What to do when practice doesn't make perfect?
Looking for thoughts and tips on this.
Basically, I've been doing life drawing every day for about 6 months now, and went to weekly classes for a couple of months before that. I do it mainly for fun, to improve my appreciation of anatomy, and I suppose with the hope of one day translating it to my 3D work.
The thing is, I'm not noticing any improvement and that leads me to believe I'm either going wrong in my approach, or missing some key techniques.
My daily routine is usually 10 mins of 30 sec and 2 minute gestures, then a couple of 5 mins, then a few 10 minute poses which I will finish up a bit if 10 minutes isn't adequate.
I partner this sketching with studying anatomy too.
I thought i would just improve over time, but I'm really not, like not even slightly, my stuff looks the same as it did 6 months ago.
Basically, I've been doing life drawing every day for about 6 months now, and went to weekly classes for a couple of months before that. I do it mainly for fun, to improve my appreciation of anatomy, and I suppose with the hope of one day translating it to my 3D work.
The thing is, I'm not noticing any improvement and that leads me to believe I'm either going wrong in my approach, or missing some key techniques.
My daily routine is usually 10 mins of 30 sec and 2 minute gestures, then a couple of 5 mins, then a few 10 minute poses which I will finish up a bit if 10 minutes isn't adequate.
I partner this sketching with studying anatomy too.
I thought i would just improve over time, but I'm really not, like not even slightly, my stuff looks the same as it did 6 months ago.
Replies
C) Sean, also, is totally right. Especially with anatomy practice, it's huge to be give and get critiques from other artists in the same sessions. Not everyone is willing to do this, sometimes it's enough just to check out other people's work at the session and see how they tackled the forms, what looks right or wrong in their work, and compare it to yours.
Ok, I'll up the time I do it, and squeeze in some shorter sessions whenever I get a few mins.
I think the key though is as you say, lack of critique. I don't really get crit from anyone. Unfortunately none of my friends/colleagues are into figure drawing or anatomy so I don't get much help from them, and while I did have a sketchbook on here some time ago, I don't seem to get much attention. I don't blame people, I guess if something isn't 'terribly crap' or 'amazingly awesome' then people tend to not have much to suggest.
So yeah, I haven't really been getting feedback which is obviously a big barrier to improvement.
Would anyone be interested in some kind of sketch group thread thing where we can crit each others work? If there's a kind of organised group then feedback would be consistent and hopefully we could see ourselves, and each other improve.
6-8??!! Do you sleep?!
I could definitely get 1 1/2 - 2 hours in and a few short sessions but 6-8, no chance!
Cheers for the link D1ver, all the times I've been to Bens site, I've never read that paper!
I think as others have said you just need to spend longer, its like the longer you spend studying something the more you notice things about it, and the more you notice things that are wrong in your painting . You have to look for a long time because some thngs are really hard to see.
I think you're shooting your own feet. Even if you are uber-talented and experienced artist your skills will degenerate pretty quickly if 10 minute sketches is all you do.
You need to invest your time and effort doing proper 1-2 hour studies.
As for critique - I don't know. Doodle is a doodle - a quick way to record something on paper. Not very much to crit.
It does seem a bit silly now thinking about it, I just had it in my head that repeated short studies would 'drum it in', but clearly they're not. It's just a shame it took 6 months and a thread on here for me to figure that out.
I think too many people get caught up in copying what they see instead of studying it.
When you study, reference should be treated like the answer key to a set of math problems, it's there to help you get the right answer. If all you do is copy the answer, you'll learn really slowly, you have to analyze the problem and know why the answer is right before you can actually apply it yourself.
Everything you do in life should be a "sketch".
What is a sketch? A sketch is a PROBLEM SOLVING TOOL. Its a small failure, made quickly, so that you can not do that again.
If you want to get good, get really good at failing as fast and and as often as possible, and think carefully about the failure and what you can learn from it, and then move on as quickly as possible so you can fail again and learn something new.
You as a human being is what your solving for, and your way to complex to just "figure out". Instead you have to test, iterate, sketch, fail, and then take notes and make theories about what works best for you. Do this quickly, and deduce useful lessons from your failures.
Also, mix up the magnitute of your failures. Make a whole bunch of similar (but not identical) little failures to solve small problems. Then every once in awhile try "medium sized failures" (take on a bigger project than you have ever done maybe), and then also try big things like making life changes (moving, dumping your girl, getting a girl, getting rid of the cat, whatever, whatever makes sense to you in the context of your lessons learned.
Be ruthlessly objective, only keep what works, and you WILL IMPROVE.
And don't stress out about it either dude. Life is a journey not a destination. Things dont get better or worse as you get older. They just get different, they change, and you change. Just try to be happy and productive with the time that you have.
Also these are very useful links:
Learn from your failures by simplifying and isolating the problems involved:
http://www.superrune.com/technical/tutorial_breakdown.php
Use this to "think out side the box" or "meta think" if you are stuck in a mental rut:
http://classics.mit.edu/Tzu/artwar.html
Examples of this philosophy in practice:
http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=138102
A good read for those struggling to find the will to work:
[ame]http://www.amazon.com/Art-Fear-Observations-Rewards-Artmaking/dp/0961454733[/ame]
Another good thread:
http://www.polycount.com/forum/showthread.php?p=1354346#post1354346
1. longer sketch/drawing sessions are needed, even try to squeeze in doodling or sketching when out and about or before bed or something
2. crit's help huge!
3. Bibendum say it right, don't just copy. So many times i keep seeing people just trace over poses on google and 'make' their character around the traced image. This will hinder you, it's one thing to ref, it's another thing to exactly copy or trace.
Now i know people who 'mimic' certain styles to get a feel for it; like blizzard art, or etc when applying to studios and such. And sometimes they start off by drawing over the images to get a feel for the style. but definitely not an all time thing.
4. and this is from me, don't give up! I hit that hurdle too about a year ago, where my art just looked the same or i was stuck in one style. I dedicated more time to my art development, took life drawing classes, and practiced at home. I'm still not at the level i'd like to be, but i can see a huge improvement from work i even did 6 months ago until now.
But my drawing sessions are minimum an hour a day. And it's not always just 'sketch this, sketch that' it's usually something specific like 'i'm going to practice doing hands this week, or colouring the next, or facial drawings'. things like that.
Lol, I put in 8-12 hours a day, 4 days a week into an indie project, and work a fulltime job the other three
Its all about the commitment baby!
I don't believe that just practicing is enough. As if just doing the thing repeatedly will somehow make you better. There's a reason for it. It's not arbitrary.
What I need are goals. I could sit there for hours mindlessly drawing figures over and over again and learn nothing. Or I can come up with a goal, and sit there for 20 minutes and learn a ton.
I set myself very specific goals. Like say, "learn how the Sacrospinatus affects the surface of the Latissimus Dorsi from the back". Or better yet, "learn what makes the Latissimus Dorsi form the shape that it does". This will fire me off on a journey of research. One which does require sitting down and practicing repeatedly. But it could entail a study, a sculpt, a painting, or any number of things.
I truly believe that if you make a mental checklist of things you want to learn about, then start checking them off, you couldn't avoid making progress even if you wanted to.
As for life drawing, the best thing it's good for (just for me personally) is to study shapes. Keeping in mind stuff like "what kind of shape does the leg form?" and "what kind of negative-space shape can I see with the shoulders?" helps me out tremendously.
My 2cents.
Where are the drawings ?
Don't feel bad, people spend a lifetime trying to master something like this.
Quick sketches are nice, but you should do more polished stuff. The ability to see form and render it convincingly is something that you'll pick up with more detailed drawings. Then you'll figure out how to represent these things in shorthand form for quicker sketches. Anatomy is obviously important, but don't get too hung up on particulars at first.
Don't just do life drawing. Copy some photos or favorite drawings of artists you admire where you aren't pressured in "performing" on the spot. I think too many people jump into life drawing without really understanding drawing or what makes a successful picture first.
Get your hand and eye to work freely together to develop speed and accuracy. Even if you're not truly confident, making your marks more confident will help sell the image to the viewer and it will help you focus on capturing an image that is more lively and less sterile.
chances are that if someone is really passionate about art they get interested and learn art from an early age when learning is easier on the brain. if a person tries to become an artist all off a sudden then it is very difficult to do that. there can be exceptions as well.
when someone is passionate about art they also usually spend lot more time researching art and work hard to get good at it. this is a observation and there are exceptions.
i have seen many people who complain about not improving but I also see them spending hours after hours in bars and getting high. it takes seriousness and dedication. although, getting high while making art can be interesting in some cases.
finaly, not everyone is art minded or genetically equiped to create good art. there are theories that people who use more of their left brain are less visual and more technical.
however, if you have the passion then i believe any thing is possible. what do you visualize yourself doing 10 years from now ?
Pior - I chose not to post any examples because I didn't want this to look like an attention seeking post, or to get specific feedback on my drawings but rather a possible explanation for my lack of improvement, which has been found. I will get a thread set up dedicated to it though.
And thanks to everyone else, some great feedback and hopefully others will find some of it helpful too.
Still plenty of room for improvement, but man, who knew that I was going so wrong!
+ [ame="http://www.amazon.com/Animators-Survival-Kit-Richard-Williams/dp/0571202284"]animators survival kit[/ame]. Try to apply the ideas written in these books and you'll improve even faster.
Also, 6 months is no time at all dude. Looking at people's sketchbooks over at conceptart.org and other places I think 1-3 years is a more reasonable timeframe to go from zero to decent. But then again, those guys are training a lot of different skills (values, color, design, compositon etc). If you want to become an animator you should probably mainly focus on gesture drawing: hence my vilppu recommendation.
Well, I'd like to be an artist as much as id like to be an animator, so any of those guys books will be useful. I've got the Loomis books. I prefer his books on the head/face than his books on the body/figure but I find Bridgman/Bargue work well for me.
Im not familiar with Vlippu though so I will check that out.
I kindof skimmed through the thread but one can tell a few things from that life study you just posted.
It's actually not very good (I am not trying to be mean - it's just that being honest is more useful than patting
Which makes me think that the person teaching you might not be spending enough time on theory, just letting students do whatever they want. I had that type of teacher before - it's good for exploration, but the whole term shouldn't be taught only this way. I think the best ratio would be 25% exploration, 75% hard theory put to practice. Just my opinion.
Here are a few principles you can apply to a medium-length study like above. I personally like to warm up with a very quick gesture drawing anyways - like, a few seconds long - to get the gist of the pose first. Then :
- Start by marking the outer edges of the enveloppe of the figure on the paper, and stick to them (top, bottom limits, other landmarks sticking out, middle line). This is your composition within the bigger area of the whole page.
- Identify the horizon line of the scene as early as possible, and relate everything to that (this is often overlooked because it is located outside of the figure and a majority of students just forget about it.)
- Place a few more landmarks to lock in strong elements of the figure.
- Keep the lines loose. After all, they dont really exist in nature.
- When it comes to light and shade, identify the boundary between the two as if you were making a black and white stencil cutout of the figure. Mark that line gently. Then, while working within these two antagonistic surfaces, remember that even the brightest dark should never be brighter than the darkest bright. It's all over the place on your piece. Thats because the eye gets tricked while looking at a shadow area, noticing cool rimlights, and thinks, holy shit that's bright!! But in reality, compared to the other bright surfaces of the figure, it really isn't.
Oh and on e more thing : chose your subjects wisely. Not every calendar chick picture is good for life study. There is a specific lighting setup to get right, and this alone is a huge part of a successful study.
That was easy!
You're correct in assuming my life drawing teacher doesn't give much instruction. Almost all of my actual learning has come from books. I basically only go to the classes to draw, and don't expect much in the way of tuition,
I'll try the exercises you've outlined, I can see how they will help, but I must admit I've never tried working that way, it's always just kinda straight-ahead 'rough out an armature skeleton and go to town on the shading'.
Thanks again, I'll post a sketchbook tomorrow rather than turn this into a WAYWO.
Get hold of the PDF for Loomis' How to Draw the Head and Hands. His head drawing technique is really good for understanding the basic forms of the head. Bridgman's construction drawings are very useful too.
The thing is, drawing structurally (from "bones to shading") can develop interesting analytical skills, but in the end one still needs to think of every study as a 2D composition on flat paper. Therefore, silhouette and separation of value is what matters.
Check this out - not a single line, not a single area of "smooth blended shading" in the video below. Its all about clean cut masses of light and shade. Now of course for a full figure you need more structure - but don't be fooled by the idea of lighting being that complicated smooth smudgy thing to do on top of a stick figure at the end. All you have to do is to find and to commit to light and shade boundaries, then "paint by numbers" your values on them.
(Some artists actually do exactly that, literally : using a very specific scale of values to fill shaded surfaces with).
Forget about airbrushed spheres - shadow lines are sharper than one think.
[ame]
Guess I'll interject my personal experience into the mix here, for better or for worse.
To be totally honest, I think the one thing that holds so many people back these days is not a lack of critique. It's this weird reliance on outside critique they've somehow fused into their brains. Largely due to the prevalence of the Internet, I think.
From my experience, one of the most important, most useful things an artist can work on is their own eye - their own ability to tell "Ok this shit looks cool, this looks right, that looks wrong, ok - this is what theirs does better than mine", etc.
Because honestly if you don't ever get to the point of being able to figure that out for yourself I think you're screwed.
Now, some of that will obviously come from experience, but to sit there and rely on and convince yourself that you need other people's input to improve that - well that's just not accurate. Outside opinions can definitely help! But they can also hamper your progress, and depending on the person you can be fed inaccurate information. It will always be up to you to decide what works, what doesn't - what critique to take into account, and what to say simply "Thanks" and move on. You can be improving this every day without ever picking up a pencil or sitting down at a computer. Driving to work, ok, what do the clouds look like? Driving next to a lake? Ok, what are you able to see reflected on the surface? And why is that, can you figure out the reasons for it and replicate it later? No? Take a picture, or go research some physics to figure it out. Ever notice how reflections elongate and skew on the roads when it's raining?
Take mental notes of that, or bring your camera with you and take pictures, and really think about it.
And when you're sitting there comparing your work to other people's - don't compare your work to other people your age, or people with your experience. Compare your work to the very best stuff you can find, the people who's work you admire and the work that has the quality you want to achieve. And then sit there and ask yourself "Ok, now what makes these things different?"
I think it's that stuff that's the most important, for drawing/painting especially. Because honestly if you don't work intelligently, if you're not working up top (in your noggin) and you're just putting the work down on paper, you can spend hundreds of hours practicing and still wind up hardly improving at all. (There's evidence of this everywhere, go take one look through the CA.org sketchbook pages. You see people starting out drawing what they see everyone else drawing, and they think that if they just do that enough, magic will just happen one day. Not the case.)
Yep some Loomis head studies are definitely on the cards. I've managed to find Charles Bargue Cours Des Dessin too which covers his methods of drawing from casts and light/shade quite extensively.
Two Listen - it's interesting you mention that, and it's a mindset im beginning to appreciate after reading the book Jocose linked. There's a quote in there which reads something like 'The strongest work anyone can do both as an art maker and as an art viewer is their own'. And I've got hung up on other peoples critique too much in the past.
I know it is important to seek crit from your peers but waiting for the 'all clear' every step of the way from others may not always be the best way to progress.