How Could I Improve My Art?

[jurassicplayer]

You're attempting to mimic popular cartoon styles with absolutely _no_ grasp of the underlying fundamentals. You clearly have not taken any time to learn perspective, proportions or anatomy. You've attempted to jump ahead to the end product and as a result can only produce poorly drawn replications.
If you have a sincere desire to ever "improve your art" I suggest you stop trying to take shortcuts and begin by learning basic drawing skills.

heh heh...that is what I do...completely ignore all the rest of it and just mimic and remix...Although it would be great to improve my art skills, my way of improving so far has been "Look at previous stuff I drew before and notice that they all look like shit, determine what looks like shit the most, and then draw something completely different while not caring about what looked like shit last time"...and surprisingly enough, I feel like my artwork has slightly improved from the lame crap I used to draw. Oh wait! I now understand! It's obvious that I have been unconsciously absorbing the proportions I wish my drawings to have while watching anime and reading manga. I see, I see...The only things I consider for basic drawing skills is the ability to draw a line, draw a circle, and know what the hell to draw.

 

[dib]

In other words, you're telling me that practice translates into transitional improvement? That is so insightful I must get it tattooed on my chest...upside down so I'll still be able to read it and not forget it.

I suppose the heart of the matter is the scope or what one wants to achieve. The topic is here is "how could improve my art", so I am telling this person exactly how to do that. If your personal goal is to forever copy anime characters onto notebook paper, then by all means don't reach any further than that.

 

[Myke]

In other words, you're telling me that practice translates into transitional improvement? That is so insightful I must get it tattooed on my chest...upside down so I'll still be able to read it and not forget it.

I suppose the heart of the matter is the scope or what one wants to achieve. The topic is here is "how could improve my art", so I am telling this person exactly how to do that. If your personal goal is to forever copy anime characters onto notebook paper, then by all means don't reach any further than that.

practice DOES translate into transitional improvement. Even if you aren't applying anatomy or porportions yet, by repetition those things fall into place over time, eventually the artist will start focusing on these things as well if they want to push themselves any further. I don't think anyone here should even listen to your advice unless you are ready to throw down and show us your artwork. As of now you just sound like an elitest wanna be. Show us your work if you don't mind. and be honest. also stop trolling the art forum.

 

[dib]

I know that perfectly well. And I'm saying it's such an obvious statement that jurassicplayer had a non-point in bringing it up in response to my post.

Duskye can keep repeating these same steps--incorrectly--and winding up with the same results. Or he can learn to do it right from the ground up. That ultimately depends if he really _wants_ to improve. But if I were collecting income for every 14 year old out there who said he wanted to draw but showed no aptitude for sitting down and learning it, I could buy and sell Steve Jobs a few thousand times over.

 

[Nujui]

It's still all derivative.

You're attempting to mimic popular cartoon styles with absolutely _no_ grasp of the underlying fundamentals. You clearly have not taken any time to learn perspective, proportions or anatomy. You've attempted to jump ahead to the end product and as a result can only produce poorly drawn replications.

Considering said replicas are shaky line notebook doodles, I'm not certain you even grasp aesthetic value. Most people would have--at the very least--cleaned these up and taken the time to scan the images instead of passing off cam shots. That would make it passable for Deviantart standards.

This will hopefully show you that even when producing cartoon characters, an artist still has more going on than you may immediately understand. If you have a sincere desire to ever "improve your art" I suggest you stop trying to take shortcuts and begin by learning basic drawing skills.

All I asked was how I could improve. You don't think I know that half of my drawings suck? That I don't do much original stuff?

 

[dib]

And that is how you improve.

First, don't worry about the sucking part. Everybody starts out terrible. I know a guy who was working for Marvel until a couple years ago, and his early stuff is laughable. He's the first to joke about it. Fast forward to adulthood with several comics under his belt, and he's drawing the comics for some of their top characters.

It all starts from a desire to imitate somebody, afterall. We all have our idols and are secretly busting our arse just to catch up, with the hope of someday even one up'ing them.

But understand this--art is a long, tedious process that consumes copious amounts of your time. The sort of quality that your favorite artists make to look so simple is the product of dedication.

If you're serious about getting to that point, you have to be willing to put in that legwork to study. Get books on anatomy. They have ones geared specifically toward drawing cartoons and caricatures if that's where you're looking, but you really can't go wrong with knowing too much. Learn the rules that govern perspective and proportion so that you're not haphazardly scribbling lines across a page with no understanding of how they should look.

Learn to use some digital software while you're at it. I use Corel Paint Shop Pro which could be found for all of $20-$30 online. I can recommend plenty of freeware programs too. What you're doing right now should probably be just the first phase toward a cleaner product--scan them and then redo it in vectors. Add in some colors and you would have something pretty presentable.

 

[alex_0706]

try reading books like how to draw manga's (not the real name)
or books like this

 

[Nujui]

EDIT: NVM.

 

[kudaku]

These video tutorials helped me alot, just wanting to share

http://youtu.be/f7rjoiTNJj0

http://youtu.be/8sFKNEvkPu8

 

[Shockwind]

Draw the form of the character you wanted to draw, like anatomy of a dog, human, etc. So it'll be easier for you to draw the character, etc that you like.

EDIT: Or just draw plain shapes for your guide if it's hard for you to draw anatomy.

 

[Nujui]

Thanks you two.

I probably won't be here for while, so thank you for the advice.

 

[SamAsh07]

What-ever your level of drawing is, it's definitely a 1000 times better than mine.

 

[Ethevion]

It definitely requires practice and more practice. A quick google search on drawing mangas game me this. If you're looking for cartoons, try googling it. There are lots of tutorials to help you out.

 

[Nujui]

Well, it's been awhile hasn't it? Well, I only have one thing to post, and that's from my art class. Had to draw a hand. Sorry if it's pretty big, camera is acting funky.

Spoiler

(And yes I already see the problem with it, but it was something we had limited time to do.)

 

[machomuu]

Well, it's been awhile hasn't it? Well, I only have one thing to post, and that's from my art class. Had to draw a hand. Sorry if it's pretty big, camera is acting funky.

Spoiler

(And yes I already see the problem with it, but it was something we had limited time to do.)

Well first off, the the pointer finger looks 2 dimensional, as if in the picture it were a paper hand.

Second, try adding the creases to the backs of the fingers, they look boneless.

Third, when one gives a "thumb up" the ends of their fingers tend to point inwards, towards their palms.

That is all for now.

 

[Nujui]

Well, it's been awhile hasn't it? Well, I only have one thing to post, and that's from my art class. Had to draw a hand. Sorry if it's pretty big, camera is acting funky.

Spoiler

(And yes I already see the problem with it, but it was something we had limited time to do.)

Well first off, the the pointer finger looks 2 dimensional, as if in the picture it were a paper hand.

Second, try adding the creases to the backs of the fingers, they look boneless.

Third, when one gives a "thumb up" the ends of their fingers tend to point inwards, towards their palms.

That is all for now.

Yeah, like I said it was done in a limited time so I couldn't fix all the problems

 

[Anakir]

To be honest, you can't use that excuse. Every artwork will always be on "limited" time since nothing is really considered done. You can always add more or change it to please a different crowd. Like mentioned, start with basics.

Look for shapes. Lightly draw out your shapes and connect them. Look for negative space. A lot of people tend to draw without any attention to negative space. Negative space has a hugeeee impact on your drawings.

One good thing I can say is that, although you mention that your artworks "suck," you have enough confidence to put it up for people to criticize. Now, regardless of the criticism, you need to accept it no matter how harsh it may be because you're trying to push your drawings further. We may be the wrong crowd to please though.

I have a bachelor of fine arts (drawing and painting). I have a lot of experience with critiques and I do a wide variety of genres and techniques. Just letting you know the things I mentioned aren't just thought of off the top of my head.

 

[Nujui]

To be honest, you can't use that excuse. Every artwork will always be on "limited" time since nothing is really considered done. You can always add more or change it to please a different crowd. Like mentioned, start with basics.

Look for shapes. Lightly draw out your shapes and connect them. Look for negative space. A lot of people tend to draw without any attention to negative space. Negative space has a hugeeee impact on your drawings.

One good thing I can say is that, although you mention that your artworks "suck," you have enough confidence to put it up for people to criticize. Now, regardless of the criticism, you need to accept it no matter how harsh it may be because you're trying to push your drawings further. We may be the wrong crowd to please though.

I have a bachelor of fine arts (drawing and painting). I have a lot of experience with critiques and I do a wide variety of genres and techniques. Just letting you know the things I mentioned aren't just thought of off the top of my head.

Your right that time isn't a excuse, I just wanted to show what I did in a limited time as appose to me fixing it. I really never drew a hand before and when you only have around 40 mins to do it during class, you can't really fix everything especially if it's your first time doing so. Only reason I put it up with the problems was because I wanted people to point them out in case I miss one, that's all.

And I guess the reason why I keep saying that it sucks is because I've seen plenty better looking at other drawings, though that's what keeps pushing me though.

 

[PurpleEyesOfDeat]

You will get the hang of it - I know it!
You will get better and better - I know it!
If you keep practicing, you can get better and better as you do it

xoxo

 

[Nujui]

Another hand, a bit better this time.