Art Musing (and feedback)
14d
Dwight
Hello, it's been a bit (a couple of years). I haven't posted because I haven't been doing gesture. I think I've gotten to a point in drawing where proportion, gesture, perspective, and light are natural to me (about D range in a A-F grade scale).
Attached is the first figure drawing I've done in a long time. Feel free to critique. Refs are from the free pack from Grafit, shoutout to them.
But the main point of me post is this: how do I continue learning without getting burnt out? I only got to the bones of the arms on Proko before entirely quitting drawing for 3 months, and I don't want this to happen again (this was 2ish years ago luckily). I do want to learn arm and leg anatomy, but I'm scare that I'll hate drawing again. These past 2 years has been me just having fun, drawing whatever I like. But I feel the need to grow, and I'm not convinced that I can grow without conscious and purposeful learning.
Let me know what you think, of any of this, and thanks.
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8d
Really loving the stylization you've got going in these figures, nice stuff, and nice shading!
I think the important thing especially with learning fundamentals (or just anything that your brain tells you is boring!) is that you can still have fun and draw whatever you like! Bex had some great advice in their comment here as well. Do the lessons to get the basics down, and then see how you can apply what you learned to things you really like drawing.
Are there specific areas you want to grow your skills? Can you apply these areas to the things you draw for fun?
Take breaks, move on to different concepts, and come back later when you feel refreshed. Keep on practicing and enjoying the process! :)
It think it depends on why you ended up burnt out... Was it because you forced yourself to practice something you didn't enjoy, all for the sake of improvement? If so, you should find a way to make the practice itself enjoyable. Forcing yourself is a short-term solution. As Stephen McCranie says "Fun gets the work done." I recommend his comic Brick by Brick, on sustainable creativity. (you can find it online)
Also, beautiful drawings. You did a great job separating light and shadow families.
Firstly, your drawings are beautiful, and you make value understanding effortless!
I struggle with balancing active learning, and creating for myself as well, so I completely understand your worries. It’s great to recognise this might be a problem before it becomes a problem, so you can take steps to avoid it.
I have a lot to say about this, and writing it out to you kind of helps me internalise some of it as well - so hope you don’t mind 😊
The best advice I heard to avoid burnout was actually at the start of the ‘draw a box’ course, and it can be used for anything, from art, to learning a language. The advice was to always try to keep making art for you, and try to keep time spent actively learning less than 50% of the time you are drawing (or painting). (Honestly, I find anatomy incredibly dry to learn, so if you feel the same, maybe have anatomy be 10% of the time your draw). The danger from burnout comes from devoting all your time to active study, and you start to forget why you are learning to draw in the first place.
Writing out a goal helps, and dont wait until you’ve hit an imaginary goalpost before you allow yourself to work on that goal. There’s a danger (especially for me) that once you start actively studying again, you start to think that any time drawing that isn’t exercises, is wasted. If your goal is to create art you enjoy, then drawing stuff that makes you happy, your own stuff, isn’t wasted. That’s you actively working on your goal, and that’s why you’re doing it.
Hope that helps! (And that i made sense 😅)
Oh yeah forgot to mention the times range: 4x 1min, 3x 2min, 2x 5min, 1x 10min. Hopefully you can tell which are which.
