💭 do we want what we can’t have, or do we have a knack for taking all that we already have for granted while chasing whatever’s faster, bigger, newer and louder?
learning to differentiate between what i must fight hard to accomplish and what’s simply not meant for me has been a painful lesson to learn, but it’s also brought me immense peace 💖
After going cross-eyed painting what felt like a thousand leaves for my last piece, I promised myself I wouldn't do that again. Clearly this is why I have trust issues with myself.
Anyway, this is the digital drawing refining process I went through before starting to paint.
Hi! First off I jut wanted to say I'm a huge fan of your work. Your art inspires me so much and I love all of the fanfics you've written. Especially pieces of you. Anyways, I was wondering if you have any tips for beginners. Anatomy wise I mean. I'm not very good at Anatomy and was wondering if you had any tips? That's all. Keep up the great work!
thanks so much!!
man i love talking about learning How To Art, lets get to it *breaks my knuckles*
I did a quick tik tok a hot minute ago rambling on my process with figures:
I am trying to narrow down my thoughts and i think that overall, human anatomy is easiest to grasp by starting simple, then narrowing your focus.
as i mentioned in the above tik tok, simplification of shapes can really help, as well as memorizing general proportions of the body. even if you cannot draw the specific detail of, say, the musculature of a neck, or every single finger joint, if the structure is there and is generally in the right place, it will be far more helpful.
my favorite phrase in regards to developing skills and then style is, "you need to learn the rules before you can break them."
Observation and reference is super important, especially with something as complex as the human form. Frequently refer back to real people, pictures, references.
(If you are able to, I recommend trying to attend sessions with live models. If you can't there's lots of websites that give a similar structure to those sessions, but with photos instead (most sites give an option to exclude nude pictures as well which can be nice). (here's one i found by googling "figure drawing")
To practice simplified anatomy, i would probably recommend gesture drawing, just very quick and loose doodles from reference (with the above type of website, 60 seconds a pose or less!) to help get an idea of your basic shapes and proportions. (Some examples below!!)
Reference is very much your friend. if you do have a specific pose in mind, ask a friend to pose for a picture, or take one of you! (or be like me and use a webcam, because you've already got a tripod for it, why not)
(tracing from photos can also be a good way to learn! though it is important to remember that it should be used as a LEARNING TOOL, not as a means to produce a final piece of artwork.)
my final note for this long ass ramble is that, often times people will pass along tutorials from other artists. HOARD THESE. so many people have really good tips for shortcuts, or how they think about things! (for example, this artist, Meg Syv, is someone whose work i really admire, PLUS she retweets a lot of tutorials as well as posts lots of WIP work, which gives some insight into her process!) (i think she's been coming back to Tumblr as well, @/bludragongal )
okay i think that's all i can word vomit for the moment.
TLDR: Observe and Reference from Life, Simplified > Complex, Create a dragon hoard of tips and tutorials that other kind people post online.
HOPE THIS HELPS!! All the well wishes for your art journey!