LN Draws For A Year

[LonelyNess]

I've always been very jealous of artists, having what I believe to be no artistic ability whatsoever myself. But, I read that if you do anything mediocrely for long enough you can become not terrible at anything, so here I will chronolog my endeavor to draw a picture a day for a year. I'm already a week into the the project, so here's a little bit of a picture dump. Please, critique me and tell me if I'm so shit that I shouldn't even bother continuing.

I have a list of prompts that extends for a year, but if you guys wanna give me prompts I can use them as a substitute, just remember that I'm not good so please don't expect me to draw anything very complex, (day 7 was me drawing a mason jar for fucks sake)...

 

[Vederation]

You should draw your debit card next. It'll help with solidifying your skills and techniques! *hint* *hint*

Joke aside, I like the motivation behind this project and this is a really great practice, so I am compelled to bite. As a starting point, my advice as a fellow "artist" regarding this matter would be to not get caught up in details: to focus on getting the shapes correct should be emphasized at this stage, since completion should be your top priority. There are two reasons for this: 1.) because you want to know why objects are made the way the are 2.) getting gud in drawing takes mileage and completion: the quicker you finish, the more arts you make. And the more arts you make, the better and experienced you are in the long run. Be sure to keep yourself challenged on getting the shapes and angles accurate/convincing, however

You're on the right track, so hopefully you can keep yourself motivated to reach entry 365. I'll look forward for more. Cheers.

 

[LonelyNess]

Vederation - thanks for the advice that I just try and make sure to get the basic shapes / angles right before trying to get more elaborate. I think that's why my bed is the weakest of the pictures, I tried to get detailed and just failed miserably (i mean it does look like a bed but the perspective is all off). Tried to keep Day 8's picture as simple as possible while making sure it was clearly a wristwatch and I'm pretty happy with it.

debating whether or not to do weekly image dumps or daily

 

[LonelyNess]

Tables / beds can fuck right off ty. Not super happy with this one at all.

 

[LonelyNess]

Holy fuuuuuuck hands are hard.

 

[LonelyNess]

Started out by drawing my own glasses but decided not to because my glasses are hideous, so I drew the most plain glasses I could think of.

 

[LonelyNess]

Ok, so I was reading some drawing tutorials and they suggested if you're a sketcher (like me), to go out of your comfort zone every once and a while and do full line art. It also suggested that I draw in pen, because making mistakes that you can't undo is pivotal to learning how to draw, so today's drawing I decided to do that. Also I stopped using loose leaf notebook paper and bought a $2 sketchbook.

I present to you: Chicken Breast + Mashed potatoes and gravy.

 

[LonelyNess]

I reeeeeeally don't like line art vs. sketching... you can way more easily see my mistakes (which I think is the point?)

 

[LonelyNess]

Two weeks, in the books! I'm pretty happy with my teddy bear. I call him stuffles.

 

[LonelyNess]

Woo trees!

 

[LonelyNess]

If I had a hammer
I'd hammer in the morning
I'd hammer in the evening
All over this land

 

[LonelyNess]

I fucked up the inside of the bell, but other than that i'm mostly very satisfied with how nice my lines / curves are. They're very straight and uniform.

 

[LonelyNess]

 

[LonelyNess]

Ok, so the two tires are not uniform, but beside that I REALLY like how this one turned out.

 

[LonelyNess]

Drawing something "old" is such a dumb prompt...

 

[LonelyNess]

Three weeks down! 49 to go.

 

[Bummer]

Holy fuuuuuuck hands are hard.

Congratulations upon reaching enlightenment.

This seems to be an overall good practise you've got going on. Are you aiming towards being able to draw things realistically, or will you settle with just being able to draw stuff that's recognisable? If the latter, try to check out the works of other artists/comics and actually study the various objects in the background or whatnot. Sometimes I'm surprised by how a drawing can have various flaws or just being shoddy in general but still be interpreted perfectly by my brain without thinking twice about it. Once you have identified the minimum amount of effort needed to draw something, it's easier to branch off from there towards more advanced stuff, sort of like starting out with skeletons, and then moving on with muscles and skin.

I'm not trying to encourage laziness, but I've seen my share of new artists who jump straight to realism, even though that's not always a requirement if all you want is just to draw well. The method you're already using is making you improve step by step, which is great, but I got the impression from some of the drawings that you're using photos as reference, so don't feel pressured to aim for the same level of complexity. Just have fun for now and get familiar with shapes and drawing styles.

 

[LonelyNess]

Congratulations upon reaching enlightenment.

This seems to be an overall good practise you've got going on. Are you aiming towards being able to draw things realistically, or will you settle with just being able to draw stuff that's recognisable? If the latter, try to check out the works of other artists/comics and actually study the various objects in the background or whatnot. Sometimes I'm surprised by how a drawing can have various flaws or just being shoddy in general but still be interpreted perfectly by my brain without thinking twice about it. Once you have identified the minimum amount of effort needed to draw something, it's easier to branch off from there towards more advanced stuff, sort of like starting out with skeletons, and then moving on with muscles and skin.

I'm not trying to encourage laziness, but I've seen my share of new artists who jump straight to realism, even though that's not always a requirement if all you want is just to draw well. The method you're already using is making you improve step by step, which is great, but I got the impression from some of the drawings that you're using photos as reference, so don't feel pressured to aim for the same level of complexity. Just have fun for now and get familiar with shapes and drawing styles.

Well, my overall "goal" is to be able to do some art for a board game that I've designed, because I can't afford to pay artists and I don't wanna beg for free art for a product that eventually I hope to profit from. Also I've always just wanted to be good at drawing pretty things but have never had the technical mastery to do so.

And yes, I have been using photographs (or my own items) as reference for most of the drawings. If I didn't I have little to no grasp of what lines are meant to go where and I imagine the things wouldn't look like the things they're supposed to look like. I've been following the lessons from drawabox.com and he recommends using photos for reference until you get a good "mental library" of images and how they're supposed to be drawn. Do you disagree with that approach? If you think it would be more beneficial I'd be open to only drawing things from memory.

 

[Bummer]

he recommends using photos for reference until you get a good "mental library" of images and how they're supposed to be drawn.

I can agree with that advice, and also that "mental library" is a very handy term since that's essentially what most amateur artists will go by: regardless if you're capably of drawing the ideas you have in mind, you should at the very least know what it should look like. Getting to the point to flesh those ideas out to satisfaction is what takes time and effort.

 

[LonelyNess]

Feet aren't as hard as hands but i feel like maybe my toes are too spaced apart.

 

[Bummer]

I'd suggest you go back to your earlier days of sketching with a pencil, and once you have the shapes down, draw the final lineart with your ink pen on top. As we've spoken about on Discord, that foot is a bit off when it comes to the placement of the toes, which I suspect happened because you drew one toe at a time and didn't outline the foot beforehand.

Sketching first and inking second is great because you can be more loose and experimental in the first stage where you focus on getting all the outlines, shapes, and main features right, while the inking stage is where you only draw the important bits and add the final details that don't have to be sketched beforehand (like wrinkles and such).

 

[LonelyNess]

Apples would be delicious if i weren't allergic to them.

 

[LonelyNess]

This is a drawing unrelated to my daily drawing prompts but i got into a bit of a drawing "mood" and wanted to draw my favorite pokemon so I could see how good I could make it.

 

[Nerina]

It's really inspiring to see you draw and post here everyday! I know of another artist on the PS! Art Chat who draws everyday, and it's really amazing to see how much progress he made each year! I also personally feel like I'm improving much more whenever I can get myself to draw consistently, or at least study or look critically at artwork. You also welcome feedback, which is another trait which will help you improve quicker! I'm looking forward to see much more from you ^_^

 

[LonelyNess]

The eyes look really... off, to me and I'm not quite sure why. I think maybe they're too close together and maybe slightly too big?