and the angular-ness of the image - obviously an artistic choice. I'm going through an angular phase right now I think. If we had to render everything exactly how it is then we wouldn't be much of artists would we?
One thing to mention at last. You should be an artist first and physician last. So learn as much that you can communicate your message but as less that you keep loose and not end in stiff, over rendered muscle men.
http://i251.photobucket.com/albums/gg310/Chriskhaos/IMG_2518.jpg
The thigh of (his) left leg currently doesn't support the flow of the figure. It appears to by almost sagging despite his beefed/firm muscles. The red arrow shows your current action-line, and the blue line shows a possible fix.
(http://img224.imageshack.us/img224/3056/wiiiidecq7.jpg)
well i found some of my grandfathers ink pens, so i thought i'd try them out on a new anatomy sketch.I'm not sure if anyone's pointed it out yet, but one thing that keeps catching my attention is that the feet on your people seem to consistently be a little on the small side. I think that the length of a foot is supposed to be roughly half of the distance from an ankle to the bottom of the knee, or something like that. Yours look to be closer to a third of the distance in most cases.
In case you haven't seen this already, I'd recommend checking this out:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/334333/Constructive-Anatomy
:P The hand is backwards.I don't think so. Looks like he has the hand turned thumb-out.
Aye, the hand looks correct to me.:P The hand is backwards.I don't think so. Looks like he has the hand turned thumb-out.
I don't know what the golden ration is. I just threw things together that I thought might make sense or look good. I'm really only used to drawing figures/humans. Landscapes, wildlife, and buildings confuse me. I don't know where to begin or how to do them. I've even screwed around with point-based perspective and nothing's ever come out looking good. This is ending up like every other drawing idea I've gotten.. starts out cool and somewhat exciting, then as soon as my pencil or stylus hits the page/tablet it all goes to hell.
[edit] I am thankful for the help I've received.. I don't want anyone to think I'm being ungrateful. It's just a matter of personal disappointment. I guess I'll try my hand at it again later today.
That all sounds good, I guess, but I doubt I can pull it off. There's a lot I don't know.. how land forms near mountains, how to create a believable set of rooftops and trees, how to mimic the look of an aurora, the texture of the moon, etc.
Arms are unrealistically tight with the body. Legs are too long. Shorten the upperleg so that the fingertips touch the top of the knee, and scale the lowerleg accordingly. Make sure your feet fit about 1.5 times into the lower leg.I agree with you on the arms. The legs seem fine to me, four heads to the crotch region... I'm not sure where the fingertips touching top of the knee comes from, my body and a few charts I posthumously consulted seem to contradict that. Feet are an issue with me, as I can't reference my own body because my feet are essentially as long as my forearm and I'm reluctant to believe that's the norm, thanks for the proportional guideline.
Note that knowing proportions won't do. Whatever you draw, I actually recommend to find some sort of reference to get your perspective right. I tend to be able to draw a pose from a certain angle from my mind only if I drew it from life once, I don't know how this is for other people, but basically I'd have to draw every possible limb from every possible angle at least once to be able to draw anything without reference correctly.For the past couple months I've felt a sort of artistic stagnation which I believe has a direct correlation with my dependency on references. I can draw from life and from photos well enough for my purposes (for now) but when it comes to imagination/creation rather than reproduction/interpretation I feel my art is lagging significantly. So now is my attempt to remedy this by confronting my deficiencies as an artist, even if it means 'regressing', or rather, abandoning my comfort zone in order to learn new things.
Both arms might actually be too long, with how they're bent, actually.Yes, I agree. My application of proportions in general is far two two-dimensional, I need to work on some foreshortening I think.
Ryu's postThank you very much for the edit. What you did with the arms and shoulders is very good. I will make some more things soon with your advice in mind. I'll be trying to make some more dynamic stuff soon also.
Well Nate anybody who stretches canvases corners in is just lamesauce :p Maybe Parsons should add stretching a canvas to their admissions requirement?
I know this is off topic from anatomy- we could call it canvas anatomy maybe?- but white knuckling the first pinnings is a no no? My teacher taught me to do centers of top, then bottom, left then right, and if my hands don't ache from the stretch I put on the canvas it always turns out too loose to be used for anything more than drapery.
It looks like you have a very 2d thought process going on. You draw the outlines but do not shade. These artists that you see the work flow out of probably build their figure studies out of light and shadow rather than try and do a contour drawing every time. You don't need to memorize much if you visualize it in 3d. A lot of it is confidence, too. I remember earlier in this thread, Helm told me to stop scribbling, and it really helped. (at least in pencil drawings, I don't draw enough on my tablet to be used to the medium) If every line is a purposeful one time thing everything will flow. Don't worry if you get it wrong, there's always a next time. c:Amen to that.
It seems like you understand a great deal about anatomy itself, however the problem you are facing is the execution.
Another question I have for you guys/girls is, "Is drawing fun for you? Do you enjoy drawing? Also where do you draw, is it at a desk, your bed(someone elses bed?) the floor, a chair, standing up, etc?Drawing is great fun for me, provided I'm not getting frustrated/hitting walls. But I find that only happens when the direction I'm taking the piece doesn't really make sense when I think about it. I usually draw at the computer, sitting, with my tablet on my lap. If I draw on paper, it's basically the same position.
Finally my last most important question. Does anyone here draw in photoshop? If so isn't it hard to get really crisp lines like you would with a pen or a pencil? Whenever I try drawing in photoshop all of my lines are blurry. I drew the picture above exclusively in photoshop and the only way to get the lines looking nice was to carve them using the eraser tool. However doing that takes a large amount of extra time. Which in turn just rips out whatever vitality the drawing used to have in it. Anyway to sum this up "Whats the best program to do line art digitally?"I draw in photoshop. I haven't really looked at it much, but there's a tonne of options for modifying the brush's behaviour. Try playing around with the Hardness property. Also try using a very small diameter brush. I use diameter 4, but usually work pretty lightly with the tablet, so the brush is often a lot smaller. Of course, my stuff is scratchy as hell, though. Just throwing the idea out to you. You might want to check out Manga Studio (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C5OlhY6mxh4). (EDIT: Oh can't believe I forgot this, but you can achieve sharper lines in photoshop if you work with a larger than intended canvas size (say double size), then shrink the final image down to intended size)
also: photos. posemaniacs is cool in that it lets you see stuff from a bunch of different angles, but if you want to draw natural-looking people you will learn best by comparing your stuff against real people. (I hear there are photos of naked women on the internet somewhere.) with photo reference it's pretty tempting to just copy the reference exactly, though, rather than deconstruct it.I followed your suggestions here and deviated away from pose maniacs. Very rewarding; here's something I just did:
Your drawing kind of disturbs me, since the girl seems to have the proportions of someone aged 10, or maybe even a little younger... except she has voluptuous breasts. I can't really nail down specific issues that lead to this impression, but I think it's to do with the body being very narrow, especially the shoulders and hips, making the head look alot bigger and nudging the proportions into the direction of `child'. I dunno, it's just the impression I get. Neck is very thin, back muscles might need a little more presence in the area between the ribcage and the arm.
Thanks ,Eyecraft, for the great edit, criticism, and guidance.
I think i have a severe problem with drawing legs :(. I get so frustrated I want to be able to draw correct anatomy, but everything I draw is so bad. I practice all the time, but I can't see my progress. Does everyone feel like this at some point or am I alone in this? :P
EDIT: Also, can anyone suggest any books for noobies in anatomy. I tried some pretty complex stuff I saw on a blog, and it was way to complicated for me. It was on a much more advanced level, for someone who already has a pretty solid understanding of anatomy.
Anyway I was wondering what is the best substitute for not having a live model? Is pose maniacs really that good of a anatomy drawing aid?Go draw 10 of their figures a day and then tell me :) Seriously.. it has helped me a lot. It's definitely true that real people have all sorts of proportional variations -- for instance I'm a tall man, but my proportions -- eg hip to shoulder measurement -- are relatively feminine.
I want to draw a lot more but I want to make sure if I start again that I will be on a linear track to getting better.Oh well, start anyway. Nobody's track to getting better can ever be linear, as far as I've observed; You can only keep giving things a good try and periodically discarding things that aren't working. And it follows from this that you can only know what things are really worthwhile after getting back into the game.
I'm willing to put in the work and the time but I don't want my soul crushed when I find out I've been doing everything wrong(that has happened a few times before)It happens. Your current approach is quite incorrect, though it is instructive; I've found this is a very reliable truth that can be applied no matter where you are (and presumably, no matter who you are or when you are.). It's just the way life works. It's uncomfortable only in direct proportion to the magnitude of your misplaced arrogance.
Another question I have for you guys/girls is, "Is drawing fun for you? Do you enjoy drawing? Also where do you draw, is it at a desk, your bed(someone elses bed?) the floor, a chair, standing up, etc?Even when I feel burned out drawing-wise, drawing is fun for me. At such times I just push on through the frustration to find the fun, and use a Lojban based concept generator I wrote to decide on subjects and perhaps find a spark of inspiration.
Finally my last most important question. Does anyone here draw in photoshop? If so isn't it hard to get really crisp lines like you would with a pen or a pencil? Whenever I try drawing in photoshop all of my lines are blurry. I drew the picture above exclusively in photoshop and the only way to get the lines looking nice was to carve them using the eraser tool. However doing that takes a large amount of extra time. Which in turn just rips out whatever vitality the drawing used to have in it. Anyway to sum this up "Whats the best program to do line art digitally?"I don't use photoshop, I do use GIMP... IMO the tip about the pencil tool is good and I imagine it operates pretty much identical to GIMP's pencil tool, which I also prefer over Paintbrush.
EDIT: I just tried Mypaint and I seem to have a problem with the brush tool. It doesn't pick up every stroke with either my pad or mouse. It has random chops throughout a stroke. Any way to fix this?
A problem I am having is emulating a good paint like effect. I use Corel Painter X and I know its a suitable choice for this, but I think I am lacking in the necessary skills for creating this desired effect. Everything I usually render has a very paint bucket look to it, or for lack of a better explanation, MS Paint look. It doesn't have that pizazz that paintings look like. I don't want my art to have a totally "digital" look about it, but instead like an artist actually painted it. If anyone has any advice, please give it.
It looks like whatever you're using isn't set to track opacity based on tablet pressure. If you're using painter, try out the other brushes and play around with the settings. When I used it I liked one of the pastel brushes that I modified. But you shouldn't worry about this too much, just try for the opacity, because completely opaque strokes aren't for everyone.Sorry for not being familiar with this term "opaque strokes." I've been messing around with with Painter's brush settings, but can't find anything I'm really satisfied with. I think part of my problem, as I said before, is I'm not really skilled in the painting area. But for now, I'm not as concerned about the painting issues, because I'm just trying to get anatomy down first.
mm, it's probably a bug in GTK+ on Windows, for some tablet setups on Windows, GTK+ has problems.
OTOH it could be a MyPaint bug that only shows up on Windows -- the main development platform is Linux, naturally.
possibly relevant:
https://gna.org/bugs/?12018
"This is a GTK bug. To fix this someone has to build a new Windows version of MyPaint using a fixed gtk+ version."
^^ the above sounds the most likely to me.. do the described symptoms match?
I really don't think you should be posting a torrent for those videos. $45 really isn't that much, especially for something you say is "ridiculously comprehensive" that you "highly recommend."
(http://xs140.xs.to/xs140/09262/leg771.gif)
the leg i drew for Scribblette, occured to me that i should probably put my own advice up for critique if i'm going to stand by it and this is a pretty good place for that
(http://xs140.xs.to/xs140/09262/leg771.gif)
the leg i drew for Scribblette, occured to me that i should probably put my own advice up for critique if i'm going to stand by it and this is a pretty good place for that
(http://xs140.xs.to/xs140/09262/leg771.gif)
I didn't think that this would be worth making a topic about, so I'm just gonna ask this here.Live study or photographic reference of nudes is where I would start.
How do you go about learning anatomy? What's the best way?
Do you start with learning the skeleton? The muscles?
I found a really nifty thread on conceptart.org titled 'Realism vs Construction' that discusses two different approaches to figure drawing.
Thread is here: http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=160487 (http://conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=160487)
The difference is between precisely copying the light values (realism) vs building from 3d forms (construction). Two large images from the thread that show the difference visually, linked for size:
Construction
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3174/3068048269_570ea2b402_o.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3174/3068048269_570ea2b402_o.jpg)
Realism
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3014/3068914058_d21fa2ab40_o.jpg (http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3014/3068914058_d21fa2ab40_o.jpg)
I'm only on about page 4 of that thread as I post this but there is a lot of discussion about different art schools and how they approach the subject.
Tourist
I think I just need to learn the volumes of the bodyparts moreagree?
because the shading and stuff is bad right now
but I pretty much know where everything fits I think
so, volume and perspective/foreshortening
By the way Mathias, what is the anatomy book you own? I've been looking into getting one but I'm not sure which I should get.
I was going to post this to the creativity thread but as this one doesn't explicitly say "human" anatomy I figured it would go here.
Regarding the Panzerwurm, try to remember that mother nature is obsessed with efficiency. If the animal can get away with not having something, evolution will direct its resources to something else. Consider the roles of the following: the rib cage is a flexible shield around the organs, the plates a kind of inflexible extremely heavy armour, the spikes a repellent defense. Does the animal need all three? Think about how much bone that is, bone is kind of costly to grow. If you remove the most expensive and redundant element, the heavy plates, it seems much, much more realistic, in my mind.Thank you for taking the time for those hints. Those are all valid questions and observations and I thought about it:
A similar question could be asked of the legs; does it really need 6? Could it get away with 4? Dinosaurs got away with 4, even 2, despite their immense size.
I don't know if the bone structure of the fore-legs really fits their role. The animal is basically going to be walking around on them at all times; their role is as a structural support. The arrangement you have now is more for accomodating a lot of twisting, something more appropriate for manipulators like arms. Look at how much stronger the back leg is, how much better it serves its role as a support.
That's all I've got for that. Definitely check out some dinosaur stuff. :)
HWUUURRRRR....
BLUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUHhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
I would actually recommend taking the time to work from life or photographs right now, as I think you need to build up a mental library of how different features look in different angles so that you can inject that information into your imaginative studies
The main thing I would recommend trying to get better at is seeing abstract, 2D shapes that every drawing is made of. The book "Drawing On The Right Side of the Brain" has a lot of techniques for this, such as flipping the canvas and using a grid system to determine placement. I made a short gif with tips on how to draw from an image.
Working with a simple grid would be a big step backwards for Dennis because he is reproducing his knowledge in the third dimension.
My current goal is to be able to construct any pose/angle from scratch with believable anatomy and volumes in a somewhat realistic appearance and without relying on any references
That one looks nice, I like the green color. What are you using to draw your lines?Thanks. For the lines I'm using blacklead pencils from Faber-Castell. They come in various levels of soft/hardness. The green is from some cheap colored pencil by an unheard of brand called Fantasia Colors.
Anatomy aside, I still can't get a good feel of 3d forms in general - when drawing simple 3d primitives I still end up with distortion and crooked angles, and any attempts at foreshortening without any reference end up in total failures :( Any advice on this?I guess it just takes a lot of time and practice until one can accurately render 3D volumes from scratch. I too am struggling with that.
I was trying the 2nd website wishie posted, but all the times seem to be off for me. atleast for the longer poses I noticed them only lasting about half of what theyre supposed to. Anyone else have this issue? MAybe Ill post my stuff later but I cant scan it right now.Had not measured the times while I was drawing but sometimes it felt like some poses didn't stay as long as they should have which I attributed to losing the feeling for time while drawing... odd.
The last body reminds me of my girlfriend. Mmm....
Dennis, this is good work. You will find that you will continue to have that problem for the rest of your artistic career. You will always have multiple skills that are lagging behind the others and it is difficult to choose the strategy in which you deal with them. I'm having problems with it too, currently.The main problem is distractions and too many options/activities which beg for my attention. There are always 100 different things I'd like to pursue and I never find the discipline to follow only one of them at a time. I also don't have an "artistic career", never had an art job, never made a single cent from anything I've created.
Would you say Loomis' Figure drawing book is a good idea for beginners?
Ryu, good paint-over. You articulated the face extremely well. Most realistic human countenance I've probably ever seen, brah.
Dennis, way to go for persevering in your studies (unlike me). Keep it up! I like seeing your progress.The truth is, I don't know what I'm doing anymore and I've lost track of the main goal. I'm in some strange brain-off mode, hoping to improve just by regular practice without putting much thought into it, with no intention to memorize the names of any muscles and bones. I'd like for my subconsciousness to assimilate a natural understanding of how things/people look. The hope is that something like that will come auto-magically just by drawing regularly. I'll keep doing this for some time and see how it works. If it doesn't I can still open the books and take a more scholarly approach (which I think of as not being fun enough to pursue for the moment).
If you can't finish the sketch in 120sec, why not just pause it? What's wrong with that? The goal isn't speed sketching, it's learning anat. Just a thought.
I really want to add snat sketches to my daily practices . . . might use that site.
Question - how do you feel, personally, that you've improved since you've been doing all these study rounds?
Perhaps reticence, unease, something like that.
As to your question, that's what figure drawing is. Studying real human beings in positions that signify this or that emotion. If you have the time and means I wholeheartedly suggest working from a model. If you can direct them when they pose, all the better.
The piece itself has gone far since the last post. I can post the process so far in steps, animated in .gif form, if anyone's interested.I love process animations. I am interested.
The best recourse in the world is finding a local life drawing class. They can be quite cheap if you find the right ones, 5 or 10 dollars for a few hours untutored :y:.
Does anyone know of a book that shows photos of people walking with like a grid background to tell distances properly? IIRC It was pretty old. If not, does anyone know where I could find something of that sort... :'(. Its for a math paper due tomorrow :-[.Would an animated photo help? http://youtu.be/G8Veye-N0A4
I am glad, so a tiny part of the A+ you will get for that paper is mine! :crazy:
You can't directly apply the proportions of the face to those of the skull, lots of things are totally different; and the main proportions you're going for (the roughly 3 noses in a face rule) isn't very applicable for the skull, considering flesh adds a lot of different variables to the face.Shouldn't it still work as a rough guide though? I mean, muscle doesn't add anything height wise and the features remain in the same general places as a blank, emotionless face. The nose is over the nasel cavity, the teeth go in the mouth, and the eyes aren't going to leave their sockets.
The main problem is the width of skull. The eye sockets are far too big, and also too far out from each other. Fixing that will pretty much solve the problem with the proportions I feel (perhaps narrow down the cranial a bit too, to fit with the smaller orbit size).Completely agree that the eye sockets were/are the main problem. Fixed? How else can I improve?
picarto chat pestered me to post morePicarto chat has done well to pester you with that request. :D