First time sharing my drawings. Been drawing for a while but don't feel like I'm getting anywhere. How can I improve?

Hey, so I started drawing figures using line of action probably 4 months ago. However I never shared my work since I felt I'd like to reach a point at which I at least kinda like my figure drawing.

Unfortunately that hasn't happened yet and in all honesty I feel pretty frustrated seeing complete beginners draw better than I do. So I can see that by never asking for critique I probably won't get any better. Thus I randomly chose 3 pages of my drawings and scanned them (sorry for the weird quality, I rarely do stuff digitally). The 5/8 minute ones are labeled, the others are all either 30 or 60 seconds.

https://imgur.com/a/8xXYbFg

Thank you for your advice!

hi, don't worry already, there is a long way to go and sometimes you stagnate for a long time before you can improve.

I like your drawings, I appreciate the fact that you try to put details like the face (which is very hard) or shadows.
Seeing your drawings I have the impression that you are not using the full amplitude of your arm to draw. try (maybe on larger sheets) to make long strokes and curves in one stroke.

also I advise you to be interested in anatomy, there are very good manuals like the MORPHO series which is more for artists (available in the library), and if you want to deepen on a more scientific anatomy PAUL RIECHER "arstistic anatomy".
All this aims to better understand what you draw:
Volumes! you can thus learn to draw simple shapes in volume (cube, sphere ...) to replace the members on your draft. then you replace these geometric shapes by drawing over them the real shapes you see on the model and voila

Warning ! I know it's not easy, don't hesitate to take your time, vary the exercises, 1min (for the line of force), 10min (main forms), 1 hour (in-depth forms and details) you can do them at later if you want or separately, but it's important to vary because you don't learn the same thing depending on the time you allow yourself to do it, and the 1min is as important as the 1 hour.

Finally to deepen I advise you to learn about the book "drawing with the right brain" by Betty Edward, a very good book, you can see videos which summarize it on youtube, there are good exercises to learn from it.
Sorry it was a bit long, I hope it will help you, do not lose hope you will improve, keep drawing !!!

sorry for my english (google translate :p )

Thank you for your answer! The English is fine to understand

I think the reason I don't do those long strokes with my whole arm is because I thought it'd be possible to make the drawing work without them. But I'll try doing them for a bit and see how it goes, thank you for the advice. Also gonna check some of those resources

I definitely wish to stay away from "scientific anatomy" tho; I saw some classes on the human body by e.g. S. Hampton but they didn't help a lot. I don't understand how knowing the complicated names and locations of all these muscles should help me draw them

Well, FriendlySoftware, I must say that you're really know what you're doing in terms of the basics of rendering, and in terms of getting a lot of energy in your drawn poses. Greater job on your visualization of the silhouettes and negative spaces, here.

I think; to me, at least; is that your poses seem a little bit too cluttered. especially in your 8 minute pose, at least. Would you please work on your first ever 10 minute figure drawing (clothed or nude), while you shade in your pose in black, so that you'd be able to see the attitude more clearer.

The arguement is that...... well, here's this surprise link. It's from the really old blog of John K. (Spumco, Ren & Stimpy) which spewed and doest spew lots of generally and particularly concrete fundamentals for your record goals. Take this link with a grain of salt, for it's really, totally worth it.

My hat's off to you.

One Stroke Exercise:

Try drawing basic shapes in one stroke. Circles, triangles, parallelograms, eggs, squares- you get it. Flat shapes, like the ones you see in elementary schools. Make each shape as perfect, and even as you can. After drawing your first shape make each shape the same size as the one drawn next to it. Keep the spaces between shapes as eyeballed even as possible.

Do this exercise before you do your figure drawing until you feel you have warmed up. It helps you with control, proportion, and quality/economy of line.

Warning: This task is elegant, works really well when you take the time to do it right. But like all elegant things, they can be rather hard to put into action. Have a reward ready. On your first few goes, you may be too tired to progress to figure drawing. Don't let that turn you off this exercise. I promise you will see improvement when you get to the fun figure drawings.

All the best,

JCML Fine Art

Let me know how it goes.

All the best,

Jcml Fine Art

Thank you for your asnwer!

I've drawn 10-minute ones before. Just with this particular one, I felt like I was done after eight minutes; in other words: I didn't know what to spend the remaining two minutes on. I think the model was wearing some latex suit that irritated me, but well

Alright, I'll take a look at that

Thank you for the answer JCML, I'll make sure to try that exercise