Forum posts by Sanne

I concur with Medic!

What helps the flow of motion in gestures is the action line - basically, a long and fluid line depicting the spine. (It can be longer than the spine and head) Exaggerating this line and drawing on it is a majorly helpful tool to 'animate' the drawing more.

To give an example, a cartoonist can draw a very exaggerated line of motion and build a character on this line. Add extra lines for the arms and legs and build the limbs on these lines. Don't aim for perfection, aim for motion. Even if the proportions are a little off, it will give you a better sense of what will help improve your drawings and remove stiffness.

Hi there, welcome to the site!

That's a lovely drawing. :) There's a lot of background and a very small subject in comparison - what exactly are you looking to improve on? Are you focused on drawing Anime or do you want a solid realism basis first?

My main tip for the action lines is to avoid drawing an s-shape for it. C-shapes only, because action lines only curve once! Other than that, don't be afraid to be dramatic with your lines. It's okay if the lines are longer than the spine and go through the head entirely. They're intended to help you place the rest of the body parts properly on the spine after all.

Thanks for your splendid advice lokken! Those are awesome videos, super helpful and thorough!

Hi Mothill!

I also use a Wacom Bamboo (pen), but I started with a Wacom Graphire 1 (about 14 years ago, holy cow!). The best way I found for me to get used to the coordination between hand and screen is to replace your regular mouse with your tablet regularly. With time (it may take several months) it will become so natural to you as picking up a regular pen to put on paper.

I also personally found that Photoshop does not agree with my style of drawing. I like to draw fast and use quick strokes of my pen, but Photoshop has a nasty habit or not following my strokes quickly enough! That's why I prefer Paint Tool SAI, or similar programs like OpenCanvas and GIMP. If you struggle with photoshop for similar reasons I suggest giving it a go.

Your gestures look pretty good to me, so I think you won't have too much trouble figuring this one out! :)

Hello Achan!

I hope you're having a good summer so far. :)

A good place to start is by doing gesture drawings of 30-90 seconds each, as described in 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/

Then you could spend 2-5 minutes per photo to study and draw it as close as possible. If you do these practices regularly you'll find yourself improving very quickly!

Hi matthew, I'm afraid the link you gave us is broken. I did however look for our color article, perhaps this will be useful to you!

https://line-of-action.com/starting-to-use-colour-in-your-life-drawings/

Hello wenqdu! I'm sorry it's taken me a while to get back to this topic!

Your DA looks good, although I don't have any solid advice to give. Some of the anatomy is still off but your painting technique looks fine! Do you sketch out your subjects before you paint them or do you just create them while you paint?

The practice image you posted here looks pretty good, but I think you put a little too much focus on the ribs. She looks heavily emaciated and the arms seem a bit thin. It's a bit confusing because her hips and belly look fleshy, but then other aspects look very bony. That's definitely something I'd take into account. You can partially fix that by paying a little more attention to the proportions of the limbs and softening the shadows and highlights on the ribs.

Does that help you? :)

Hello maniacalpineapple! (What a funny username!)

I looked through your art and I really love the feet studies you did! They look great :)

I noticed that with your faces, your style is heavily influenced by Anime. Anime is a stylized version of realistic anatomy, and often if you don't have a solid grasp on the realistic anatomy, you struggle drawing Anime style too.

I recommend that you try and focus on using our Face & Expressions tool to focus on the realistic anatomy first before you attempt to draw in any other styles. It will probably benefit you most!

Hi zaika!

I'm so sorry I haven't been able to reply to you before this. I tried to look at your blog entry but it appears you've deleted or made it private since.

If you're still looking for help on your art please feel free to post again. I'll definitely be checking in on you and give you my thoughts if you do!

Hi chippu!

Thanks for sharing these drawings with us. :) Before I start, I want to point out to other members that the reason the heads look a bit slim or squished is because the forum has resized the images chippu posted. If you click on them, you see the full sized versions, wherein the faces look much better and not so squishy!

cenozoick has given great advice. :) Another tip to help you find errors is to do the following:

Open your drawing in whatever program you use, and then <strong>flip it horizontally</strong>. I flipped your drawings and instantly found a lot of errors in some that are really hard to miss when you view them normally. It's small things, like a minor misalignment of the eyes or a small difference in jaw shape. It's hard to see un-flipped, but it's still off. I think that's what _nada_ picked up on!

Can you give it a shot, see if you can see the same errors I'm seeing? If you flip while you draw it can be super helpful in finding your mistakes and correcting them!

Hello voxfour!

I'm sorry I wasn't able to get to your topic sooner, I've been on sick leave and was unable to check in here before. I hope Nikki.May's and my posts will still be helpful to you though!

Nikki.May raises excellent points. I don't know about Proko, but the site itself also has a couple of articles on gesture drawings that are useful:

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/

My main recommendation is to try and draw everything in less strokes. Instead of multiple strokes (even back and forth motions) to draw the spine, try to draw the spine as one line, from A to B. It probably sounds silly, but it'll give your strokes more confidence and strength! :) It'll really make the motion pop out more.

Please let us know if you need more help. I will be around more frequently from here on.

Welcome to the site Emre!

I concur with what Medic said - your drawings look splendid overall! Some of the models do end up looking a bit stiff, so I also think gestures are a good way to bring motion back into your art.

Although I know you've drawn gestures before, we have some articles that may benefit you further:

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/

Might be useful to your studies if you check them out. :) Sorry if there's nothing new in there for you, otherwise please enjoy!

Hello Nicolas, welcome the site!

I can tell you'll be doing just great with your studies, you certainly have the talent for it!

Your gestures look good, but I also notice some errors in anatomy. Have you tried to focus on 30 second gestures instead of 2 minutes? Some of the errors are about proportions - e.g. a torso that is misaligned or has a much too long midsection. Forcing yourself to draw in 30 seconds forces you to focus on the basic shapes, which make a better foundation for refined pieces.

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/

These articles explain what I'm talking about very well. I strongly suggest you spend about 10 minutes regularly doing 30 second gestures - it's an amazing warm up, and it will benefit you with your foreshortening difficulties too.

I think the reason the crouching positions are hard for you is because you don't break the bodies down into basic shapes. Foreshortening is a matter of envisioning stacked shapes (such as cylinders and blocks) from a different angle. Building the body with these blocks before you flesh out is helpful in understanding how a leg/knee looks when crouched from the front, for example.

I hope this makes sense! If you'd like more help with that please let me know. :)

Thank you very much!

I'm back in the saddle now, and I'll try to catch up on topics and keep a close eye on new ones from here on. Thanks everyone for putting up with my absence!