Figure Drawing Class Mode [30 min] Critique

Hello Line Of Action!

I've been practicing my gesture and figure drawing for a week now, and I'm not seeing much improvement. If anyone notices anything I could do to get better, please do give a critique!

Thank you!

Links to my figures/gestures: https://imgur.com/a/6sVEs6K

Hey there,

Your shorter sketches have good flow which is something I am always working toward. On your longer sketches I see a lot of smaller, thinner lines and the figure still looks like it's missing some meat on the gesture of the shape you've placed. One way to move toward this might be trying to focus on shaded and lit areas on the body. I get a charcoal or something with a lot of surface area so I can fill in swathes of area more smoothly.

In general, I think playing around with the parts of the sketch that I focus on (light, gesture, speed, anatomy etc) helps me keep my practices fresh and see my drawings from a new perspective.

Happy Practicing, and thanks for sharing,

Rain

Hello Nedistanman,

These are pretty well done for someone who just started really practicing for a week at them. I think starting out with a quick line of action will really help you find the flow of your studies. The furthest right figure on your 30 sec page has some of this flow going on, but if you'd placed a quick line showing the movement of the body, I feel that you'd be able to see a lot more of the life in the sketch.

Also, it's important to know where the hands and arms are in relation to the rest of the body. I usually draw the head, the line of action, then if I notice there are hands attached or close to the body, I'll draw those. That way I know where they are and I can get my arms and hands to be more accurate in relation to the body. This can be as easy as just drawing a quick circle for the hands and for the elbows as well. The same could be said for the legs and feet if they are closer to the body.

I think that Rain is also right in that you're focusing too much on the smaller strokes. Go ahead and make larger lines and just let the pencil flow on the paper. Worst case you'll make a mistake right? But we're learning so that's perfectly fine and actually required to progress. But what's happening when we make all the tiny strokes is that we're limiting our ability to accept the mistake, or learn from it as we're constantly adjusting.

Lastly, for your 10-minute sketch I would've used the whole page just so you could really get those big lines in there and feel out the form better. Also keep in mind that while an object goes further from us, it gets smaller yes, but it also can be rather close to the figure still. You did a good job with the foreshortening with the left arm and hand, but the right hand appears as though it's sticking straight up. I would again, place that hand in relation to the head, and then really focus on how the muslces/fabric look to make the illusion of depth more accurate.

I didn't realize how long this was getting so I'll leave it here! Again you're doing some good work and I see a lot of great stuff in here.

-Scribs

Me gusta la comparación de los bocetos en los diferentes tiempos puesto que muestra la dedicación y también la fluidez para trabajar bajp un tiempo límite, la dinámica de las poses también es ago que recalcar que es bastante flexibe, no soy experta de arte ni nada por el estilo, pero para alguien que disfruta de dibujar cre que es una una práctica además de poder identificar los errores.

Pienso que lo más importante en no presionarte y difrutar del proceso a pesar de ser solo el boceto. además de que los trazos son un poco desordenados pero fluidos y consistentes.

You might want to try capturing the gesture and shape a bit more, then adding in the details. I struggle with it as well and step back to find the flow, instead of trying to follow the limbs. Something that has helped me a is imagining that the torso is a 3d square or pillow at first, a triangle for the hips.

Hey there, nedistanman, I really and totally love your gestures, pushings of the poses, on your 30 second and 1 minute gestures. Plus I really think you're getting the busy areas and empty areas right, too.

In my opinion, I see some of the body proportions are a little bit disconnected on a few poses. Why don't you spend more time on the relationships (proportions and angles) in your very first 1 hour class mode, if you pretty please?????

The truth of the matter is, your understanding of proportions and perspective will get even more than better with more practice.

Keep doing more 30 second or less attitudes (gestures), in order to lighten up your control on the process.

Hope and pray that it shall and will be applicable to your current goals.

Thanks, and stay safe.

Hmm, like what others said, focusing on longer lines rather than shorter lines may help improve your art, as well as focusing on the gesture before the proportion or anatomy. I drew something like this too in my first year or so, but my art professor told me that if I keep breaking apart my linework in the gesture phase, it just won't flow. Here are some exercises from other arists I've been doing to improve myself that might help you, you're choice though.

1. Use a scrap paper to doodle some squigles or whatever. Doesn't need to be anything, lines, wavy lines, scribbles, it's al,l just meant to free your hand from tension and let it flow. If your hand starts out tense and limited, it''l probably limit your line art.

2. Do some exercises blind. What I mean by this is to only look at your subject and away from the paper. This is blind contour drawing, or in my seesions blind force drawings. Many artists recommend this because not only does switching from looking to drawing break up the flow, we end up drawing from short term memory, which can be very faulty. Training yourself to draw what you see will be invaluable. I know you'll probably get a mess of squiglles, but that's not the point. The point is to develop both observational skills and muscle memory skills so that you draw naturally. You won't get it down in a day, but practice a week or so drawing completely blind, then exercises where you you have brief intervals to look where your hand is on the paper. By this point, you'll likely have an awareness of where your hand is and a focus on the subject itself. I labeled this number two, but this is very important, please practice it.

3. I mentionied blind force drawings. Part of my practice has been seeing gestural force drawings from Michael Matessi's force method. For us, imagine the tension in your elbow when you bend your arm. That's force, and learning to see, feel, and draw it can help make your gestures more dynamic. Matessi being the expert explains it a lot better than I do, describing it as sculpting a figure through pencil. Hed has a bunch of videos on Youtube and if you can shell the price he's got books too that I've found worth the read. Look into the videos and see if it's for you.

All in all, I'd say first get advice from a bunch of different artist about methods they use and their exercises, then try out what's most intuitive to you in your practice. You'll have to keep at it for a while to see some effect, but I know you'' get it. Also, don't be afraid to get out of your comfort zone in a while. If you feel like you've hit a wall, try something new in your practice. Alot of art implements elements from several art methods rather than one, into an approach that's most suitable to the artist, whether it's intuitive, constructive, or just fun. Heck, it can be a combination of the three, that's the beauty of it. So, I guess try out what I said and more. Don't limit yourself and you'll go places. Hope that helps, good luck. Oh one lat thing. Draw from the shoulder and elbow, not the wrist. Agh, my wrist.