What happens if 30 seconds isn't enough?

Reconsider what "enough" means.

Many artists get caught up in this idea that they need to produce a "sketch" in each 30 second window of time, and this becomes an impossible goal if in your mind a "sketch" is actually a semi-complete picture in pencil.

Relax; you are doing just fine. Almost no one can actually get a "complete" drawing done in 30 seconds. That's actually the point — by giving yourself such a short window of time, you are forced to make cut-throat decisions about priorities, and stick to them. It demands that you prevent yourself from getting sucked into the "interesting" or "fun" details that leap out at you when you look at an image, and instead, absorb and capture the direction and energy of the complete figure as quickly as possible.

If all you get in your 30 seconds is a single line that defines the flow of energy/the weight of the pose, that is a success. If you get a few "bubbles" down that define where the hips and torso are in relation to one another, that's perfect. You are doing gesture drawing like the masters.

Before you begin your gesture drawing practice, take a deep breath. Remind yourself: You do not need to have something that is recognizable to another person at the end of those 30 seconds. You DO need to try and make a clear decision about what you see in that pose AS A WHOLE, and make one or more marks on your paper that record that decision. These are not drawings you’re going to put on the wall, these are exercises in perception that you do to "warm up" and put yourself in the right state of mind before you attempt those longer poses.

There is no mistake more common for new artists than to get stuck in the "details" trap, to leap immediately to what is "fun" or "interesting" or what they think will make them "better" in the eyes of others, diving into shading or spending minutes or hours painstakingly rendering a particularly pretty set of eyes or hands only to discover when they're done that that beautiful detail is out of proportion with the rest of the body, or at a bizarre angle that disrupts the flow of the pose, or a hundred other mistakes that come from seeing the individual parts instead of the flow of the whole body. It takes a more seasoned eye to be able to resist working in detail and instead start with much more generality. Gesture drawing practice can help get you there.

In class mode in our tools, the 30 second and 1 second series of poses that serve as a warmup, no matter what length of class you pick, are there to help you approach those longer poses with the same eye for seeing the whole first, for putting details in the context of a larger line and flow.

My advice if you are worried that your 30 second drawings don’t look like anything: Stop worrying. Start putting a single line down that captures the direction of the spine. If you have time, bubble in the placement/angle of the hips, ribcage and head. If you have more time, add some lines for arms and legs. Don’t have time? No problem. You’re learning more than you realize.

Comments

meckeon

This is great advice. For a long time I've been worrying about not being able to have recognizable figure in 30 seconds. But now I realize its more about your perception of the figure and your decision making process than having something pretty.

Breeanna Seymour (unregistered visitor)

The 30 second poses are always super helpful to "loosen up" like you've stated. I find, to my sheer joy, that these short scribbles help me to complete the longer poses faster, which gives me time to get to all the fine details. I use to worry, thinking I was too slow, but have come to realized it's better to just do and let instinct take over. Thanks for the article!

Juan (unregistered visitor)

Thank you so much for the article :)
I just started my journey on gesture drawing (3 days ago), with the class mode. Of course I wasn't expecting results on this little time, but nevertheless I was getting frustrated with the 30 seconds poses.
I'll try to relax and just enjoy the journey. Let's see if there is some improvement after a couple of months!
Best wishes!

TomHuppe

wow, i wasnt thinking about it that way, thanks, that's a great advice

Estelle (unregistered visitor)

I asked this question at the end of a tutorial...I should have looked here first. I was concerned that I wasn't getting much down in the 30 seconds...it always ends with me trying to decide where the dots go, but I understand the pint of it better now. Thanks so much! What a great site!!

Kim - Site admin

It makes me so happy to read these responses and see that the site is helping people! :)

JER

Muchas gracias por el articulo estoy muy contento con el sitio, si es un poco difícil, pero disfruto el echo de hacer trazos libres y rápidos y lograr un boceto en corto tiempo.

Grégoire (unregistered visitor)

Thank you

I tend to linger 'cause I feel that the drawing is not completed it is missing something.

Thank you for your input

Jer Bot (unregistered visitor)

Noticing that gestures were available as an option, and the premade "class"es was interested me so much about this site. I discovered the power of gesture drawing years ago and it's been priceless to re-programming the way I approach the figure. The results i my lines flow better and it's easier to *feel* the post of the character. Great site and wonderful article. Thank you.

Sempervirens

Great advice, gave me a new perspective, one thing tho, What should i be capturing in this 30 seconds? the line that goes thru the center of the pose? or maybe the edge that defines the dominant side? thanks in advance!

Sanne - Site moderator

The 30 second gestures are supposed to capture the bare minimum lines to define the figure. That can look like this:

Even though this doesn't really look like a person, I spent 30 seconds capturing the most obvious motion lines of the body; at a first glance, it's not too hard to recognize this is a person with an arched back holding up their arms in a dance gesture. Being able to capture a pose and motion in just a few lines is the main goal of 30 seconds.

A lot of the time, these 30 second gestures don't look like much and that's okay. They should warm you up and train your brain, not be totally detailed figures. :)

Sempervirens

They do look beautiful to me, gesture drawings have me hooked, i had never before been able to appreciate simplicity in drawing, and practicing gesture drawing really changed the way i look at things, thanks for the reply and advice, i am experiencing a problem tho, following this advice:

from Luis Escobar (another great online teacher) he mentioned to not approach gesture drawing with stick figures, he does the drawing in like 15 minutes tho and he is also a much more seasoned artist than me, the thing is when i follow his advice my "final artwork" ends up looking much better to my liking, i've been trying to fuse the method he presents with all the information i found on this site to get some speed into my process, i am not making any progress in this tho, the step to go from stick figures to a more meaty drawing pretty much kills all what i like about my drawings, i'm going to buy a camera and post some pictures for people to critique and i hope that will shed some light. Again, thanks for the reply and all this free resources you guys have! greetings from Mexico! :]

Divydelta

I didn't know about these videos! I just watched a few minutes and it already seems very helpful. I'll definitely watch more of Luis's stuff. Thank you!

Margaret (unregistered visitor)

I'm familiar with gesture drawing from years back. Still, it took a few days to get back into the "swing" of doing them. After that, I remembered why they're so important. Gesture drawing trains your eye to see the object all at once , and are really what set set up the conditions for more developed, good drawing.

Kratsbw5

I feel like this ended up being really helpful because I always feel as if I spend too much time on a sketch and end up going too much into detail that when I end up doing the actual piece it doesn't turn out as good as i had wished

Chronorust

These are the exact words I wish I heard years back. Getting back in the game and I'm already doing much better by not worrying. Thanks for the speech!

그레이스 (unregistered visitor)

인체드로잉을 시작을 하는데 막연 했는데 흐름을 잘 알겠습니다

Gerry Capelle (unregistered visitor)

Thanks for the well spoken reminder.

Matilde Damele (unregistered visitor)

It's so true! Thank you for the useful advice

Roselys

Pourquoi on n'a pas de tutoriel pour faire les mains le visage , etc
Why we dont have tutorials to draw face , hands etc

Wjt7317058 (unregistered visitor)

拨云见日,豁然开朗

ViciousPony (unregistered visitor)

Great advice! i will take it into account, greetings from Argentina.

Sophbeanzee

Thank you for posting this, it was a maj boost of encouragement which I feel I always need and don't get all the time when I'm drawing or practicing. I'm always constantly bringing myself down and ik my diagnoses of mental health make it worse, but it comes horribly into play as a self-taught artists with only a couple of HS classes of that type of professional teaching.. The rest I've learned myself through reading a bunch of books by other artists and online teachers, and. youtube vids. I found this sight ]through a research period of how to draw gestures, and exercises for improvement on figure drawing and I've come back to this site over & over again and it's a wonderful reference. Loved reading this article!! Mindfulness in painting, drawing and art is always important!! ❤️❤️

Devil Darlinqq

I really needed this article! I've been trying to practice drawing realistic heads, and I couldn't get any details like the eyes, nose, mouth etc. down. I thought that it was way too quick, but now I understand that that is the point. For the first time today, I finish the 30 min class mode, and It was the first time in a while that I had fun while drawing. It was so nice and refreshing, and it really was fun! This site has helped me so much recently, even if I just got started, I feel myself improving so much! Thank you for this article, and thank you for creating such a great community! I hope to have many more practice sessions using this site!

-Devi

MC (unregistered visitor)

Thanks for the helpful advice! I have been skipping the 30 second poses thinking I am just a slow drawer and that is okay. This article reminded me of the purpose and importance of the 30 second pose.

Agnesee

I've always struggled to understand what the point of 30 sec poses was. I watched a lot of videos but only this post cleared everything up for me!

Lena (unregistered visitor)

Thank you for this encouraging reminder!

Gregoire (unregistered visitor)

Yep
I trying to just to that.
Thanks

Steven9331

I joined the site recently and am working to improve my drawing skills. I find this approach very healthy, organic, mindful and realistic about how to improve the perception of the art creator. I enjoy this web site very much and have been very dedicated to my practice and building up art muscles through on line courses geared toward manga, perspective, and fundamentals. There are many resources and I am integrating these in a gradual manner strengthen my skills. My goal is to produce a manga book with my character and original stories. It has been about a month and a half and I'd say that although I have art knowledge my skills are practically non existent. My point is that I am seeing small measurable victories as I go on this journey to create my manga book. Still very early in the process the character is in beginning stages of development. I would never have thought that I could get this far about 2 months ago, however, with my drive, persistence, and all the available resources and my progress to date - I know that I will do this project, do it well and feel good about it! I want to say thank you for having the site, Line of Action with all of these great resources, ways to inspire artists like me (daily tracking journal, the gesture drawing practice and commitment to draw regularly, the resource of poses and book selections that are valuable references. So Thank You! I will continue to appreciate the site and recommend to those who have an art / drawing interest.

Martini (unregistered visitor)

Awesome possum! In deed as a begginer this is so truuue.

Thks a million

Thomas (unregistered visitor)

Very convincing. Good explanation!
My personal challenge is, to follows this recommendation in my sketching Work without getting in the fun/Details Trap.
Thanks a lot for the advice.

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