Art Sharing & Discussion Thread (2D & 3D)

[Niko (protozoalord)]

Figured I'd just move this discussion into a proper thread. @vicious @altcunningham

If a mod feels like moving a few of the messages from the Pointless Chatty Thread to here, go ahead. Probably will make more sense.

Have you ever done life drawing?

That was my game changer a few years ago. Didn't have it in high school. When I went back to school in 2009 for art, I had one class.

When I went back for art in 2023, I pretended I knew nothing, just jettisoned everything I ever learned. And most of that program was life drawing. Then I was able to bring in everything I ever learned from Wizard How To Draw or stole from comic books and really put it together. The improvement even over the last 2 years for me was radical.

And that year so many of the youth I was with were just obsessed with anime and refused to do anything in a non-anime style, but if you don't know the foundations, you really don't know why anime is even working with what it exaggerates. And you really saw the kids that picked that up go through growth searches in art, while others stagnated.

The past year and a half that I went into design, I requested that I'd be allowed to do the after hour's life drawing sits, just for my health. And I have a bi-weekly one that I attend at a studio.

I owe everything I have going now to that year of fundamentals and coming in ready to reset. Helped that the Prof was our age and into comics, so he understood where I was coming from.

It was kind of funny every now and then. He would ask if people knew who Jim Lee was or J Scott Campbell or Frank frazetta and none of the kids did. And then I would raise my hand and explain. And the kids did not care because they didn't make chainsaw man.

I've also noticed when I try and match energy with my own anime interests they do not consider. Cowboy Bebop or Neon Genesis or Ghost in the Shell or any of 80-90s to be good, story or art. Ah, youth.

I've not done life drawing before!! I'd probably love them when I have the ability to consistently go, but for now I may use a bunch of anatomy reference books a friend has sent my way and reference those for poses and studies. I do intend to do comics at some point, and have a lot of characters and story drafts prepped, just gotta get on drawing.

Back in high school, most of my art was like... Drawing Gundam and other mecha and robots, random dudes from 80s and 90s anime/manga, tokusatsu characters, etc. Mostly focused on a specific character or two for long stretches. More recently I've just done really goofy doodles and never finished pieces, or just scribbling body parts and anatomy trying to get things figures out. Sometimes character design reference sheets and all that.

Most of my personal hurdles with art (and most things, really) is just low motivation. Hopefully ADHD meds will help start of next year, though.

I know I fall into the category of those youths, but not really even knowing or at least respecting Ghost in the Shell/Eva/Cowboy Bebop is crazy to me. Most people I hang out with are under 30, and everyone at least loves Cowboy Bebop and GitS. In the overlap of LGBT and retro anime circles, basically every trans woman I've met is kinda a hardcore GitS fan.

 

[vicious]

I think the biggest mistake most people make when learning to draw anatomy is focusing on details too early. Which is fun, but it's kind of like balancing blocks on a ball. It's only going to get more difficult because of how you started out.

Thankfully, you can kinda emulate life drawing classes by practicing drawing quickly.

So, I can't speak for all life drawing courses, but usually you "warm up" with very loose sketches. These are just to practice proportions and flow. Get a lot of cheap paper, and a cheap pencil (or newspad and charcoal if you want to try a bigger canvas). Limit yourself to 30 seconds for a drawing. Or 1 minute. Or 2 minutes. It doesn't have to look good, in fact, you're doing this to avoid obsessing over details. Try to very quickly block out the shapes of the body from your reference book. Even if it's just like, drawing their torso as a big bean-shape, that's fine. Head just a circle with some lines showing where the features go. That kind of thing.

This is harder by yourself than in a class because in a class you're forced to change poses often. So you really have to police yourself with this one. I'd say do about 5 of each of those "timed studies" in order of least time to most time before starting on something you want to work on for 30+ minutes.

As for references, Andrew Loomis is regularly studied by animation students, George Bridgman is another one, both recommended artists from which you can learn anatomy and flow.

 

[Red Ogre]

I'm definitely interested in checking in on this thread. I have nothing to offer other than astonishment. People that are able to recreate faces with nothing but a pencil and paper are magicians.

 

[Niko (protozoalord)]

Thankfully, you can kinda emulate life drawing classes by practicing drawing quickly.

I didn't think I was doing it right by accident LOL, given my attention span and motivation, most of my sketches are in 5 minutes or less! I'll keep this in mind though. Thank you a lot man!!