Let's Draw! Back to Basics

[The Unborne]

Long story short: it's been little over 6 (maybe 7 years?) since I last picked up a drawing pencil. Although I remember being okay at drawing from photo references, I never quite got to the point of being able to freehand anything imaginative.

Fast-forward to today: I'm teaching in China and would love to get back into drawing.

Pleasant surprise: My loving girlfriend, Vivian, wants to share this hobby.

Which brings us to...

Back to Basics

Over the course of my high school career I had the opportunity to buy a treasure cove of art instruction books; fortunately, I've received a care package from the States with all of those old books (ugh, the shipping and handling though...). This thread will document our progress as we try to accomplish a variety of exercises. It's our hope that you all can join, cheer, help, or get inspired.

Seriously, other than our little self-study, we are in no way professionals. Anyone with better credentials, feel free to steer us in the right way or provide us feedback if when we say anything silly.

Besides seeing our works in progress, you will also get to see a bit of the behind-the-scenes of obtaining art supplies (in China!), relearning pencil grips (in China?), and just exploring the different resources available to us (and you) online or in the bookstore.

So! without any further ado:

LET'S DRAW!

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Our Daily Routine (so far)

Spoiler: What's a "Daily Routine"?

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As adapted stolen from Brandon Dayton's blog, Vivian and I will be following a routine that includes a simple warm up drill and moving on to focused practice (we'll begin with exercises but will hopefully graduate to things we can find around us in China).

1. Practice on a consistent schedule - For us? We're aiming for everyday, but that might just mean doing simple warm-ups on our busy days.
2. Warm up - This is where we drill basic shapes until the bones in our hands turn to dust or when 10 minutes have passed.
3. Study - For now, we'll turn to our books for basic exercises to practice the artistic fundamentals like training ourselves to see, practice hand-eye coordination, etc. Basically, you guys will get to see what kinds of things we learn from our collection of books, blogs, whatever. Let's plan on 15 min - 30 min for this part.

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Resources

Spoiler: Book References*

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Betty Edwards' Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain - Apparently a classic book (I saw it referenced constantly back in high school). Tries to use (cough) neuroscience (cough) to explain drawing, but I never had a chance to practice its exercises until now.

Spoiler: Online References*

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http://brandondayton.com - Decent blog that has some pages dedicated to practicing art.

*As we reference them or you all make recommendations.

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[The Unborne]

Tools of Our Trade

TBW

[The Unborne]

Day 1:(Self) Portraits

While many drawing books have exercises, Betty Edward's Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain has pre-instructional practices. The idea goes, these will be helpful reminders of how far we go and give us insight into how we currently draw. Plus, it's going to make for some good before-after drawings later on.

The first practice is the Self Portrait. Right out of the gate, we're focusing on what some consider the hardest part to get right, but we decide to make it fun and instead of drawing ourselves, we draw each other. Yes, yes, first exercise and we're already making changes, but you're supposed to enjoy practicing, working out, whatever you do.

Unborne's

Spoiler

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Thoughts: Overall, it looks like my drawing hasn't really changed from the last time I drew someone's face. I see the same flaws: my rendering doesn't really work. They look more like wrinkles when I'm trying to create depth. Overall picture looks flat. I did like the line art though before I started trying to shade.

The yes seem too stylized, but then again we were drawing each other while our heads were looking down, looking back, etc. A little difficult but pretty enjoyable. I could'Time spent: 20 minutes.

Vivian's

Spoiler

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Thoughts: Yes, my hair is really that bad when I don't comb. Really, this isn't a bad drawing. It demonstrates a common habit of beginning drawers.

When we first begin, we always put onto paper the shorthand in our heads (e.g., some people when not looking close enough might put a circle as for eyes). For example, if you're beginning out, you might just be focused on the paper in front of you rather than the subject in front of you. Lots of resources talk about drawing as seeing, and to draw well (especially in the beginning), you should be looking at your subject constantly as you draw.

[Artman77]

Welcome to the threads sir. I need to make picking up the pencil a daily habit as well. Here's to 2017 being a productive year!