Thanks for the feedback! I will certainly try to incorporate the gesture into my other figure drawings! With the measure proportions, it seems all about getting accurate that I forego the flow, but I'll try to balance it in the future!
I'll also be sure to keep up the basic forms practice, it has been super beneficial to my art! Even before doing ART School.
So I was hoping for some advice. I struggle a lot with overthinking. I overthink so much, that I don't even start drawing a lot of times. There are so many fundamentals I want to work on, and I often wanna do things that I'm perhaps not ready for yet, like color.
If I want to do personal work, I've got a lot of ideas and it's difficult to choose one. Even if I do decide on one, I worry that my skills aren't good enough to make a quality piece.
Does anyone have an idea/advice for a practice routine that'll make it easier to hunker down and just do the work?
I also got into an art rut back in September, and I didn't really pick things back up until April of this year. When I started drawing again it was a lot of study and practice. Now it's challenging to start an original piece. Because I've gained so much knowledge about art, I'm a lot more aware of my flaws, which makes it more of a drag to get through original work. Is there a way to get the creative spark back?
So I think this is probably different for everyone and I think i may be changing my schedule but here is what has worked for me so far.
All week I am thinking about my piece for the following week, giving it time to incubate in my head, so when I get to the next saturday I am ready
Saturday = prep day, prep all my instagram posts for the week, prep my references, prep my study materials. Sunday Monday Tuesday Studies only. I do studies based on what my main focus will be on my main piece for the week. If its anatomy heavy, ill do anatomy study etc.
Weds Thurs Friday = Work on piece. I use the studies I have done through the week and directly apply them to the piece Im working on. I focus on having the same process and trying to punch higher each piece.
I don't know if that is helpful or makes any sense, if you want more details just let me know. Thats what works for me. I like doing studies, if I didnt I would change this up a bit. Anyways let me know if you have any questions maybe this is helpful.
@Lockenheim Thank you! And don't worry, it made sense and was helpful I like the idea of studying what I'll be drawing later to maximize the result, a very efficient system! Using Saturday to just prepare references also seems like a good idea, I hate havng to collect references every time! XD I'll try to incorporate something like this into my practice.
I don't know if this is a probelm you have, but I often have too many ideas and I don't really know which one to pick. How do you come up with ideas and actually pick the one that's best?
So I got COVID shortly after making my last post, so I haven't done a lot of drawing this past week. I'm feeling better though, so I got back in the swing of things with a portrait study! Feedback is welcome!
Glad you are feeling better! I often times have many ideas. I typically have the next 2 weeks pieces planned in my mind, so I can incubate them and think over them and consider what I want to accomplish out of them. I just come up with ideas by getting a small thought of something, planting it and letting it germinate in my mind, thinking on it before I sleep and revising it through the two weeks before I do it. Mostly in terms of what I pick to do I think about what skill I want to work on and try to find a piece that would make sense with that skill. For example I wanted to beef up hair and anatomy this week, and last week was clothing rendering. Next week is some different lighting. So mostly I just think of my practice days during the week as practice and the piece for the week the test. If I don't have any ideas then I just do studies, but I really like doing studies so there is that. Id just say pick one and if it doesnt work out its whatever, I have many pieces I don't like but I really just focus on the improvement I dont really care about the piece.
Let me put it another way that may make more sense. I used to do pottery for a hobby and enjoyed it. But I was focused on getting better at the skill, not about making something to take home. So for the first many months I didn't bake anything, I didnt make anything to take home, I just kept throwing bowls and cups and tried to make it as good as I could until it was destroyed. I never cared about taking anything home I just wanted to get better. I think I treat getting better at art the same way. I don't really care about taking home a pretty picture at the end of the day, what I value is getting better. I dont know if that makes any sense or not, and I know Im rambling anyway ADHD take over OK bye.
25 days later
I understood completely, thanks for the advice!
Wow, it's really been a while! First it was COVID, then I got really focused on making a reference for my original character, that I stopped with my art practice. I hope to build better focus and balance between personal art and practice art in the future!
This is a WIP study! I'm working on a piece with a waterfall and a lot of foliage, so i wanted to get some practice done.
This is the piece in question. An artist I follow is holding a contest, basically, I have to draw a romantic date between two of her characters!
This is my dress design for the girl character:
This is the thumbnail, I really want dynamic lighting in this one. Following a tip from Marco Bucci, I made sure the focal point has the most contrast and then everything else more blurs together.
Any feedback on the design and thumbnail is welcome!
This is really cool ! Your drawing got a lot of energy i like that !
Thank you!
2 months later
Snakker here, welcome aboard. Really liking those studies
Cheers
2 years later
Hello! It's been quite a while since I posted... like nearly three years! Damn! Well, with a new year, I've decided I need to complete this course once and for all. Luckily, since I was last here Marc Brunet created an detailed and helpful schedule for the art course. I'll do my best to follow it diligently. My goal is to complete it by May 2026. I haven't checked the threads of any students yet, but I'm excited to do so!
In the past years I haven't drawn much digitally, so this will be challenge for me. Especially considering I'm using an Intuos pen tablet rather than one with a screen display now. Still, this course is designed with digital artists in mind, so I will do most of my assignments digitally! I want to get the most I can out of the course after all!
In January, I plan to complete the first four weeks of Term 1. I will also be doing a digital illustration as a benchmark for my skills.
Just to get a taste of where I'm at, here's a portrait sketch I did a few months ago:
I'm stoked to return to this journey!
Welcome back!
Thank you! : )
Also, I realized I never shared what came of the thumbnail I shared. I didn't end up finishing it in time for the deadline of the DTIYS. The colors are fun, but I still need to work on environments.
Oh it looks amazing! I love the atmosphere, so magical
Hello! I have officially completed Week 1 of ART School. This week was rather uneventful since I decided to not redo most of the Photoshop for Digital Production 1 assignments. All I have to show for now is the pen control assignments! They're a bit rough... especially the circles! It's going to take me a while to get used to digital again 😅 I also decided each day would be dedicated to one specific exercise, then on the last day I do all four to test my progress. Well, I can't currently do that! My wrist was injured yesterday. It's feeling better, but I'm still taking the day off for it to heal.
Looking Ahead:
This upcoming week is very exciting as I get to start the figure drawing portion! I'm also making steady progress on what I call my "benchmark" illustration, but I'll share that once it's complete.
See you next week!
8 days later
I am back for Week 2, which introduces figure drawing into the curriculum. To be honest, I wasn't exactly prolific this week. The wrist injury delayed my start and then my return back to school this Monday ended it early. I've never been good at balancing school with anything else, once it starts everything else goes out the window! This time I'm really going to try keeping on the wagon.
Anyway, I still did some work! I continued with the pen control assignments. This time I tried to take a slower approach to work on my hand-eye coordination. Whether or not they actually look better, the exercises felt easier. The figure drawing assignments are the beginner level ones--practicing cylinders and tracing over photos with the simple skeletons. Again, each day got easier than the last. The first day took a lot of trial and error, but I started to breeze through by day three.
I still need to experiment with the presentation of the assignments. They were saved as .jpgs and boy are they crunchy! I deleted my original files from 2022, so I don't remember how I did it back then. However, what's going on now isn't working. Also, should I move the tracings of the image. It would make them more clear.
Looking Ahead:
The figure drawing continues, this time introducing gesture drawing! The pen control exercises are changing, and I will do five line art studies of my favorite artists! To be more sustainable, on weekdays I'm going to halve the assignment load (ex: do 5 figure tracings instead of 10) and do the full on weekends.
Until next time!
