1-, 2-, 5-, and 10-minute drawings

Hi all,

I started a daily figure drawing practice about a month ago. I'm self-taught, so any advice would be welcome.

My main goals for figure drawing are to improve at drawing volume and line quality. I struggle at finishing the figure in 1 minute, and my 2-minute drawings are often headless.

Without further ado, here are the drawings: https://1drv.ms/u/s!AuTa49C40AZG-X_NpwrRCgyRK2AT?e=aruJnZ

The duration is marked on the upper left corner of the page or right next to the figure.

Any tips for me on how to improve further would be highly appreciated.

Thanks!

—Babyishbrazen

Your drawings are amazing, given the span of time you drew them in. But you should keep this in mind that you need to take your time in drawing the figures. Don't pressure yourself to complete the drawing within a minute or two, because it's impossible to achieve what you want if you set impossible goals. Instead of taking 1 or 2 minutes to draw the figures, first start by taking 10 minutes draw what you want, and then gradually decreasing the amount of time you have by 30 secconds every day. I hope this helps.

Hi Disfunctioning Potato, Thank you so much! I never considered reversing the time span. I can already imagine how that can help. I will defintely start doing that! Thanks again! :)

I'm liking what disfunctioning potato mentioned, taking some more time isn't a bad idea. In fact just taking a couple of images and studying the body would help a lot to set you up for quicker figure drawing down the road. I'd reccomend studying the skeleton as well as looking out for resources that show the "simplified forms" of the human body. When you understanding what "primitive" shapes make up each part of the body, volume will click and you'll find ways to simplify the body into shapes which you can bring volume too. Similiarly, understanding the primitive shapes and simplified forms of the human body creates structure! (which if you dive into gesture, the combination of gesture and structure is what makes those really dynamic figures). I think you're already understanding a lot of these things based off of your work, insofar as understanding the shapes of the body (and especially through line). if you're not already, look into the "overhand grip", Proko on youtube talks about this in their intro to figure drawing class, and I'm sure Love Life Drawing talks about it too. The overhand grip can change your line quality big time (it also gets your shoulder more active than your wrist which is a good habit to start at your current skill). The fact that you're starting with charcoal says a bit, Im guessing you're already following them! But that's what I got. I love your second image, right most 5 minute sketch, the bend in the figure there looks great!

Hi Gardner Littleton, Thank you so much for your suggestions! I've since been giving myself more time to study the figure and have gone back to my anatomy books. I also revisited Proko's and Love Life Drawing's intro videos. It's a good reminder that some we can always check back in on the basics once in a while. All in all, thank you for encouragment!

Also studying pictures and tracing over them could help to find line of action and gesture lines in this moment of your journey. Just as an experiment, adding to your more imporant drawing routine. Like you could make your shorter gesture drawings, and them compare to the tracing.

There is a long video that someone recently recommended to me because my drawings are stiff and i have been playing on repeat, it helped me open my eyes to the rhythmns of the body. Where John Asaro shows the flow of some paintings, that could help you down the road, if not now. He begins talking about the simplified shapes that make drawing stiff or that convey flow. Then he gives lots of examples for one hour and a half, both in paintings and photographies.

"How to Compose the Figure for Oil Painting" on New Masters Academy chanel

• Carol F edited this post on February 14, 2022 1:47pm. Reason: add information
• Carol F edited this post on February 14, 2022 1:47pm.
• Carol F edited this post on February 14, 2022 1:48pm.
• Carol F edited this post on February 14, 2022 1:49pm.