I think doing the assignments on paper will nurture your sculpting skills, too. The entire course is all about learning, remembering and replicating specific 3d forms. There are assignments later on in the course that feature more detailed rendering in drawing - for those ones it would sure be best trying to sculpt the subject instead of drawing it - but all the assignments that only involve sketches and getting to know the forms are just as valuable for a sculptor as they are for any 2d artist. While there won't be any advice on sculpting in general, following the lessons and assignments as they are will provide you with all the tools needed to succesfully sculpting the human figure and all its anatomy.

Hi there! I think you did a good job on the structural, mannequinization part :) The underlying simple forms you used to express the anatomy are readable and solid in most places. Only area that to me looks like you didnt really think about constructing it three-dimensionally is her left thigh. The overall form of the upper leg isnt clear anymore, instead you have two complex organic forms that arent easy to comprehend. Maybe try showing the anterior and lateral planes of the upper leg's box a little better with your cross contour lines. The plane change should be visible. Right now, it looks like youre using the s-curve between rec. femoris and add.s as plane change, which doesnt make sense (try imagining a shaded version of this form: it wouldnt look real). All other critique I have for this drawing is regarding line quality and proportion: Especially in the hips the individual forms are hard to read. I think you did construct them well enough, but because of all your cross-contour and x-ray lines having the same strength as the lines seperating the forms the latter are harder to find. You designed the lower legs and esp. the ankles to be unnaturally thin. If thats what youre going for, take heed that both lower legs have the same proportions. Her left lower leg feels a little thinner even than the right. Maybe that's just because the medial portion of that leg's gastrocnemius is too small/ ends too high. Her right leg is about 1 cu longer in your drawing than her left. For me at least it looks like that because I feel that her right toes are touching the ground which would mean that both legs have the same distance to the viewer. Of all of these points there werent really any major complaints, I think youve made a structurally and anatomically solid drawing. Maybe youll find it helpful to re-do this exercise sometimes while thinking of even simpler forms and then adding anatomy "on top". Thats always a good idea, anyway. Have fun drawing and until next time!

Theres another way to think of these overlaps thats mentioned in the robo-bean lesson: If, instead of the two ovals of the bean, you think of two boxes youll find that the overlapping line is created by a side plane twisting its way into visibility from behind a front plane. Its difficult to explain, but maybe try taking a look at the robo-bean lesson, you might find it revelatory! With this explanation in mind, I think both drawings are correct in a way :D The overlap suggested in the pencil drawing is actually the one that can be observed on the model aswell! Kind of. We can see the right side of her torso, and the upper overlapping line is in line with this observation. However, whats right for the actual pose, cannot be applied to the bean in this case. This is due to the bean's twist being so exaggerated that, actually, the left side of its torso-oval is visible and not the right. Its centerline forming an S-shape is an indication of that. Note how the model's spine in the pose is actually forming a C-curve. Now, this doesn't mean the bean is all wrong and should feature a C-centerline instead - its definitely a good thing they put so much exaggeration in there in order to really feel that twist. But abandoning the reference also means that you have to stay true to the logic of your own drawing instead. Hope this provided additional help :) see ya and have fun drawing

Hi there! These are definitely getting somewhere :) It's impressive to see that your drawings are already quite accurate in proportion! There's two pieces of advice I can give you which might be of use: 1. Try making "confident" marks/ lines. This means, start with one line of action for the entire pose. Even if it doesn't align at all with specific body parts! E. g. the LoA for the pose in the top right hand corner would be a big C-curve symbolizing the flow of the torso into the legs. It's not about getting correct results in 30s, it's about literally feeling the pose and the way its energy is translated in drawing. If I were to make a gesture drawing of that pose, I'd glance at it very shortly and my first impression would be: "Whoa, energy flowing in a curve." Then I'd immediately draw this curve based on that very instinctive/emotional first impression. After you did a line of action, apply the same mindset to the secondary aspects of the pose, meaning one gestural line each for shoulders and pelvis, 1-2 lines each for arms and legs. This way, you'll get a purely gestural "spaghetti figure", without any informtion about shape/ weight/ contour and all that distracting stuff that one can focus on afterwards. 2. When you are feeling comfortable with the gestural stick figure, I'd recommend simplifying the gestural shape of the torso into a flexible rectangle and later, to add some form, into "the bean" which is dealt with in one of the following lessons. In your gesture drawings it sometimes looks like you didn't have a clear idea of where the torso starts/ends which, I think, is very important for connecting it to the limbs (or the ground plane as well in seated poses). Also, I personally never start with the head bc I think it's the least gestural part of the body, so it doesn't really help me getting a feeling for the movement in the pose. Btw, that one right upper arm of the stretching model on the bottom right really feels like you felt its gesture while drawing it! Hope you'll find this useful and applicable! Have fun drawing and all the best Felix

Maan these are soo great!! Congrats on getting this far and on having stayed this disciplined over time! May I ask what's the average time limit for these poses and whether you did these from life or photo reference? Also please keep posting stuff like this these are veery inspiring to everyone here I think :DD Grüße aus München :)

i agree with Alessandro :) Only thing there might be to add are gesture lines for the pelvis. Meaning just the angle between the two ASIS similar to the angle between the acromia as you show for the shoulders. It's not always clear to me what the gesture of the pelvis is, even though, I think, it's even more important than the gesture of the shoulders! Other than that you show a clear understanding of the assignment, even getting proportion and shape right for most of these very short poses, so great job! If you haven't already, I recommend taking a closer look into the next lessons. Also, by "in real", do you mean you did these from life? This would be the best way to exercise gesture, so keep it up!! Have fun drawing and all the best Felix

These are not at all what I'd expect for someone's first try on gesture! It looks like you've already got a sufficient feeling for/ grasp on gesture. It will be useful to look at the following lessons to get some more structure and form in there. But I'd say you've pretty much nailed your first try :D Your approach to this one will probably change after you've had some more epiphanies in the other art fundamentals. Have fun!

Eyy, these are really good in my opinion!! I can definitely relate with your experiences with force drawing vs. gesture, haha. I think in order to be able to apply force to figure drawing you'll basically have to have eaten up anatomy, bc it's all about muscle functions and muscle interactions there. But it seems trying to use force on less complex subjects such as the bean has really helped your understanding of gesture and weight, so maybe try some more forced beans? Anyways, while I love your longer pose studies, in which, I think, you started with simple """stick figure"""" gesture lines (but with dynamic & flexible sticks!!) and the bean everywhere, I personally like to begin any gesture drawing with these steps. Otherwise I'll risk making the figure fall apart, as it sometimes happens in your 30s poses. Sometimes, with the shorter poses, I believe you treated "weight lines" that contain information about volume and mass as gesture lines, which are about direction and energy. Maybe it'll help you to differentiate between these concepts in your mind? You can often imagine body parts, like the forms of the limbs (especially in relaxed poses), like a piece of cloth on a clothesline. On one side you have a gesture line (=clothesline: forceful, active, strong directional force, withstanding gravity, direction of the bone), on the other side some weight lines (=cloth: saggy, heavy, affected only by gravity (applied force), hanging from the "rope", muscles & fat). I've attached an image explaining a similar concept (but with a different focus) that has some good drawing examples. Hope this helped a bit! Have fun and keep up the very good work!!

I agree, these are pretty neat. Good idea studying Stan's work. I think your understanding of gesture drawing would really benefit from studying the concept of the bean. And then mannequinization. And then anatomy. And then see how you will have developed. Have fun!

Hi there Dirtynka and welcome to your art journey :) I'll leave a few bits of advice that have helped me when starting to learn art: -"art" as a craft describes a complex set of skills, all of which being used simultaneously by an artist when drawing. Following this figure drawing course as a beginner, I got very frustrated: At some point while focusing on gesture drawing only and not even knowing what other drawing basics there are to learn, my learning curve reached its limit and I didn't know why. -> It is a good idea practicing gesture drawing for some time but then also, one by one, introducing yourself to the other fundamental concepts of drawing. Those basics are all (?) tackled in this free online course: https://drawabox.com/lesson/1 if you are interested. If, as a beginner, you try to work on all these different topics alternatingly, you'll unlock new levels in each field much faster, because they all influence each other! -As for gesture drawing itself, I recommend trying out this exercise first: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5bw3BW4Q6VM&list=PLXkHosWORUv6bxfPGz31WESqw_87adQ5r&index=2 In the video they focus on gesture only in a very exact and easy to understand way. Stan's gesture drawings always contain knowledge of topics that go beyond gesture, such as perspective and anatomy. -Also, on a minor note, changing your drawing media from time to time can be a good idea to stimulate your synapses and steepen your learning curve. I found that for me, drawing digitally provided some limitations in my development. But for a beginner, drawing digitally can be a good idea that takes away some complexity. The most important piece of advice is of course to enjoy the process, not to stress yourself and to take your time! Always keep in mind what drove you to start learning art in the first place and use this thought as a means to boost your stamina while studying! Have fun drawing and all the best Felix

Yes, I think that's the case, too :D For realistic foreshortening, perspective must be applied to the forms! Objects that are farther away from the viewer should appear smaller in comparison to closer objects. For this right humerus, it means that the ellipse at the distal end of the humerus's body should be larger than the ellipse at the proximal end. Constructing the humeral cylinder with a foreshortened box, like the one you correctly constructed for the right hand, can help here. Hope this helps! Have fun studying and keep up the clean linework!