A few gestures after Glenn Vilppu. This was an exercise in lines of action, as well as practicing my mark-making, (CSI stuff) and trying to keep things clean (and failing haha). Gesture is one of my weakest areas, and since I'm hoping to one-up my overall figure drawing now, it seemed like doing a master study was as good a place as any to start. Let me know how I can improve, Proko community! Thanks!

After suffering from a massive dose of inspiration to draw, I decided to do some more gesture studies! I put "gesture" in quotations because the more I dig into this concept for my own drawings, the more I'm realizing it almost doesn't even exist. It's like penmanship... everyone's handwriting is different despite using the same alphabet (assuming we're all using the same language, i.e. line is the alphabet, and gesture is the distinct handwriting). There is no definitive gesture drawing method or style or means or anything, no way it's supposed to look. All it is is expressing the figure in as few of moves as possible before going into the rest of your drawing. How it looks for you, how sloppy it is, how it shows up... it doesn't really matter! As long as it allows you to spot your figure and get it on the page, it's fair game. Although I wish I could tame my sloppiness a little bit... but again I blame the fact that I'm working so small in a travel sketchbook. It's my excuse and I'm sticking to it! At any rate, I usually begin my drawings sloppy anyway to find my lines, then once I've located my shapes, I come back and emphasize what I like with darker, more deliberate marks. In charcoal this is super easy to execute without having the drawing turn into a gross mess, erasing plenty and ghosting in light swiping lines... but in pen... Oh heavens does it show off the bad habits haha. These are 5-minute "gestures" done in ballpoint pen, after Julliette Aristides. I'm continuing to spot and draw in the line of action and really trying to feel things like contrapasso and proportion and straights, curves, etc. I like this style of gesture better than my previous Glenn Vilppu studies, too, even though I find that style more beautiful. I'm partial to the envelope method, and this speaks more to that than Glenn's free flowing form feel, which I find almost too poetic to turn into something accurate enough for my taste. I also chose to do it in pen because I really wanted to force myself to commit. To go for it and stop getting too uptight about it all. I'm still not super happy with these. Too scratchy, too indecisive, wonky line choice... But the rusty old cogs in my head are turning! There's always this point when I'm drilling myself on something that I consider a weakness. It starts off super frustrating, then gets more frustrating. Then, even though I'm still frustrated because I can't do what I want yet, I begin to understand what I need to do to change my hand. I think I'm at that point now. Once I can start working larger again, I'm confident I'll experience the leap into enlightenment that always follows this frustration period. But for now, this will have to do! Again, let me know what you think, Proko community.

I just visited the art center where I will begin a class format mentorship program on July 10th. And let's just get to the point. I'm terrified. Haha They were very nice, but I started sweating and stammering and they seemed to think my questions were weird. They kindly called them philosophical, but from their faces, you could tell they meant weird. :P The class is open and the mentor is going to walk around and offer assistance on whatever you're working on. I would be much more comfortable continuing to pursue this in the safety of my basement studio only sharing this with people I will likely never see, but I know that being in a room with better artists and having a strong feedback loop will be incredibly helpful for my growth. Anyone else deal with similar feelings in these situations and how have you coped with them?

Hello everyone I have a question is that i to draw in tintin herge style, anime style,flintstone style,ben 10 style and semi-realistic style and since my goal is to draw in that particular style and not to draw in realistic anatomy style then why should I spend time in learning real human anatomy and I am confused in it please shed light on it and end my confusion pleaseeeee!!!!! *Is it necessary to learn real human anatomy to be able to draw in the tintin herge style, anime style, flintstone style,ben10 style and semi-realistic style!!!!!!!

Have recently been drawing again after a years lull. Did some sketches of fruit to warm up cause its been a hot second, turned out better than expected - feel like it was good representation of the form but the quality of shading is messy ans directionless and I don't think I demostrated a clear enough difference between each value. I have included a screenshot of another artist on here who's shading i will try to work rowards next time as it's super impressive and crisp. Decided to learn about reilly finally which i've really been enjoying! Feel it's really helping me to understand the form of the face in terms of the fleshy bits(?! - its late dont judge me( and how light and shadow behaves in the context of these forms. Generally need to work on hair as I was definitely making some hopeful decisions without direction and I think that shows 😅 Still need to work on confidence with my lines and get used to using charcoal in overhand grip. Overall pleased with my progress though😊 Critique always welcome.

Drew Sonic the Hedgehog after watching Stan's video on combining different line weight methods and I made a certain choice to make the lines really thick and dark at specific points like Sonic's quills, his index finger, and the tips of his shoes. Does anyone have any critique on how I could improve?

Hi everyone! I would love a critique on my linework. This is from the simplify to CSI part of the Drawing Basics course. For anyone that does not know or hasn't done this part of the course for a good while. The goal is to simplify the pictures to C, S and I lines. The proportion doesn't really matter. In the beginning I just drew, trying to match the outlines I saw on the pictures. When I watched the video again I noticed that I drew way too fast and slowed down a lot. Making my marks more intentional. What do you think is the most important line mistake or lesson I need to learn and improve one?

Good evening, I'm 39, never drew or did anything artistic in my life and started with Stan's Drawing Basics course four months ago. I've been struggling my way through all the projects and now reached the end of the value section where the project is to draw a head from the reference photos of a bust and I just can't do it because drawing a head is still super intimidating and feels impossible. Throughout the whole course most of my drawings looked like those of a 5 year old compared to the submissions of others that had an almost professional look to them. I don't really know where to go from here. While I really like the course, I feel like I can't keep up with what the course expects of me at this point and that I thoroughly lack talent which in the end does matter although everybody says it does not. Does anybody have an advice how I could continue the drawing journey without the ever-present feeling of being overwhelmed? Should I maybe focus on a single subject matter (e.g. birds, trees, figure) so that I focus on one thing instead of doing a new one in each course project? And did anyone of you struggle like I did and got past the desperation eventually? Thanks Michael

Hello everyone. I just started the course and did the first exercise with a pear. I would appreciate any feedback! Sorry for the cropped shadow, I misjudged the placement on the page

Hi everyone, I’ve just signed up to the Drawing Basics Course and thought it would be fun to learn alongside a few other beginners. I’m looking to form a small friendly group where we can encourage each other to keep practicing, ask questions, stay motivated and share our weekly exercises and progress. No pressure or judgement- just enjoying learning together. Maybe looking to post one exercise each week - not sure if that’s the usual thing. If you’re interested let me know where you’re from (I’m in Dorset UK), whether you are a beginner etc. If enough people are interested, we could keep everything on Proko or later try WhatsApp. looking forward to meeting some fellow wannabe artists! Lia 🇬🇧

Hello everyone hope y'all having a nice this is a mannequin practice I did and I please give me feedback for it and my long term goal is to make character designs for comics and make comics!!!!!!

Does a drawing need to look exactly like the reference? When using a photo, it is easy to feel that any unmatched color or detail must be a mistake. But drawing is not about copying every change onto the paper. The key is knowing the goal of the study. For shape, focus on proportion, angle, and placement. For values, study light, shadow, and cast shadows. For color, compare temperature, saturation, and value. A reference provides information, not an answer to copy stroke by stroke. We can simplify or leave things out, as long as we understand what we are choosing.

Hello everyone in the following image where I have marked in blue there is something which feels off but I cannot figure out what if off so please help me!!!!!!!!!!!! If it is possible a drawover would help a lot!!!!!

Hello, I'm thinking about doing the full 'Drawing Basics' course, and I'd like to find a small group of people (4 or 5 or so) who are about to start the same course so we can (constructively) critique each other's work and try to keep each other motivated for the assignments :) Because in general it looks like instructors feedback is only sporadically happening, and without any feedback at all it's probably a lot harder to get better at drawing. At least for me, your mileage may vary of course :) If anyone's interested, feel free to let me know. (also posted this in the 'Art Lounge')

Hello! I just started Drawing Basics and I would like some feedback on my pear. I had a hard time with the second-to-lightest value as I thought it was mentioned in the video not to have too many distinguishable pencil lines for the different values. But upon looking at the video again, I think I just misunderstood. Anyway, I appreciate any advice or thoughts!

Should we go in order? After Line and Shape, do we need to follow the order? I'm just asking because I don't want to mess myself up, but I want to check out the perspective portions of the course. There are things I need to go back and do over, again. I know that. Like, my lines need work, and morphing basic shapes isn't really my thing, yet. BUT perspective might give me a fresh perspective on things. Sorry, anyway. I think I talked myself into watching the perspective lessons. Thanks

I take the picture of the art; this doesn't look great. Should we put flash on? Shutter speed or something? The light hits the page and it's wonky, and then the stuff from the other side comes through. I think that is a paper problem. Anyway, any ideas about how to photograph the work in a sketchbook?

I am wondering if this is a good use of my iPad. I drew the boxes with the reference on the iMac before loading them into a separate layer and adjusting the size only to fit over the reference. This skill is primarily aimed to develop our ability to see, correct? I did not use the line straightener function. But I’m also wondering if incorporating that into future practice might accelerate iteration and reduce complexity so my eyes can focus more on construction without the variable of line inconsistency? Or is all of this grossly missing the point?

Line weight of importance for the rino. How much weight should the line have? Should I be tapering lines that go into the animal/shape? Digital inking is neat, but it's time consuming. I'm using affinity designer 2 for the inking: pen, weight and divide techniques. Any tips for increasing accuracy and speed? Thanks Peace