Drawing from imagination

Hello, i am new here and, first of all, i want to thanks for Line-of-Action site: it is great!

I love to draw having a photography as reference, but I would like to take you with some tutorials on how to draw from the imagination, as I have realized that there are patterns that can be followed without loss of quality. Even the mastery of these patterns is very important in my opinion for the observation drawing as well. In fact, as much as we seem to be trying to reproduce in design what we are observing, over time what we do most is draw the pattern we have associated with each part of the body.

So (a) do you have some tutorials about drawing from imagination and about mastery the patterns to each part of the body?
(b) do you have some advice about how to study the drawing from imagination?

Thanks again! :)

Luiz

ps:
I am referring to the picture kind of shapes pattern (in the picture, for example, some shapes to build a head)

https://ibb.co/s1sGFqb

• Fonte Boa edited this post on August 22, 2019 1:54pm. Reason: append a picture
• Fonte Boa edited this post on August 22, 2019 1:55pm.
• Fonte Boa edited this post on August 22, 2019 1:56pm.

Yes, Hi there. if you want to be better at drawing something from memory and imagination you have to start doing it. There is no way around it. Tutorials that go beyond basic structure and primitive shapes is a waste of time. Get a book on barge plates that show you how masters draw anatomy and try and mimic their results then draw from memory. Rince repeat, drawabox tutorial is a good one to start with if you are just starting out but it is really boring so dont stick to just that. One more thing, when you draw timed poses or other try and change the angle of themodel, it will train your brain to understand the volume and surface on a different level and will force you to draw with your brain and not with your eye. then draw draw draw draw draw.

Okay... humm... I will say my method. If you want to draw humans: study the anatomy of every single part of the body. Then you will understand it and you could draw it from imagination. This rule works for everything but is easyer in the case of drawing humans because all humans are almost the same. Anyway you can do thos for draw trees, bees or dogs. The point is UNDERSTAND what are you drawing. Once you have the knoledge then you can think the basic shapes-forms* and draw almost everything! ^^

Be happy

i agree on anatomy but limit this to like 30 minutes a day and it will be enough. anatomy is crap if you dont know how things look and feel. u can master anatomy but still be shit in drawing figures so draw study draw drawdardawradawr. hyper realists do not draw well from imagination or memory so just drawr daradawawdardaawdaaw from imagination references are enemies when practicing this muscel

So I don't have any tutorials for you, but I did some research in this topic. I'm able to observe and draw good enough from observation, but from imagination it's totally different topic and I have big troubles with it.

Great resource to listen about imagination topic is Proko:

&t=1s
This movie contain one important thing: you can draw 10 years from observation and still can't draw from imagination. It's just different.

So what you can do:
1. Draw thumbnails, small, general shapes, without much details.

2. Draw silhouettes, 10, 15 etc.

Examples from pros: https://www.artstation.com/adku/collections/631364

3. Choose one random silhouette and try create something new, just try too draw what you see your mind eyes.
( Anyway it would be great feature to have class mode with silhouettes)

4. Try research something more about "How to design something" instead "How to draw something" (change "something" to e.g "creatures")

5. You can check books: "Sketching from imagination", great drawings and some advices about sketching.

https://www.amazon.com/Sketching-Imagination-Creatures-Publishing-3dtotal/dp/1909414875

6. You can try read this article: https://monikazagrobelna.com/2019/08/02/sketchbook-original-why-its-so-hard-to-draw-from-imagination/

Please share your advices too, I will appreciate it. Unfortunately I still can't draw from imagination. So not sure if my few above suggestions are good. It's just my research.

Interesting podcast episode, little bit about drawing from imagination:

Marshall Vandruff mentioned one important thing, that when he was young book Andrew Loomis "Fun with a pencil" would change his life.
It might be good idea to train it much more deeply and spend more time on this book.
Book: https://www.alexhays.com/loomis/Andrew%20Loomis%20-%20Fun%20WIth%20a%20Pencil.pdf

What do you think?

There are also interesting comments below this movie.

• Adku edited this post on September 18, 2019 5:24am.

Wow adku, you put in some time with that. Thanks for the share!

I've been working from Andrew Loomis's Figure Drawing For All It's Worth pretty religiously for past few months and it's been doing pretty well for me, but obviously you need to spend a lot of time applying the lessons to proper reference before you can start to effectively create from imagination. You'll often hear artists talk about "building your visual library" because after all, if you don't know how something looks in real life, it's gonna be hard to render it convincingly. I shared some of my notes here:

https://line-of-action.com/forums/topic/applying-loomiss-lessons

• Gibberibberish edited this post on September 25, 2019 5:44pm.
• Gibberibberish edited this post on September 25, 2019 5:48pm. Reason: typos and general clarity

The Udemy Character Art School is specifically about doing imaginative drawings rather than observational drawings. I bought it a year ago, and I’m about halfway through, and have seen marked improvement in my observational drawing, and I’ve learned to do imaginative drawings, which I didn’t have a clue how to even approach when I started. Now, whipping up a sketch for the NPCs in my D&D games is a quick, pleasant way to practice. If the course isn’t 80-90% off the “full” price, wait for it: I got it for $10, which was a steal, and it seems to be regularly areound $20-25. Don’t pay the whole $300, lol.