Eugene - My Artistic Journey

[Gordon003]

First of all, congrats with your college graduation.

I like your mixture of exercises from 60 sec gesture drawings to figure drawing and also practising on charcoal pencil though it didn't went well. .

A particular exercise I should add to my regime is deconstruction with turning edges given that my pose are nothing but flows due to FORCE. XD

Overall, look like your gesture drawing is getting better with showcasing the model action; though you have the same problem as I do with the torso looking a bit too big. . Keep it up!

e.g. I know that that reference regarding the gesture drawing problem. This is what I feel.

Connecting upper torso with face can be involved with a muscle called sternocleidomastoid. You can check out this Force Friday video.

[Sthingz]

Awesome resources you have shared with me, @Gordon003. I will definitely check them out, and thanks again for your feedback.

P.S. It's good to know that I am not the only one struggling with the upper half of the torso , though your art is definitely better than mine, so I'm looking forward to implementing your pointers

[snakker]

Yo congrats on the graduation! And I'm also seeing lots of art gains here, keep it up!

BTW I hate charcoal XD and I feel the pain

cheers

[Pattu_w]

i have just scroll through your page and wow, that some progress right there, good stuff, looking forward to see more

[Sthingz]

Hi everyone! I'm back from my first week without school, and it felt amazing! I had so much time to work on my hobbies. On that note, I believe I improved my drawing skills a little this past week, but I'll let y'all be the judge of that. Also, I hope everyone had a merry Christmas and that the weather wasn't too cold (because for me it was ). Now, let's discuss my progress:

Tuesday 12/20:

• I watched Term 2 - Anatomy 1 until 1:36:51, which is when Marc starts talking about the construction of the mouth and lips. I will finish watching this video lesson today, Monday 12/26, after I post my progress.

Wednesday 12/21:

• I warmed up by practicing my line art and then I gesture drew 60-sec poses. I was not satisfied with how stiffly I drew my first set of poses, so I gesture drew a couple of more poses in a looser manner.
• I finished by figure drawing 5-min. poses. I seldom used my eraser during this practice.
  
  
  
  
  
  

Thursday 12/22:

• This day I didn't feel like studying, so I had a bit of fun drawing a pose from reference. I think it is important to have fun every so often to preserve one's passion for a hobby. Going back to the artwork, I couldn't decide what face to give my character. As a result, I ended up with two versions - one with a normal face and the other one with ahegao. I have an amusing yet very much true takeaway from this experience, so look forward to my Key Takeaways.
  
  

Friday 12/23:

• In my last post, I said I would practice the anato bean; however, what I really meant to say was the robo bean since I have yet to study anatomy. That said, this day I practiced drawing the robo bean from different angles. This study session had no time limit. If I recall, I think it took me an hour or two to fill the whole page, front and back. Nonetheless, I learned a lot from this study, and it also helped me get a better grasp of perspective.
• After I finished my robo bean study, I jumped to drawing from reference. I absolutely loved how this drawing turned out that I even colored it! (which is a first) I believe this is my best sketch thus far. Please, let me know how I did and if you spot any areas of improvement (apart from the coloring, because I don't know jack about it , and the neck. I promise you, @Gordon003, I will watch the video you linked me PRONTO since I will now be starting my anatomy studies)
  
  
  

Saturday 12/24:

• I warmed up by practicing my line art followed by gesture drawing 60-sec poses.
• I then figure drew 5-min. poses WITHOUT using my eraser. To be honest, I did not feel much pressure or anxiety knowing I couldn't use my eraser. Instead, I felt that I was being more economical and confident with my lines, but, as I previously stated, I'll let y'all be the judge of that. After I finished figure drawing, I proceeded to mark the anatomical landmarks I learned from Michal Hampton's book. Doing this taught me a couple of things which you can check out under "Takeaways" in the picture I have attached (Also, if you guys could, please let me know how my figures turned out in comparison to the ones from earlier in the week).
• I wanted to give myself a bit of a challenge and, consequently, drew a model with clothes. I probably spent upwards of two hours trying to get the folds in the clothing correct, but this messed up my anatomy. Realizing that I wouldn't get anywhere, I redrew the model but without clothes (I had to use a bit of imagination for this ). After a little longer than an hour, I came up with a drawing I was satisfied with. Looking back at this experience, I think it was good to challenge myself so I can see where I am at with my observation skills.
  
  
  
  
  
  

Sunday 12/25:

• I warmed up again by practicing my lineart and then I quickly moved to draw the three major upper body masses using boxes in different perspectives.
• Although I felt down given my unsatisfactory drawing on Saturday, I pushed through and drew another model from reference. The result was much better, though it did take me about 2 hours.
  
  
  

Key Takeaways:

• Hentai/doujinshi is a great resource. Wait, hear me out! I am trying to develop an art style akin to that of manga, and so far I just know how to draw nude figures. Meanwhile, hentai and most doujinshi (the pornographic type) display nude characters. For this reason, I think these two resources will greatly benefit my drawing (and no, this is not an excuse to watch/read hentai/doujinshi ) Also, I came across More How To Draw Manga by Kazuaki Morita while browsing Pinterest, and this looks like an awesome guide on how to draw manga characters. I'm so much looking forward to reading this given that I will now start studying anatomy.
• Time is of the essence. The sketch I was most proud of took the least amount of time to draw.
• Boobs are hard to draw . Time for daddy Proko and Mikemegamega to show me the ways (I haven't watched these videos yet, I just had them bookmarked for later, and later means now)
• More accuracy can be achieved on paper than on iPad, at least for me. I find myself redrawing lines all the time digitally, whereas on paper I feel that I have more line control (i.e., dexterity). This is exemplified in my line art where I practice drawing a shape and tracing over it (check the second screenshot from Sunday 12/25). I have a way easier time doing this on paper than on Procreate which sometimes gives me jagged lines. Is this a common occurrence for digital artists? If not, am I doing something wrong or is there a setting I have enabled/disabled causing this? I am very interested in hearing all of your opinions.
• Drawing hands make a drawing POP! Plus, I am getting better at drawing them .
• Although not an actual takeaway, I am happy to report that I took care of every commitment in my last post. Considering I don't have school anymore and, therefore, I have more time to think about what commitments to set, this should now be the norm.

Next Week's Commitments [THUS FAR]:

Now that I will be studying human anatomy, resume reading Michael Hampton's book (try to at least get through the chapter about the head's anatomy).
- Practice drawing volumes in perspective (deforming, connecting, and shading them) as a warmup
- From different angles, draw the different facial features and their corresponding anatomical composition from the Term 2 - Anatomy 1 video which includes the head, ears, nose, and mouth/lips. I will leave the bones, muscles, and fat discussed at the end of the lesson for next week.

Notes:

• Figure drawing from reference will now be timed. I will have 1 hour to complete my sketch, and this will be the norm going forward.

[snakker]

Great job, I never thought hentai could be so … educational 😅

Great work on the stylized figures

[Sthingz]

I don't exactly recall who said it, but there was a very talented artist who suggested learning anatomy from hentai. I didn't believe him until now. What I know for sure, is that he must be a man of culture as well ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°). And I appreciate you dropping by

[Araita]

Nice study session. The only issue I can see with using hentai as a reference is you will have proportions that are already tweaked for the viewer preference which is not necessarily what you need while learning. But otherwise, it's a fun idea
I have a little suggestion re-drawing you have done on Thursday - think about how the neck and head move while looking back - right now it looks very artificial and I think it is also too far compared to the shoulder width.

Good job keep it up!

[Sthingz]

Thanks @Araita for dropping by, and I appreciate you giving me feedback on my drawings. Regarding the one drawing from Thursday, I can totally see what you mean - while the whole body is turning toward the viewer, the neck + head look unnatural and stiff. Hopefully, my head studies and the video @Gordon003 provided me with will give me some insight into how the neck + head moves in relation to the body. As far as hentai goes, that's something I will probably visit in the future - I am already having a hard enough time drawing shapes in perspective. Yesterday, for example, I spent the whole day just drawing shapes in perspective, trying to connect them, and deforming them. I was really messy and, although I practiced a lot, I felt that I had no end goal in mind. Therefore, today, I will restart drawing these shapes but I will only focus on cubes and cylinders, then progress to folds, and so forth. But going back to the hentai studies, I will make sure to keep in mind what you said. Thanks again!

[Araita]

Yah head studies and google will help a lot. Just keep on going Feels like you're getting a bit frustrated (sorry if I am wrong) - give your brain a break after intense training of one thing (it'll practice it in the background anyway) and come back to it in a day or 2 - gives you more space to relax and magically you are also better as the brain had time to process.
Have fun! You're getting better

[Sthingz]

Happy new year everyone! This week I'll be making the transition from working part-time to working full-time permanently - we shall see what happens (apart from having to wake up early, ahh ). On a positive note, I finally tackled the subject of anatomy, namely that of the head. So here's how the week progressed:

Tuesday 12/27:

• As promised, I finished watching Term 2 - Anatomy 1.
• I drew volumes in different perspectives as a warmup, and I repeated this every day of the week (as you will see below).
• I tackled the first topic of the anatomy lesson - the head. I found head studies pretty easy since I had already done them before, plus I already watched this segment of the Anatomy lesson on YT. However, I still find myself struggling with extreme angles from above and below.

I apologize if this image is hard to see. I drew my volumes in pencil very lightly.

Wednesday 12/28:

• This day was not a good day. As mentioned in my reply to @Araita, I just repeteadly drew volumes without an end goal in mind. I became so engrossed in drawing volumes that I ended up with no time to practice anything else. I would really appreciate feedback on a good schedule to organize my volume studies (I still don't have one ). I really didn't think about posting work from this day, but I think it's important to highlight my failures, not just my "successes."

Thursday 12/29:

• On top of my volume studies, I looked at the mechanics of how a cube rotates as well as how cube and rectangular prism connect to each other in different perspectives.
• I gesture drew 60-sec poses with an emphasis on line economy (I want to be able to gesture draw like @Pattu_w ).
• I tackled the next topic of the anatomy lesson - the ears. Similarly to the head, I had already practiced drawing ears using mikeymegamega's method. However, Marc's simplification of the ears was superior, so I'll be adopting his method instead.

Friday 12/30:

• After my volume studies, I gesture drew 60-sec poses and 5-min poses (the cleaned-up under drawings for the latter were done within the time limit).
• This day I studied the nose and, as was the case with the ears, I found Marc's method of drawing it much easier than mikeymegamega's.

Saturday 12/31:

• I took the day off to sleep in and go out to celebrate the upcoming new year.

Sunday 1/1:

• I watched Mike Mattesi's FORCE Friday video about the neck (thanks @Gordon003)
• Following my volume studies, I gesture drew 60-sec poses.
• I studied the last two remaining facial features - the eyes and the mouth/lips. I also made sure to incorporate the material from the FORCE Friday video to get better acquainted with the musculature of the neck and its placement.
• I sketched my first portrait EVER, and I did it under 20 minutes! (I think it took me around 15, but that's only because I had to reference some of my studies - I am confident I can draw a portrait in 10 minutes )

Monday 1/2:
- I read Michael Hampton's "Head Drawing" chapter (from page 56 to page 85) which talks about the construction of the head. The material discussed in this chapter is almost identical to that of Marc's anatomy video lesson, although I did learn something new (check out my key takeaways below).
- I refined the portrait I drew the previous day. Please, let me know how it turned out and whether it resembles the photo reference or not. To me, the finished version looks more manly. It should be worth noting that I did make two changes: I made her mouth smaller and I made her right cheekbone pop out more. Also, I thickened her hair, which I have no idea how it looks like since the photo does not show her hairline, and I added some shading, which I am not very good at (I have no knowledge nor experience in this department).

Key Takeaways:

• Per Michael Hampton's book, the line that defines the center of the eyes is also the line that defines where the keystone or nasal bone ends and, subsequently, where it connects with the upper lateral cartilage.
• The neck is defined by a straight and a curve which may not so easily follow FORCE, and the main muscles to look out for are the sternocleidomastoid and the trapezius, the former of which attaches to the manubrium and clavicle.
• The lines that create the jaw begin at the BOTTOM of the ellipses that define the sides of the head. In perspective, the same applies but these ellipses sometimes are not present in extreme angles - I must be wary of this.
• I need to draw more lightly. My portrait's rough sketch took less time than my finished version! I think that this shouldn't be the case given that I am simply just tracing over my own lines, but please correct me if I am wrong. Also, when gesture drawing 5-min. poses, I found myself pressing very hard with my pencil when drawing my cleaned-up under drawing. Therefore, I need to lighten up here as well.

Next Week's Commitments:

• Read about the anatomy and motion of the sternocleidomastoid discussed at the beginning of the Anatomy chapter in Michael Hampton's book.
• Draw at least 1 portrait a day
• Study relevant facial fat pads and muscles (i.e., rewatch the last chapter of the Anatomy video lesson, "Finishing the Head).
• Begin shading studies of the face.
• Draw a full body pose from life
• Continue drawing volumes in perspective, but re-introduce line art practice as a warmup

[Gordon003]

Nah but in all seriousness, you did a great job with your work so far and congrats with your job transition.

Gesture wise, not sure if you are following FORCE principle but if so, make sure you have a (straight-curve) relationship of human parts to show the direction of where that part is facing/going toward. But the line economy looks good. I'm having trouble controlling my line amount in my gesture drawing lol.

Anatomically wise, like the fact that you focus on volume along with your anatomical study. I'm facing the same challenge and focus more on volume atm. Like your anatomy paper notes too btw. May use it in the future lmao.

Schedule wise, it depends on your past experience imo. For me, I'm playing around with an engineering concept called SCRUM which basically allows me to assign task I should in the upcoming 2 weeks and just focused on that. Much like art journey, it depends on your preference and experimentation is required to find the perfect schedule for yourself!

[snakker]

Great job on these studies, the head can be tricky

Cheers

[Sthingz]

Thanks for bringing up your criticism of my gesture drawing, and it's totally true. Although I try to avoid symmetrical shapes per FORCE, I can see that I include little to no straights, just curves. I don't know if this is a result of the time limit, but I know for sure that I apply this concept more during my 5-min gesture drawings than I do during my 60-sec poses. To tackle this, I will conduct some FORCE studies this week. Thank you @Gordon003 for your feedback (plus I love the meme )

[Pattu_w]

I want to be able to gesture draw like @Pattu_w

You made me smile now, ARE YOU HAPPY??, in all seriousness tho, these gestures of you are looking clean, i like that you're tackling some difficult poses, i usually try to avoid to do laing/sitting poses, they are haard, great stuff all around.

[Pattu_w]

Hey, I was replying to yato's forum and I remembered a channel that helped me a lot when it comes down to gesture.

That one is a pretty good video full of good advices and the channel as a hole helped me to tackle gesture, check it out later.

[Sthingz]

Hi people! Quick update - I won't be posting today. I am going through a somewhat difficult situation so I haven't been in the mood to share my work (I have it all done, it's just that I am not feeling well due to the anxiety of being told I will be receiving bad news this week). Hopefully, the bad news don't turn out to be that bad. I'll talk to y'all soon. Take care!

[mitsuki-youko]

Aw, sorry to hear that you're going through difficult times. hope all will be alright for you

[Sthingz]

Good evening everyone! Thank y'all for your patience while I was going through some tough times. In this progress report (and going forward), I will cut down on the amount of text for the sake of making the content more digestible and, most important of all, less boresome. Here's what I have worked on these past two weeks:

Artwork:

Tuesday 1/3:

• Some perspective practice
  
  
• Portrait drawing from photo using pencil + pen (roughly 10-20 minutes)
  
  
• Portrait drawing of Lucy from Elfen Lied (2 attempts; digital drawing is finalized version of the second one)
  
  
  

Wednesday 1/4:

• Tried simplifying the nose in two-point perspective and tackled shading for the first time using cross-hatching (I failed lol)
  
• Portrait from photo using pencil and contour lines
  
  

Thursday 1/5:

• Tried drawing the nose again w/ cross-hatching, but this time from a different angle
  
  
• Head studies
  
  
• Portrait from photo using pencil and contour lines (I forgot the eyelashes, rip)
  
  

Friday 1/6:

• Warm-up (plus some random stuff)
  
  
• 60-sec gesture drawing
  
  
• Portrait from photo using pencil and contour lines (again, I forgot to include the eyelashes )
  
  

Saturday 1/7:

• 60-sec, 120-sec gesture drawing
  
  
• Portrait from photo (3 attempts; I'll post the photo reference on 1/9) and drew some faces from an anime (it's some Chinese-based anime, but I can't remember the name) using pencil
  
  

Sunday 1/8:

• Drew human facial features from different angles
  
• 60-sec gesture drawing
  
  
• Head studies
  
• Revisited portrait drawing from 1/7
  

Monday 1/9:
- Finalized portrait drawing from 1/7 digitally (took me around 1-2 hours, but I saw huge improvement)

Tuesday 1/10:

• I took a break and, therefore, did not produce any artwork

Wednesday 1/11:

• Drew human facial features from different angles plus some perspective practice
  
  
• 60-sec, 120 sec gesture drawing
  
  
• Portrait from photo using iPad (I think this was the best portrait I drew)
  

Thursday 1/12:

• 60-sec, 120-sec gesture drawing
  
  
• Portrait from photo using iPad (I tried using hatching on this one)
  

Friday 1/13:

• I took another break from drawing

Saturday 1/14:

• Figure drawing (I have yet to learn how to draw hands and clothing folds, so I found this figure drawing session quite challenging, but also very educational)
  
• Portrait from photo (3 attempts)
  
  

Sunday 1/15:

• Drew two portraits from reference (implemented hatching on the second one; nevertheless, both took me several attempts)
  
  

Videos Watched:

• Tuesday 1/3 - Wednesday 1/4: I watched videos on how to shade
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i6JDwEwXJI&t=441s
• Thursday 1/5: David Finch explains how to draw the human head using the Loomis method
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6i6JDwEwXJI&t=441s
• Friday 1/6: David Finch demonstrates how to draw hair
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7L9VJSr_PEI
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7mnrCcCJ3IM&t=616s
• Saturday 1/7: Proko explains how to draw the human head using the Loomis method in a 3-part series
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wAOldLWIDSM
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JC2ZppKHCqU
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P9LOUHmPhS8
  David Finch demonstrates how to draw the nose and eyes
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e_p0GfC9uiQ&list=RDCMUC0-xeMXO_Vu8_wqqKf_Nipg&index=11
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PyPWtIFIzbk&t=589s
• Sunday 1/8: I watched Proko's older videos explaining how to draw the head from different angles
  https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL39135B8D190B7C97
  Marc explains how to draw faces "like a pro" (the biggest takeaway from this video was how to draw the brow line at timestamp 5:40)
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXqU5RKYkBY&t=465s
• Sunday 1/15: I watched @Pattu_w's suggested gesture drawing video (very helpful, thank you; I'll be putting the material to practice this upcoming week)
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NAY5N76VP8M
  Marc explains basic vs. ao shading
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTh9NpGPeYw&list=PLh33PBNTMQJd6NcJuwhJFSK5i-J32zFM9&index=8

Key Takeaways

• These past two weeks I went about drawing in a really unorganized manner. I failed to fulfill two commitments from my past progress report: (1) reading about the anatomy and motion of the sternocleidomastoid discussed at the beginning of the Anatomy chapter in Michael Hampton's book; and, (2) studying relevant facial fat pads and muscles. I did not attempt to fulfill these commitments because I found myself already struggling with what I had learned from the Anatomy session, namely, everything that came before the "Finishing the Head" chapter.
• Shading is difficult, and it deserves more time to be learned. Therefore, I will not tackle this subject until I understand the human face wholly.
• When constructing the sphere for the head, I struggle to determine where I should chop off a slice from both sides to get the side planes of the human head (this was the number one reason I had multiple attempts for several of my portraits).
• I have a really difficult time drawing the lips, especially when the mouth is open. Although drawing a sphere from the top of the chin to the line signifying the bottom of the eye sockets help, I still don't know where I should place the sphere within the skull nor how to determine its center from different angles.
• While it's relatively easy to determine the eye sockets for the eyeballs, determining how much space the eyes themselves should take is challenging (i.e., how tall and wide should I make my eyes?).

Next Week's Commitments

• Focus entirely on learning how to draw the head. To that end, I will read Andrew Loomis's book Drawing the Head and Hands and conduct multiple head studies.
• Incorporate more gesture drawings into my daily drawing routine (60-sec, 120-sec, and/or 5-min).
• Draw two portraits from reference; one from real life and one from an anime/manga (no shading for either).

[snakker]

Wow, you are hitting that art gym hard! Great job.
I find heads are pretty difficult but very satisfying, to do. Loomis is definitely a help, and in the end, the number one thing that helps me the most apart from the basic construction stuff is thinking in planes and geometric shapes, I find them much more easy to manage than circles and ellipses.

Anyhow, keep it up!

Oh and I noticed you tried out some crosshatching, it definitely takes some getting used to. The problem a lot of times is that it can be very time consuming. i used to doodle a lot with crosshatching and one thing that helps start "filling up an area" in a similar shade is to make a bunch of crosshatched squares tiled together and then add the actual "shading" hatching on top. It helps cover larger areas

cheers!