Sketch. Doodle. Chicken scratches. Yeah, my standards are lowering as I type.
After reading the entire archive of El Goonish Shive from 2002 to present, and seeing the corresponding increase in drawing ability, I figure if someone can start like Dan did and end up like Dan did, I ought to be able to too!
I guess part of the reason why I want to learn how to draw is because I’m generally horrible at details. I’m an INTP (for those MBTI types) and I’m super big picture, and I’m always getting into trouble because I don’t look at the details. I’m thinking learning how to draw will help me learn to be detail oriented.
This isn’t the first time I’ve tried to learn, but I just got a new iPad2, and hey, if I have it, I may as well use it. I’ve gotten a pdf of Andrew Loomis’ Figure drawing for all its worth, and I’m thinking about getting Drawing With the Right Side of the Brain by Betty, although there’s no iBook version of it.
On to the actual question part - I just doodled something today, and GAWD it looks terrrible. Do you just keep on plugging away, making terrible drawing after terrible drawing? Or is there something you have to practice first, like drawing circles or something - Loomis isn’t much help here.
Budding artists, please feel free to chime in on this thread - misery loves company.
I’d say yes. Draw, draw, draw. As much as you can. And try to do different stuff - observation drawing (both people and objects), doodling, copying from photos/magazines, other artists, etc. etc. Try to think about why your drawing doesn’t look the way you want it to, analyze it. Try to draw different types of drawings: Portraits, cartoons, landscapes, cars, rooms, and so on.
Learning how to draw is comparable to learning how to play an instrument: There are no easy ways to do it, so practice, practice, practice. Don’t give up, and don’t get stuck.
Oh, and don’t get disappointed. Every failure (if there is such a thing in drawing) is a step forward.
“Many are willing to suffer for their art. Few are willing to learn to draw.” - Simon Munnery
Yes, you have to draw bad-looking drawings in order to learn how to draw. It’s a learnable skill, NOT an innate talent, but it does take time.
The best part of Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain is the seeing=drawing exercises, such as blind contour and upside-down copying. The portions about right-side brain stuff is a little woo, and the rant about signatures is out of place.
There is another book I’ve skimmed through called Drawing with You Artist’s Brain, by Carl Purcell. It’s the same idea, and the author interaction with the reader seems more intuitive.
Consider getting the Right Side workbook, where you draw right on the pages of the book.
Finally, there is a Walter Foster-branded iPad learn-to-draw app. Walter Foster is a publisher that makes short, cheap art instruction books that I’m not generally fond of, but I don’t know about the app.
I popped in to recommend Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, but you’ve got that covered. Beyond that, i can offer a couple of essential tips. Use your pencil to measure angles and relative lengths. And, use a frame–it can be as easy as an index card with the middle cut out, or a photo mat, or there are probably some commercial products available. It helps you to set up your drawing, and to learn to see negative shapes. Most importantly, learn to look. Recognize how shapes and values relate to each other.
Set a timer for 1 minute or 30 seconds. Try to get the basic shape completed in that time.
If you’re interested in figure drawing, there is a site (which i apparently don’t have bookmarked on this computer) that generates human figures in various poses, and can be set to a timer so that they change at brief intervals. Search “gesture sketches” or “figure drawing” or “poses” and you’ll probably run across it.
Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain is the only drawing book that made sense or worked for me. I cannot recommend it highly enough. Before I got the book, I couldn’t draw anything for shit. Never been able to. Within a month or two, I was actually able to draw portraits that actually looked like the people I was trying to draw. I was astonished.
I actually don’t find the left-brain, right-brain stuff in it “woo” at all. As soon as I learned how to draw what I actually saw, not what I thought I saw or what I thought something was supposed to look like, it all clicked. Maybe it doesn’t work for everyone, but it sure as hell worked for me.
If you have enough money for tuition, you could take an introductory drawing class at a community college.
Here in Chicago, you’d be looking at a three credit class at $89/credit. The academic year starts in August, and non-degree students can pretty much walk up and register.
I never had to learn how to draw, because I always knew how. Both of my parents were artists, and I remember my mother taking me to the art museum at a very early age. She would hold me up and point out certain things in paintings and drawings, like how certain lines and curves made an interesting composition, how the artist shaded a nose or made an eye sparkle. Or she explained to me how Picasso combined different perspectives in one painting, or what Vermeer did with light. And I remember her sitting right in front of me, and having me draw her face without looking at the paper. In short, she taught me how to see, how to look at art and at reality. That’s basically all you need to know how to draw, plus practice.
In kindergarten, we had to draw a Fairy Godmother. I was the only kid whose drawing had boobs and hips.
You have to draw, draw, draw. But not just that, but you have to draw with the intention to improve. That means always trying new things, always studying techniques, and always pushing at your comfort zone. The internet is littered with the webcomics of artists who don’t take this to heart, and just keep drawing the same crap without any improvement for years.
