Something I often tell my partner who is learning to draw:
It doesn't matter what you draw as long as you enjoy it. When you're starting out, do not make drawing feel like work.
We learn best when we are playing, & while art is certainly a lot of work, it shouldn't feel that way when it's for you.
Just because a method exists doesn't mean it's the best method. Experiment.
My partner is great about this, and changed the way we stain wood!
He found you can remove most excess stain from flat wood with a squeegee. It's easier, less wasteful, & more efficient than wiping with a cloth only.
as the edge of a shadow gets closer to the originating object, the shadow edge gets tighter. blurrier the farther you get from the object. bonus tip - add an edge of luminosity on the shadow
Tracing over references is really helpful for learning anatomy! And copying other peoples art (just for practice) is super common throughout history, it’s called a masters study.
Those things aren’t cheating, they’re honing your skills.
No I didn’t! SUNY Purchase. I think maybe it’s Paul Rand? A pal of mine did like a beautiful little Cornell box featuring the phrase and it absolutely stuck to me hard.
learning 3d is worth the hassle even if you never use the products directly, and is absolutely free. ability to rough sculpt anything i need and be able to rotate it for accurate perspective and keep all the proportions right; taught me form and perspective better than any book or course.
that's a great option too, although much harder imo. i played with air-dry clay for small projects but i find the medium much harder to force to do what i need it to. no precise sculpts from me haha, although i would love to get to enough proficiency to do stuff like these one day
Modeling clay doesn't dry (intended to be used for stop-motion and stuff) and I wouldn't need to use it for high detail, just for poses and maybe rough lighting.
clip studio has 3d model options. you can import a range of their prefabs, download ones from asset store or add your own through "clip modeler" (import tool) that comes with the software. it has also user-generated content like poses, extra tools and more.
not sure how robust it is now, but it had basic obj import. clip studio varies with ability to use the basic rigging to pose stuff, which photoshop did not have.
Hear me out: it is line-obsessive, trying to recreate an image/pose/perspective; like drawing bones when you're intending to render the flesh upon them. Every waver in your line-work will frustrate you.
Spatial awareness is the thing required for drawing what is seen.
Studying may be boring, even scary, but it’s worth it. Being able to call upon certain skills when necessary enables you AND helps you come up with more ideas than just holding an idea in your head until you can get it down does.
The first one is always gonna be the worst one. The Wright brothers didn’t build a 757, they built a rickety prototype for an idea that everyone shat on. Now we have air passageways. Yeah the first go is gonna suck, appreciate that suck, stand on it to reach the shelf your dream is on.
Use grips and aids AS SOON AS YOU NEED THEM. Maybe before. Don't put it off. If it irritates, put a squishy grip on it or wrap it. If it hurts, take a break and stretch. Put cushy grips on your pencils, stylus, brushes RIGHT NOW, because hand health is important to actually being able to make art.
Never point out the flaws in something you made. You can't unsee them, because you know they are there. Other's might never see them, or care about them. You are lessening their experience with your creation by drawing attention to what you perceive as imperfection. Just let them enjoy it.
This has been such an incredibly difficult lesson for me, and such an incredibly important one. I still have to fight back the urge to preemptively "own up to" the flaws in my work, but NOT doing so has helped me hate my art a lot less.
I too struggle with this, and have to remind myself often. I've found framing it as being unfair to the viewer helps. Don't diminish their experience because you are self conscious of your work.
To not treat colour and values/shading as the same skill! It really held me back from rendering well by lumping the two together, and I got much faster once I took time to understand forms and having accurate depth of shadows no matter what the colours are--just in black and white.
Talent doesn't exist, there's no special universe magic that makes you good at art, there's just years of practice & hard work. If you learned to write, you can learn to draw, they're the exact same skill: making marks on a page that convey ideas to others. Go learn to make cool marks on a page!🙌
yall have picked up this thread again and I'm LOVING all the new stuff! I will space out the sharing so I don't bombard you but be sure to check out the reposts
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“Shape” and “form” are two different things. Theyre not synonyms.
(Context: the words shape and form are both “form” in swedish. This art advice made zero sense to me for most of my life lol)
It doesn't matter what you draw as long as you enjoy it. When you're starting out, do not make drawing feel like work.
We learn best when we are playing, & while art is certainly a lot of work, it shouldn't feel that way when it's for you.
My partner is great about this, and changed the way we stain wood!
He found you can remove most excess stain from flat wood with a squeegee. It's easier, less wasteful, & more efficient than wiping with a cloth only.
Get yourself a surface you can tilt.
Be it a tablet stand, a desk easel, an art board, or even a TV tray. Drawing on that tilted surface is FAR less painful in the long run!
I have a tilted stand, I just need to get used to it 😅
Runner up:Loosen up that death grip on your art tool.
Those things aren’t cheating, they’re honing your skills.
I’m finishing school soon and I’m planning on expanding as an artist, so seeing other artists post encouraging words lifts my spirits.
New tools for a new spirit, that’s what I’m aiming for 🤩
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sorry my native language betrayed me here and the naming convention didnt click!
when i still used photoshop it had 3d tho
Hear me out: it is line-obsessive, trying to recreate an image/pose/perspective; like drawing bones when you're intending to render the flesh upon them. Every waver in your line-work will frustrate you.
Spatial awareness is the thing required for drawing what is seen.
🔥Me.
Todays tip: 6. Backgrounds and shadows can give depth and stabilize the figure!
https://www.instagram.com/reel/C6L4x3qL0bt/?igsh=MTd3cnhzbTR3cDVoaA==
1 - work easy to hard
2 - work big to small
3- work dark to light
4- work these in any order
It's going to cost you more than you're willing to pay if you don't.
I have a bump on my ring finger that has always supported my pencil, so that periodically gets irritated.
https://youtu.be/-nuk0kQD_lc
The least fav are those chunky foam grips- those don't work well for me!