Forum posts by Sanne

Hi Nerilla!

Those gestures look really good to me! I don't have a whole lot to add at this time. :) If you keep on practicing and use these gestures as a base, I'd love to see your 60 or 90 second gestures in the future!

Ah, sorry!

This website has a bunch of free tools with reference photographs that you can study from (think of it like having a model in art class whom you draw/paint on your canvas). You can find the links to these tools on the Home page.

We have some articles that help you with basic gesture drawings that you can use as a foundation to build from. Here are the articles on our site:

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-1-line-of-action/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-2-torso-and-hips/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-3-joints/

Hope that helps! :)

Hi Carneo, welcome to the site!

I'm super glad to hear you like us and are practicing hard. :)

The articles you refer to are indeed excellent guidelines to get started with. If I'm explaining something you already know and I misunderstood your question, let me know alright?

The idea behind the gestures is to give you a solid foundation to work off of (as well as warm you up for bigger pieces). They're not limited to just the guidelines for spines, joints and limbs, although that is their starting point. Having put down the basic guidelines allows you to 'build on top', so to speak. When you get to the longer timers, you can start fleshing out the model and try to replicate the photo reference from your foundation you just put down. The longer the timer runs, the more detail you can put in. You can define muscles, shading, facial features, hair etc. up until the timer runs out.

Does that answer your question?

Hi feathersandcoins!

I adore the expression in this drawing, you did good on it!

If you don't mind me asking, did you base this style on cartoons or did you go for a more realism effect?

The idea behind drawing more detailed cartoon styles is usually that you have some grasp of basic realistic anatomy that you can then reform into something less realistic (ergo cartoons). I made the mistake of jumping straight into Japanese animation style, rather than learning how a real face looks from the start, and it made my progress more difficult later on. Like Akiresa said, focusing on anatomy is important, but more important is to focus on realistic anatomy. If you refer to the gesture studies in our tools, they are great at helping you understand how a real face, body and hands are constructed and look in different positions and angles.

A very important lesson: "Draw what you see, not what you think you see." We often draw things the way we think we see them, rather than how they really are. That's why it can be really difficult to draw things properly. A popular trick I've seen tells you to take a reference image (like the image of a horse), then flip it upside down. Now draw the upside down horse! You're forced to draw the lines as you see them, because you don't know how to draw an upside down horse. Maybe that can help you?

Either way, I think you did a great job at the image, and I hope you'll have fun practicing more!

Hi Akiresa!

Your gestures look really good. :) The only thing that I see at this time is your tendency to draw proportionally short legs. While there is definitely some foreshortening going on that warrants it, it might be good to pay attention to how long a leg is compared to the rest of the body in the reference photo!

In the bottom left gesture, I also can't quite figure out if I'm looking at the front or back. The 'spine' line you drew doesn't correspond with the spine from the reference image, and it looks like the chest is facing towards us rather than the back. Something to take note of, too. :)

Overall you're doing really well! Keep practicing and it can help to look back a week later and compare your gesture to the original. Time allows us to spot mistakes and find out how to fix these things, so don't be afraid to go back and study your studies!

<strong>As a special note, please be careful about posting screenshots from our tool. Not all the photographers who donated their photos to us allow for that kind of sharing in the licenses.</strong> We're hoping to replace every photo in the tool with our own that we have the rights to so this isn't an issue, but in the meantime I recommend only uploading your drawings and not the photos themselves. That way we're sure nobody gets in trouble. :)

Hi there aspenpando!

I fully understand your struggles. My own art skills developed with drawing manga, and it wasn't until years down the line that I got stuck in areas similar to your own.

What I found is that manga makes for a very poor base to work and learn from. At its core, manga is a cartoon, a stylized representation of what we see in real life. When you use it as your guide to learn how to draw, you do not learn to understand correct anatomy and end up struggling because your brain can't 'connect the dots', so to speak. You're basically trying to fly when you haven't learned to walk yet!

The best way to remedy this is to discard manga tutorials and focus on realism - gesture studies and using real people as models to study from are the way to go. This probably sounds like something you don't want to do because I'm guessing you really enjoy the manga style, but fear not, you don't have to give up manga all the way. :) The idea behind this is to make your brain see real life and give you the ability to put it down on paper first in a way that makes you understand how things go together. When you know how to do this, you will be much more capable to apply this knowledge to your manga drawings and give them the life and dynamic feel that you're yearning for now.

Knowing how a body is put together, how the joints work in movement and what gives faces their special expression from real life studies is a base that you can stylize later. It's like putting down the foundation of a house and building the walls, then painting the walls in the color you like to make it what you want it to be. You can put motifs with wallpaper and whatever you like on there, hang up pictures, put up shelves, but you'll always have a sturdy wall making that possible.

I hope this wasn't too confusing! If you want to get started with gestures but don't know how, I recommend these articles:

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-1-line-of-action/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-2-torso-and-hips/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-3-joints/

I'll do my best to answer any other questions you may have. :)

Hi again Sergio!

That's a very understandable (and I imagine frustrating) situation. There's nothing wrong with starting with a higher timer and gradually working your way down! You can always start with 60 or even 90 seconds, see how much you get done and practice this regularly for 1-2 weeks. If you feel more confident, lower the timer one step down (so if you did 90 seconds, go down to 60).

Alternatively you can practice to draw faster, too. A quick stroke with some disregard for perfection/detail is what gestures are about, after all! The circle and vertical/horizontal lines should be easily done in about 5 seconds, giving you 25 seconds to draw the face shape and other features. (You can also leave out the circle entirely and just work from the vertical and horizontal lines, but this is personal preference for sure.) Your goal is not to be perfect but to get a feel for proportion and train your brain to recognize what it sees and put it down on paper in the simplest way possible, while keeping the expression intact.

In short, you're trying to figure out the essential key features in a face that determine the expression and emotions. Arched eyebrows with wide eyes can convey all the surprise without needing a nose and mouth and jaw/face outline, after all! Being able to recognize these key features and jotting them down quickly as a base is something to work towards alongside finding the right proportions.

You can definitely combine a bigger timer with practice for quicker sketching. Both work just as well and will help you improve, but you may need to experiment to see what works best for you.

I think this is something that can be very personal in nature. Some people are very fast learners and retain their gained knowledge and skills very well, even with long periods of time between the drawing. Other people get 'rusty', forget how to accomplish certain things or lose some of the motor skills they developed through practice.

In most cases you do end up with a headstart when you get back to practicing, which makes it easier to work up to your previous level and go from there, versus starting 'completely from scratch'.

But everyone is different in how they learn and forget, so it's best to assess each person's situation individually and try to avoid generalized statements. Working with what someone experiences sounds like the best way to learn in my opinion!

Hello Elmigloo!

Stu's advice has been wonderful, practice is indeed the key to improve! I'm very impressed by what you've drawn so far, especially considering this is your 'first run'. Keep it up, you're doing great! :D

I'm curious, have you tried drawing gestures at all? They're not refined pieces by any means, but they're wonderful practices that can help you understand the dynamic movements of the human body, as well as help you understand proportions. We've got some handy tutorials on how to use those right here:

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-1-line-of-action/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-2-torso-and-hips/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-3-joints/

It's important to note that these are generally drawn in quick succession to force your mind to draw what it sees as quickly as possible. This is important for future improvement! They will end up making fantastic bases to draw full size illustrations on top of later on, so getting these down is only beneficial. :)

Best of luck with your practicing!

Hi Snow!

I'm so glad Larissa's critique was useful to you!

I agree that in the first drawing, your attempts to shade did give the slight effect of wrinkles. I love her face shape and you absolutely nailed her expression though!

I get the impression you're trying to to cross hatch shading but aren't quite sure how. It's the inconsistency in the shading that ends up not looking quite right. Why not give this tutorial a look-over, see if it's got some tips for you?

http://www.craftsy.com/blog/2013/07/hatching-and-cross-hatching/

Let us know if this is helpful and if there's anything else we can do for you!

Hello Larissa!

Stu gave some excellent tips there. :) I'm glad you're so inspired!

In regards to your lines problem, you may want to try switching to pencil. You're using a pen right now which doesn't give you much room for pressure sensitivity and controlling how dark the lines you draw are. I think that's contributing to the 'busy' feeling of your work, the amount of lines look about right. :) Pencil is my recommended medium for paper gestures because it's more dynamic with light and dark.

Good luck!

Hi Stu,

I hope I'm not too late with offering my thoughts! I've checked out your gestures and they look very dynamic with motion and range, so I think you did well there. :)

The only thing that stands out to me is that your gestures are very heavily stylized and take little note of anatomical proportions. Your next step could be to focus on proportions to help you further, if your goal is more realism. I particularly notice that some torsos are very short, for example. I notice that you focus primarily on the silhouette of a gesture; have you tried starting with fluid guidelines to draw the body parts around?

I can't recall if I've linked you in the past, but just in case, here are some excellent articles with useful information on managing this:

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-1-line-of-action/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-2-torso-and-hips/

https://line-of-action.com/gesture-basics-3-joints/

I hope this helps!

Hi DrDayDream!

I want to extend a belated welcome to our site and forums! :) I'm thrilled to hear you've found us useful even with a live in model at hand.

I had to remove several of your sketches in accordance with our forum rules, which you're more than welcome to review again here: https://line-of-action.com/forum-rules/ Regular nudity is definitely okay, but sexual depictions come with all sorts of legal issues we'd rather avoid, sorry!

In regards to your shading, I think it would be good to explore a higher contrast in your drawings. Everything looks very gentle and soft, but that also leads to a drawing looking simply smudgy rather than carefully detailed. It also looks faint, as if the shading is not finished. What sort of goals have you set for yourself regarding shading, and what materials are you perusing for practice?

Hi Skyeder!

What sarchale said is correct. :) Practice is the key. The site has plenty of tools to help you with that, from quick gestures to full on studies.

At the top of each page, you will find two dropdown menus called "Lessons & Tips" and "Practice Tools". If you go through each section, you will find an abundance of information, articles, and of course our drawing tools. They are a good foundation to get started with, and can complement any course or books you utilize for your progress.

Best of luck to you!

Hello sktchman!

I'm happy to tell you that nature scenes and architecture are two subjects that we've been planning to introduce to the site in our tools. I don't have any specifics on how or when at this time, as we've been busy dealing with other life aspects that warranted our focus, but it's still on the table. :)

I don't know of any resource that will let you load your own materials and set them to timers like we have here, but I hope we can provide you with adequate resources in the future so you won't have to look for one!