Lately, I've been thinking I might like to take up drawing as a hobby. I used to draw a lot when I was younger, and everyone seemed to praise me for it (although I guess at that age that isn't saying much). I took a couple after school art classes back then as my then art teacher suggested, but they were more arts-and-crafts oriented, and really, I just wanted to draw. Over the years, I guess I kind of lost interest, and now I'd be lucky if I could draw a simple stick figure.
Anyway, I was wondering if anyone knew of any good resources for someone wanting to get really good at drawing? Also, how long do think it would take me to get to a point where I could atleast be fairly decent (provided I bought books on different drawing techniques and I spent a lot of time practicing)?
Anyone?
Easy. Still life, Anatomy, Imagining, you name it. Find what you WANT to draw. Want that like air.
the only resources you need are a pencil and paper
just draw what you find interesting from different perspectives
try to rely on yourself to improve each drawing
what do YOU find wrong with it?
how can YOU remedy it?
ultimately this will lead to artwork that is YOU, which is what art is about.
the time it will take to reach a point YOU believe to be good depends on you inherent talent and actual desire.
from your post i would guess about 7yrs to never.
Draw from life, you learn everything you need to know that way.
Move around. Draw your socks, draw your room, draw gestures of the people you see around you. You learn a ton from drawing people. A life drawing class can help enormously if there's one available in your area.
i had same problem. people kept telling me, and i wouldn't listen. when i finally did, my style grew dramatically. There are only 2 things you need.
1) Just find an artist you like and try to emulate their style. Don't flatly copy it and post it as your own, but you do need to try and imitate it in the beginning. Find more artists you like and repeat.
2) Practice like there's no tomorrow. It's cliche, but practice really does make perfect; the muscles in your hand get trained to get proportions, contrast, etc. correct over time. I cannot stress this enough.
good luck
I had a friend who could barely draw stick figures, one day he told me he was going to learn how to draw ((he sounded really enthusiastic about it)) We were pretty good friends and I knew that none in his family had ever been good at drawing.
Only two years later he was incredibly good at drawing from life.
What took me 5years to achieve only took him 2, and he never once asked me for advice.
Keep at it and draw what YOU want, if you don't know what then draw everything! If you work hard enough You'll get there.
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there are a million how to draw manga books on demonoid.
Learning to draw takes time and effort, and each person learns at a different pace. But, if you really apply yourself (as in, seven hours a day [or more] of structured learning and practice) you can be at full life-drawing level within a month. If you want to take a more relaxed approach, you'll likely be at that point within a few months. Just remember: No matter what style you want to draw in, learn life drawing! The skills you develop in that field will prove invaluable in any style you work in.
>>9 Most of those How To Draw Manga books suck ass.
Good books are:
For anatomy, anything by Burne Hogarth. His text is thick and a bit pretentious, but his drawings are incomparable and invaluable. Dynamic Anatomy is a good start.
For perspective, I use Creative Layout: Perspective for Artists by Joko Budiono, Thomas Denmark and Leandro Ng. It's a good book, but it's by local art teachers, so you may not be able to find it. There are many good books on this subject.
If you wish to draw comics of some kind, get a book that will teach you the art of storytelling in the language of comics, not just a book that shows you how to do a close-up and a bird's-eye view and spends thirty pages talking about inking tools that can only really be learned with practice anyway. I only know of two books that teach this - Making Comics by Scott McCloud and Graphic Storytelling by Will Eisner. Making Comics just recently came out, and is already a classic. It covers ground that nobody else has covered; I keep it at my drawing desk at all times. Eisner's book is much older and simpler, but it too has valuable insights. Also, get McCloud's Understanding Comics as well. It, too, is a classic, and will really make you appreciate comics anew. The beauty of McCloud's books is that they really are a deep formal analysis of the medium as a whole, not just "how to draw manga" or "how to draw action comics." You can use his books for ANY style of comics.
Also, get books about your favorite artists that have interviews and show how they work. My favorites are MANGA: Masters of the Art and In The Studio: Visits With Contemporary Cartoonists.
Get a book about drafting and environmental drawing. It is not essentially difficult, but it takes skill and practice.
Find a class or club that hires models to pose for group drawing sessions. It may cost a bit much to sign up, but it's worth it, and those models ARE standing still, nude, for hours to earn that pay. Even if your interest isn't in realistic life drawing, drawing from models is invaluable to learn how the human figure works. This is as valuable for the manga-style artist or simple cartoonist as it is for the portrait painter. Even if your human figure is wildly exaggerated, you still want it to act like a human figure.
To draw people, learn to quickly draw stick figures that are in proportion, then flesh out their shape. Fill pages with these! Learn, also, to change the proportions of your characters. Draw young and old, men and women, beautiful and ugly, black and white, short and tall, fat and thin, bankers and punks. Learn to exaggerate your figures in any way you choose. This works for animals, as well. If your town has a square, a corner with a coffee shop, or some other place where lots of people hang out and pass by, take a sketchbook out there and sketch people. If it's obvious you're an artist, people won't mind you.
To draw objects, learn to sculpt them as you would sculpt with clay: start out with the basic shapes and work inward from there. For example, for a car I would start with a box that has the proper size and shape, then carve out of my box a hood and windshield, a rear window and trunk, wheel wells, and so on, finally adding details like window decals, a radio antenna and scuffs on the bumper at the end.
Draw confidently and loosely, and draw LARGE. Get a huge sketchpad with lots of cheap paper, and get a big, thick piece of graphite, and learn to draw on paper a couple feet to a side. Having learned thus, drawing small will be very easy. Don't be afraid to make mistakes! You will make many drawings in your life, and all will have mistakes in them. Better to be confident and experiment a bit than to fear your drawings.
Good luck!
I first learnt how to draw by life drawing, or any sketches that were of life drawings. I believe this will give you a more solid foundation than trying to create your own style from a handful of straws, or copying manga.
Anyone can practise to become a great drawer. What natural ability you lack, can be replaced by practise and dedication. I have seen many people who don't possess an artistic talent, but with constant effort, their technique can mature significantly within the short space of two years. How much you progress depends not only on your natural abilities, but obviously, how much you practise as well.
I think I can kind of relate to you in that I used to draw a lot when I was younger, to the point where I won scholarships and prizes. I stopped for about a period of 5 years or so, before I picked up my pencil again. The beauty in learning how to draw is that you don't forget how to do it. Which was what I was initially apprehensive about. If you indeed have a natural ability as you say, then you will find that after a couple of shaky starts, you will see great improvement within months.
I would recommend that you start with black and white pictures with evident light and dark shades. More contrast so that you can define the contours as well as learn how light works. Pick pictures with more gradient as you progress.
If you are interested in drawing as a hobby, a weekly drawing class might be fun for you. You'll get to learn new things, meet new people, and, most of all, get to draw. I don't know if you are aiming to draw from life, or draw from imagination, or a cross between the two, but research the different classes available in your area.
http://shii.org/2ch/2007/10/art.html
Tutorials and et cetera!
Oh, serious, deadly serious?
Avoid a style like the plague. If you become stylized, so you can only draw an eye like this, a hand like this, a face like this, it is really fucking hard to get out of that style and all your art will end up looking the same.
Use different techniques by all means, and draw what you like, but if you ever find yourself saying "This is what an eye looks like" or "This is what a nose looks like, know you need to reassess.
In my view, you should actually avoid artists while just learning the craft of drawing. Have a look at the philosophy of art, find out why people do things as they do, but make sure you are not just growing into a copy of an artist you like. However good Michelangelo is, we don't need two of him.
Other than that, find the tools you like. If you like hard pencils, use them! Don't let any guide (or art teacher) tell you that 2B is the 'sketchers' pencil, or tell you that you can't draw with pens on first draft. I have happily drawn with metal points to good effect. Use the tools that suit you. A good artist can draw a masterpiece with a chunk of chocolate.
OP here.
I bought a book called 'Drawing for the Absolute and Utter Beginner', and it recommends that I get 2H, 2B, 6H, and 6B pencils. But the thing is, I don't wanna waste a lot of money, and if I were to buy the pencils individually, I'd pay a ton in shipping. Now, I could buy a pack that had all together, but I'm having trouble finding one with all of these. And before you ask, buying at a local art store isn't going to work (I don't wanna go into a whole thing, but that's just not going to work) So if anyone can help me out here, maybe point me where I can buy all these as a set, I'd really appreciate it.
And I know >>15 said I shouldn't let any guide or teacher tell me what kind of pencils to use, but I'm not sure what works best for me yet, as I've only really used plain ole' number 2 pencils, so for now, I'd like to get what the book says I need.
Buy a sketchbook and draw everything.
I always wanted to draw, but I also thought I sucked at it, cause I'd never be satisfied with what I did.
Until one day I just drew some random stuff in my desk, and another friend (who could draw a lot and even gave classes at a certain point) said I had some talent and should train more. And so I did. I borrowed a book about it from him, and started studying the human figure, and then copying. I'm still at it since I haven't got that much time anymore, but it did a lot for me.
I studied art for 3 years full time. Lots of good avice been given in this thread :)
I totally agree with >>15. Forcing a style is the best possible way to ruin any chance you have of being any good at all.
Learn the basics- perspective, composition, etc, and spend lots of time practicing them on still lives, landscaped, portraits. If you can find a life model to pose for you, that would be great.
Don't stick with one meduim to start with- try out a range of things- charcoal, pastels, leads, inks, etc, and find out which is most suitable for you. Make sure you're using quality paper which is suited to whatever you're working with- it makes a big difference.
Don't start small! You learn much faster and better when you're working on something significantly larger than A4 size.
Erasers are forbidden.
Don't underestimate the importance of underwork, or get impatient with it.
I could probly ramble for hours... i think i covered the most important stuff.
dude just start to draw again
that is all you need to do
>>15
With all due respect, I really think avoiding copying is the worst thing you can do in any creative endeavor. This mindset is the reason why Japanese dojinshi look like professional magazines, while even professional American manga and tend to look like trash in comparison. In Japan, kids learn to copy their favorite artists from when they're as young as 6 years old.
Think of it this way: if you only look inward when learning to draw, you will only draw the things you know how to draw. When you try to copy something, you are forced to figure out how to draw things you don't know how to draw, and never would have thought of in the first place. When you copy something you like, you break down what you really like and dislike about different art styles, and it adds to the collection of tools you can use in drawing to create your own personal style.
So yeah, I would suggest that the OP copies whatever he thinks looks awesome. It's what helped me the most.
#21 here:
Holy crap, I didn't see how old this thread was O_O;
>>22
Thanks anyway.
I don't think they're that expensive. You don't have to buy top art brands. Just go to a newsagent and buy them for like $1 each.
I don't really see the point of 6H, H, let alone 2H is hard enough. Softer pencils are much easier for beginners (from experience, anyway). Personally, I use a pacer, 2B, 6B and find that they more than cover for all my shades and lines.
>>24
I enjoy 4b as it doesn't smudge too much and I can still make relatively clean/thin lines
and I find changing pencils all the time kinda annoying
is it normal for people to not be able to draw a perfectly straight line
mine always end up curving; am i retarded
No, that's something you'll need to practice. You can start by simply drawing a frame around what will be your picture, say 1/2 inch from the edge, just to warm up. Do this on every new sheet you use. The practice will add up.
Same goes for circles and ellipses. They don't come naturally, you need to practice them before you'll get consistent. A good way to work on that is to do a still life with lots of cylindrical objects at varying angles. Which reminds me, this is something that helped me: NEVER draw a sharp edge on a cylinder. The faces will ALWAYS be ellipses...draw those first, then connect them with sides. No sharp edges.
the only problem is, i've been practicing for years. i mean, i haven't set aside time for it, but i had assumed that i could pull this off by now. perhaps i am doomed for failure
Set aside time for it. I mean a block of at least an hour, preferably two or more. Give yourself enough time to really get down and explore what you're doing, and finish it. While the importance of practicing quick sketching cannot be understated, don't deprive yourself of the skills you can gain from spending extended time on a single drawing and not stopping until you have something you're really satisfied with.
As you keep pushing yourself in this way, the quick drawings will train your mind to put down the most important stuff first and your hands to draw what you think, while the longer drawings will give you stuff you can be proud of and help you explore details and theory as well as trouble spots in your skills. The idea is that with enough effort over time, the two will blend together somewhat and you'll be producing drawings in well under an hour of equal quality to ones you used to spend six hours on.
Bump
Any good reference sites? The Shii site is down.