Forum posts by Sanne

Holy cow I'm SUPER impressed!! Great job!

Do you have any formal education on animation or is that something you taught yourself?

Looking awesome Swen! I am learning a lot just from seeing your gestures roll by. :D Thank you!

I'm very impressed with your personal reflections and thought process, Arvel. I think you hit the nail on the head with that.

You also have to keep in mind that gestures aim to help you develop your own ability to recognize flow, action, proportions etc. Every artist does them slightly different enough that there is no real 'right or wrong' in terms of how they should look. As long as you are learning from them and notice a steady improvement (even if slow), you're achieving the desired result.

As for feeling like a beginner, I don't think that ever really goes away. You never stop learning in art. You're always discovering interesting and new ideas, you'll always find flaws in your works and you will always be practicing. But I suppose that's at least half the reason people like myself love to draw. You never stop learning. You never stop being amazed at what you can do when you put your mind to it.

Set goals for yourself by breaking down what gestures are about, like you did in your post. Don't worry too much about how polished and nice other artists' gestures look. They should be guidelines from which you can pick the elements you need to learn and improve, not goals to achieve perfect replicas.

Oh wow, that looks really good! Your 30 second gestures were very flow and movement based. These also capture the flow, but also show a clearer understanding of the underlying anatomy. So I consider this really good!

How do you feel about these 1 minute gestures, yourself?

Hey Zonalar! I'm not an expert on muscle anatomy either, but I concur with Judith. :) Cross reference the drawing with anatomical study material and see what's different, then work from there.

It looks like a great start however, I think you got most of it down rather well!

Hi Jason!

Your sketches are looking great, I think the decision to focus on longer strokes was a good one.

As for your issue with feeling like you were better 10 years ago, I have some theories on that.

We easily romanticize our past, and as we improve we change; your drawings likely look different today than they did back then because you've grown and are a different person now. It's easy to consider your old work better because we tend to have stronger emotions attached to the past. You also probably had a different mindset that allowed you to draw in a different way than you do now. That doesn't make it better, necessarily, just different.

Hi rspoint! Your 30 second gestures look just fine. :) This article might be useful regarding your worries about not being able to draw more than just stick figures:

https://line-of-action.com/happens-30-seconds-isnt-enough/

Hey Ana, welcome to LoA! Your work looks incredible. :D Resizing on the forums isn't necessary, so don't worry about it. :)

Hi Jason, welcome to the site! :) Looking forward to following your progress here!

Hi hosarin!

Those sketches look pretty good to me. :) There's nothing that immediately stands out to me that I feel needs to be fixed, although overall I can tell that more practice will be beneficial to you. That's probably the only advice to go by right now; keep practicing and doing a class or timed mode regularly. By consistently drawing what you see on a regular basis you will grow and improve naturally. If there's anything in particular you feel needs attention for hands, we'll happily review your work as you practice and see what you can change about that. :)

Hey Arvel!

I think you're definitely heading in the right direction with your works. :) You seem to have the idea of capturing motion with smooth lines down really well, but by the sound of it you're not really understanding the basic build of a human figure. (Think of where the hips start, proportions etc.)

You're doing 30 second gestures now, have you considered starting with 60 or 90 second gestures instead, and following the tutorial here?

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

This article is also very helpful and sounds like it applies in your situation:

https://line-of-action.com/happens-30-seconds-isnt-enough/

Let me know if any of this helps. :) I'm looking forward to more sketches!

Hi Claudio! I moved your reply to its own topic so we can all say hi to you properly. :)

Please feel free to post your drawings in our Critique forums or check out our Practice & Advice forums if you want more generalized help. That's the best place to get the help you want!

Your English also sounds great! Whatever you're doing to improve your English is working out great. :D

Heya Chris, welcome to LoA! :D It's good to have you here. Thank you so much for your kind words, I hope your little one will give you enough time to practice your skills. ;)

Hi Andrew! Do you have any examples of what your gestures look like when you choose one minute?

Hey Joshua! Looking good with those practices. :) Do you feel you better understand the anatomy and proportions of the head with these?