it takes you several tries to hit what you want, fine. Eventually, you'll control yourself much better.

Once you're getting the hang of drawing with line, you can begin moving into value. However, that's a whole other topic, and I suggest you work only with line until you're ready to ask about it.

[nil]

*cough* well, i didnt think they were that bad, guess thats what i get for living pretty much in an artisitic vacuum.
thanks danteort, guess i cant be too god awful or you wouldnt have taken the time to write such a lengthy response. i appreciate the honesty (and the amount of time that must have taken to write :) )