Published Jun 23rd, 6/23/24 11:37 am
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Hello there, my name is Stubbs. I have no idea how to draw, but I have always been fascinated by people who can draw. There is just something so inherently cool about being able to pick up a pencil, lay down a few lines, and convey a message or a story through other means than words. Therefore I set out to study how to draw, and this blog is my (sketchbook) journey.
In this article, I will bring you along on my 180-day sketchbook journey. I'll be showcasing my progress from day 121 to 180, sharing insights I learned along the way. Please note that I'm no seasoned artist, as my artistic background is virtually non-existent.
New blogs will be uploaded every 60 days
If you have any questions or tips, feel free to add them in the comment section
Hope you enjoy :)
Part 1. – Sketchbook Journey I – Basics and Beginnings
Part 2. – Sketchbook Journey II – Color and Quality!
Part 3. – Sketchbook Journey III – Poses and Proportions!
Table of contents:
- Showcase / Comparisons
- How this journey started
- Approach / Mindset
- Goal
- Part. 1 – With hips must be hands! (day 121-131)
- Part. 2 – Noticing weak-points (day 132-141)
- Part. 3 – Noting down weak-points (day 142-152)
- Part. 4 – Learning from my weak-points (153-163)
- Part. 5 – Using what I've learned / posing (164-180)
- Tips from the community!
- Plans for the future
Showcase:
This is my day 150 drawing vs. my drawing on day 180.
The final result:
How this journey started:
My path into drawing began through a series of revelations about the choices I had made in my life. Initially, I pursued music, convinced that it was my calling, until my studies in child psychology led me to discover the self-destructive patterns underlying that choice, since it was not my own choice, but my parents’ choice. This realization spurred a profound shift in me, that ultimately led to me dropping out and moving to Germany to study intellectual history – a field of study, which doesn’t lead directly to a conventional job (like studying psychology), but allows me to explore a broader intellectual realm; a perfect education to rebel against familial expectations.
In 2023, after having moved to Germany, I began reading the manga “Beat and Motion” by Naoki Fujita, which in many regards, mirrored my own disillusionment with music and helped redirect my passion towards art-making. The kicker for me to finally go out and buy the equipment and start following my dream of becoming a full-time artist, was actually PewDiePie’s video: Teaching myself to draw for no reason. So! On the 9th of December, 2023, I bought my first A5 sketchbook, drawing pencils, an eraser and a pencil sharpener for 20€.
This blog-series, is my Sketchbook Journey, from having never drawn before, to going full-time.
NOTICE: The following sections might change in later entries in accordance with me learning new stuff
My approach to learning / mindset:
⁍ Learning through writing:
I primarily learn though writing, which might seem counter-intuitive, when I am aiming for drawing. The point is that I document my thoughts and challenges in my sketchbook, resulting in some pages being filled with more notes than actual drawings. This helps me internalize lessons and maintain a more objective view of my work, by distancing myself from my art, in order to avoid an unfair comparison of my own work, to others. This entails, that while I use other, better, artists work as reference for my own – I only ever compare my own work, to my own work.
⁍ Consistency (Pomodoro):
Another key part of how I learn is consistency. Consistency means I draw every single day, with no exceptions. I started at 10 minutes, and now draw for between 1-2 hours. As for reaching 1-2 hours each day, I like using the Pomodoro method – specifically the 30/5 or 15/5 timer (30 or 15 minutes work, 5 minutes break), depending on how much energy I have.
⁍ Deconstruction / Grouping:
This is one of the art-fundamentals that I like to call ‘deconstruction’, which means that when I find a reference I like, I first try to break it down into different ‘groupings’, made up of the three basic shapes: Spheres, boxes and triangles. It’s a lot easier for me to comprehend and remember how to draw specific things, if I can discern the shapes and patterns which make up what I am trying to draw.
⁍ Relying heavily on art-fundamentals (The 20/80 rule):
I strongly believe in the Pareto Principle (the 80/20 rule), which states that you can draw 80% of what you want, from learning the 20% of what it takes to draw. Breaking down what the 20% most likely is, I like to refer to ‘The 5 skill pillars’: (1) Composition, (2) Value / Light, (3) Color, (4) Form and Perspective, and (5) Technical ability with tools.
Currently I mainly practice form and perspective, without much thought given to any of the other skills. However, I see all 5 skills as the 20% that I need and want to learn.
⁍ A job, not a hobby (mindset):
Drawing is currently like a side-project to my studies. Yet I view drawing as a job and not a hobby, that is funded through my studies (I’m very fortunate to be a Danish citizen, which means I am paid to study). The main point is that, when something is a job, I approach it with a deep seriousness in comparison to a hobby. For me, a hobby is when I stop because I don’t find it fun or its annoying me – but with drawing as a job, even if it is not very fun or extremely annoying, I keep drawing and don’t stop; this is my job.
Materials:
This list showcases all the materials that I actively use - but PLEASE note, that most of them are more luxury than necessity.
You only need some paper and pencils from the super-market to learn how to draw.
Inspiration/Reference-folder: https://pin.it/19hBx55
Goal:
My goal is to become a full-time artist, focusing on a mix of educational content and fan-art, primarily funded through Patreon. To achieve this, I need 149 supporters to go part-time and 299 supporters to go full-time. With 1.5 years left in my studies, I plan to launch my Patreon within the last part of this period. My current focus is on improving my skills to consistently produce high-quality content that justifies the support and investment of my patrons.
I am deeply thankful to everyone who supports me, both now and in the future. Your support allows me to pursue my dream and create art full-time. Even if it takes longer than expected, I am committed to continuing this journey and giving back to the community that makes it all possible.
| Part. 1 – With hips must be hands! (day 121-131) – Focus on learning body-parts I have very little knowledge of |
- Day 121
I don't know why I find this so funny, but damn... I need a hamburber no no no, talk to the nice Mexican man
- Day 122-124
Today I discovered a method for drawing the hips by Kojzn (I was unable to find any social media links). I mainly spent my time testing and understanding this method of drawing hips, and I'll be honest and say: I much prefer this method compared to how I did before haha
- Day 125-126
I spent most of the day trying to put the torso, legs and hips together in a front view, followed up by trying to comprehend how the legs attach/move from the hip. Another thing, which is a lot harder to notice, is that I was starting to 'ghost' my lines, which greatly improved my accuracy!
(Ghosting lines means that before drawing the actual line, you do the motion 1-3 times with your pen hovering just above the paper, before gently putting down your pen, and making the line)
- Day 127-128
I mainly spent my time, combining my leg studies from day. 95, with the hip studies I have been doing. This is also when I discovered, that before making a single curved line, it seems to help me quite a lot, if I start off with a kind of straight-lined structure (see day. 127. Second leg drawing from the right)
- Day 129-131
Today I started doing hand-practice, because as Aspirin60 mentioned to me: Draw hands! A lot of them! Hands (and feet) are the most difficult part from body. My main take-aways from starting out, is that the hand can actually be divided into specific measurements, which make it a lot easier to get the proportions right. However! As you can probably tell from day 130 and 131 – as soon as the hand does anything other than lay flat, my brain just goes "huh?" and all the proportions instantly mess up :'D
I need more hand practice!
| Part. 2 – Noticing weak-points (day 132-141) – Noticing weak points both in my abilities and mentality |
- Day 132-133
Today I mainly did more hand practice, followed by trying to put together a full body, in order to get a better idea of what I still need to work on.
- Day 134-136
The main thing I noted down from yesterdays little 'experiment', was that I still have a lot of trouble when trying to turn the body, or put it in a more dynamic position. I deftly have improved since the start, however, as the results on day 136 show: The 3/4 view of the body still destroys me :'D
- Day 137-138
This is when my exams started to kick into high-gear and mess me. And oh boy, this was only the beginning. However, something quite useful that I noted down on day 137, is to get yourself a desk-duck. Since I've been having trouble with the 3/4 view, I bought a small rubber duck that sits on my desk, and then I verbally explain to Martin (my duck), what it is that I find so difficult about it. Surprisngly, explaining stuff to Martin, actually made me more aware of the specific errors that I make when turning the body.Desk-ducks - A 'desk-duck' is essentially just any toy with a face that is used most commonly in fields of programming, as a tool for problem-solving. The practice, in programming, is called "rubber duck debugging", and is essentially the programmer, explaining the issues with the code out loud to the duck. By articulating the issue step-by-step, the programmer often gains new insights or is able to identify mistakes they might have overlooked – thus helping to resolve their problems more effectively.
- I will raise the argument (using myself as an example), that this same idea can be applied to learning how to draw, when feedback from others is not available
- A 'desk-duck' is essentially just any toy with a face that is used most commonly in fields of programming, as a tool for problem-solving. The practice, in programming, is called "rubber duck debugging", and is essentially the programmer, explaining the issues with the code out loud to the duck. By articulating the issue step-by-step, the programmer often gains new insights or is able to identify mistakes they might have overlooked – thus helping to resolve their problems more effectively.
- Day 139-141
The following three days I just decided to draw what I want, because of the exams. The most noteworthy thing that I noticed, is that I seem to be hiding my lack of understanding of arms, behind my understanding of clothing.
| Part. 3 – Noting down weak-points (day 142-152) – Trying to figure out what exactly these weak-points are about, and why they happen |
- Day 142-144
Because I noticed that I've been hiding my lack of knowledge on drawing arms behind clothing, I decided that, for the time being I would work on building a basic understanding of the arms, how they move and try out something I learned from an ongoing experiment called 10,000hrs. They explain in This video, the 5 skill pillars of drawing: Composition, Value (light), color, form and persepctive, technical ability w. tools. In the same video they explain the importance of "grouping".
What I tried with the arms, compared to my previous approach to learning musclegroups, is to group them together in "shape bundles" – basically, all the important larger groupings of muscle, being bundled together as shapes, instead of muscles. And tbh, it worked quite well for me.Grouping, Effciency and the 5 skill pillars: - Grouping: entails making simplified groups of more tangeable, practiceable "movements", where the goal is to have the simpler skills become inter-related.
- Effciency: the Pareto Principle (the 80/20 rule), states that you can draw 80% of what you want, from learning the 20% of basics.
- The 5 skill pillars: (The 20% so to speak), is (1) Composition, (2) Value / Light, (3) Color, (4) Form and Perspective, and (5) Technical ability with tools.
My current focus is on learning form and perspective, including improving my technical ability with the tools I have. Something worth noting to the "Technical ability", is that this does not refer to being able to use 15 different tools: It refers to using maybe 1-3 tools, and practicing with those tools over and over. For me, I stick to the mechanical pencil as my main tool that I will use over and over to master it.
- Grouping: entails making simplified groups of more tangeable, practiceable "movements", where the goal is to have the simpler skills become inter-related.
- Day 145-147
Today was doing more arm practice, though the exam pressure was starting to weigh very heavily on me; something that became very visible in my drawing on day 147: I drew two very quick and awful sketches, decided I was tired, so spent the last 4 minutes of my daily 30, drawing a giant cheese-stick, noted today was a bad day, and went to sleep.
- Day 148-149
Today I discovered a method for drawing in perspective called the 'XYZ-method'. In essence, before I draw any box, I must first find the corner and clearly draw the X, Y, and Z axises of the cube. When those have been laid clear, I can fill in the rest of the box. Personally I find this method to be super helpful in terms of foreshortening, though when drawing cylinders, I still much prefer just using contour lines.The XYZ method: - The XYZ method is one I learned from the 10.000hrs experiment. The basic principle is that, before drawing any shape (mainly used for boxes and triangles), you find a corner and draw out what will become the X, Y and Z dimensions of the shape you're drawing.
- This method especially helped me visualize the perspective, before even laying down my first line of the drawing – which, as you'll eventually see on day 158 and 159, was exceptionally helpful in correctly determining the perspectives of human pose references, without having anything more specific than an idea of 'I want this pose'.
- The XYZ method is one I learned from the 10.000hrs experiment. The basic principle is that, before drawing any shape (mainly used for boxes and triangles), you find a corner and draw out what will become the X, Y and Z dimensions of the shape you're drawing.
- BONUS! – Giving Cherna a character sheet!
Maybe you thought my OC Cherna was a one time thing eh? No no no! Today I also managed to finish up her character-sheet! I didn't turn out super good from all angles, but for someone who has never done a full character-sheet before, I'd say my first try went pretty good!
It's also fun to have this full character sheet, since it provides another opportunity beyond my day. 1, and day 15 drawings, to compare in the future – with the main difference being, that I can actually develop her design and character in the future!
- Day 150 – Half way!
Today I set my main focus on body construction, trying to use the XYZ method, as well as the body-construction I learned the day before. The main error I still can't wrap my head around, is that I keep making the construction of the body too wide and short. Will have to work on that in the future. Hopefully by day. 180, I will be able to at least partly correct this mistake.
- Day 151-152
Today was an off day, so I just did some box-turning. However, I also made a re-discovery of how much I like using the body construction method that learned on day 77, however with a few tweaks to it. The method is still difficult to get right in terms of proportions, however, there is a noticeable difference in how much easier it is to understand (at least for me) when it comes to drawing the body in perspective.
| Part. 4 – Learning from my weak-points (day 153-164) – Learning from what I have noted down in prior drawings |
- Day 153-154
Today I utilized what I have learned from the 10.000hrs experiment, by first drawing up a full body body (using reference), and then breaking it down into groupings of individual parts, that I can then turn and twist around in 3D-space. Though I may be able to draw the parts individually, putting them together is a lot harder than it looks :')
- Day 155-157
Today I tried to combine the different groupings into more comprehensible body constructions. Though, day 156 was a bit of a chaos because I had an exam on this day, so... Chaotic but deftly stille fun to draw!
- Day 158-160
I spent these next days before having to travel, putting together the different parts. However, noteworthy of these days is that I started using human pose reference pictures, and instead of trying to draw the people, I set my main focus on trying to get the poses right, and make them look dynamic. I will have to move away from boxes eventually, but they're so helpful in understanding perspective!
- Day 161-163
Exams are ongoing at this point, however, I had to travel back to Denmark for a week to celebrate a few birthdays and graduation parties. Since it's difficult to find time during my travels to actually sit down with practice sheets and references, I mainly spent my time during this travel, doing still-lifes of whatever I saw.Doing still-lifes to improve on drawing manga - I recall when I first started drawing, I didn't quite see any reasons to do still-life drawing as "it did not improve my ability to draw manga". However, since reading into the 5 skill pillars, I realized that still-lifes, may be sort of like a 'cheat-code' in learning to draw anything – manga included!
- Drawing still lifes seems to improve several of the 5 skill pillars at once: Beyond improving our observation skills, still life drawing also seems to have enhanced my understanding of proportions, shapes, light and shadow – all key aspects of the 5 skill pillars; especially when it comes to creating realistic and dynamic compositions. Still life drawing seems to build a strong foundation in the 5 skill pillars, which (following the 80/20 rule), can be applied to ANY art-style or art-form, wether that's manga, cartoons, painting or even sculpting.
- I recall when I first started drawing, I didn't quite see any reasons to do still-life drawing as "it did not improve my ability to draw manga". However, since reading into the 5 skill pillars, I realized that still-lifes, may be sort of like a 'cheat-code' in learning to draw anything – manga included!
| Part. 5 – Using what I've learned / posing (day 164-180) – Using what I've learned so far, to create proper body construction using boxes |
- Day 164-166
Today I returned from Denmark, and home to Germany again. Since I've been able to put the various parts together seperatly, I thought it time to finally start doing full poses (though, still missing hands and feet). Day 165, I'm super happy with the poses I drew, and day 166, I wanted to do more poses, however, I realized that the way I draw heads, don't fit with the proportions of the rest og the construction, so I will have to figure out how to solve this issue with proportions.
- Day 167-169
Exams are picking up pace and pressure, so while I am aware that the next step will be to draw bodies, instead of just constructing poses, I will keep constructing poses – though, to make it a bit more fun, I've decided to try and use more dynamic references; like volleyball players! :D
- Day 170-172
Something I noticed which isn't really visible in my drawings, is that I've had a tendency to "flip" the perspective of the torso the wrong way compared to the reference I was looking at. While I could just play it off as a 'creative decision' – It's not really an active decision, which in terms of learning how to draw, is a mistake I need to work on improving.
- Day 173-174
Today I noticed two recurring issues when I draw poses: (1) I can't seem to get the proportions of limbs to be consistent, as they mostly are guess work at the time of writing. (2) I am still unable to create natural-looking poses without having a reference from real life, even if I am using action-lines to try and portray the movement I want the character to have.Using human references, instead of 'specific references': - Something I feel that is worth noting, is that for all the poses I've been doing, I haven't actually been looking up "poses in boxes". I have been using pictures of real human beings for reference, and I think this is also the right way to go about learning how to pose using the groupings and boxes.
- In other words: Try using real life humans as your reference, as this (at least in my experience) seems to yield the most natural looking poses when drawing (even if you are just using boxes).
- Something I feel that is worth noting, is that for all the poses I've been doing, I haven't actually been looking up "poses in boxes". I have been using pictures of real human beings for reference, and I think this is also the right way to go about learning how to pose using the groupings and boxes.
- Day 175-176
Today is the last day before I have to submit a 30-page research paper for a uni exam. I am extremely nervous, because I have noticed that there are certain obvious flaws in my methodology. So to calm myself, I just did more poses :'D
- Day 177-179
And the paper has been submitted! That was such a big relief. I'll be honest and say, I've just been drawing poses because the exams have been stressing me out, so I haven't had the energy to actually expand upon the poses, or try and learn something new. Just kept going, spending about 1.5 hours on each page every day while blindly ignoring the fact that I have another exam (and the very last one of my 2.semester !) coming up in just 2 weeks...
- Day 180!
While I first realized today that it was an AI-generated reference I used, I originally chose it because it is a good challenge in terms of body-construction, without being able to see much of the actual body. I will be more careful in the future to avoid accidentally selecting AI-generated references.
Main things I noticed when focusing on construction Nijikas body, without being able to see any of it was that I have gotten better at estimating the proportions, however, I still hide a lot of it under the clothing. Speaking of clothing! Oh my, do I need to practice clothing and hair, because while day 150 had the proportions and hair off, day 180, I managed to mess up the clothing super bad – in part because I added a part of Nijikas body that is not part of the actual reference. It's not a bad thing though!
I think it's cool that I am slowly beginning to have the abilities and understanding to add body parts that are not in the references I use. However, I will admit that this blessing is also a little scary, because when adding something not in the reference, I can no longer rely on the reference or my ability to just copy – I will have to actively rely on my own abilities, and trust in the choices I make, instead of having the choices made for me.
| Art-tips from the Community! |
| These are a bunch of helpful tips that I took with me from the last Sketchbook Journey blog. I am thankful for any advice on drawing, and wanted to share these tips from the community, in the hopes that they can help you as well If you want to be included in the next Sketchbook Journey, be sure to leave your best art-tip for the community in the comments! :) |
This section feels a bit empty this time around... Feel free to add any art-tips in the comments, and I'll add it to the next entry in the series :) |
| To be continued – My future plans for day 181 to day 240 (aka. Sketchbook Journey IV) |
That wraps up 180 days of learning to draw!
Thank you so much for reading
If you have any questions or tips, feel free to ask in the comments :)
| Future goals: |
|
My current stats
Time stats
My current time stats:
- 271h 8m spent drawing
- Goal is to hit 500 hours before January 1st, 2025
- Have been drawing for 151 hour since last entry
- 271h 8m spent drawing
- Goal is to hit 500 hours before January 1st, 2025
- Have been drawing for 151 hour since last entry
507 x 290
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Thanks for the tip though! I will keep it in mind for the next entry
I draw digitally and traditionally, but I've always liked the feeling of a traditional sketch; my artwork seems to look better on paper lol. I've been drawing for most of my life but I always feel like I'm a fraud and/or i don't make a lot of progress, so today i actually decided to re-learn how to draw. Normally when I draw I end up relying on references for anatomy, so I'm going to learn how to draw bodies by myself too. I've always wanted to learn how to draw art like this!!
Your progress is amazing!! Keep it up!
In terms of using references for anatomy; I very much still do that haha, though as you can probably tell from this blog, I managed to figure out how to break down the body in more comprehensible forms that I can move around more freely. While I haven't been experimenting much with drawing without reference, I have recently been trying it out, and while I'm still unable to get the muscles completely right from every angle, I noticed that since I can now construct the body out of basic shapes – I am also able to no longer look at a reference when drawing poses :D
A tip that I will be including in the next entry of Sketchbook Journey, is that I found this website called Posemaniacs (https://www.posemaniacs.com/) which has a large library of 3D anatomy poses, which I hope may also help you learn :)
Best of luck with your re-learning!
*A sketchbook with a bit more dust speckles on it than preferred...*
*Head turn the other way around*
*Sees some dust speckles on pencils...*
*Reads the paragraph about mindset for the third time as many sketchbook journeys are*
*Realizes that the will/mindset to actively climbing that mountain of work is “slightly lacking” by this person typing this comment*
*Continues reading*
*Nods in agreement about ghosting lines*
*Rubber duck.. Didn’t I have one lying around in lederhosen…?...*
Just curious, is there any story behind the duck’s name Martin?
*Comes at the still-life parts*
They look good, better than I expected. Mostly because 99% of your drawing are humans.
*Art-tips hmmm...*
I don’t know how much you’re using the eraser while drawing (the dust free is indeed kinda nice to use). But what about putting the eraser away for a drawing or two?
Having no option to erase a bad line or a helping line, it will force you think/reflect twice about the lines you put on paper.
It might sound a bit odd, but for larger perspective drawings from a reference. Measure the angle of the XYZ corners from your starting point. It’s probably a different angle than your brain thinks. And in larger perspective drawing (manga backgrounds) these small angle deficits magnify a lot along the way.
The “Some amazing news!” is indeed an amazing thing to read. Seeing you continuing this -kinda- mind-boggling way of climbing the mountain of drawing, while finding a partner in crime along the way with the same approach. It’s certainly a good thing.
As for the scanner. The university or your local library scanner ain’t suited or practical (assuming they have one)?
Anyway. These sketchbook journeys remains a nice read (and a way to spend way much time on writing a single comment…).
p.s.
not sure how things look like over a few years when you need “just 300 supporters”. But for now, kindly adjust the “just 300 supporters” to 299 would you ;-)
I just chose "Martin" because I've been watching a lot of Martincitopants on YouTube as of late haha :P
In terms of still-lifes, I have yet to actually research or learn about how to properly do it, so they're really just made from observing and copying. However, while I mainly draw humans, I'm actually surprised how much drawing still lifes help me improve, it's kind of crazy to me haha
I think I forgot to add it in the actual blog, but I made a note to the left corner drawing on day. 152 that despite that fact that I use a mechanical pencil, I don't actually use my eraser unless I made a complete misplacement of a limb for example. But going back to the mindset thing: If I started erasing my mistakes and bad lines, I would be working against myself since I would probably just end up repeating the same error again and again, and then never learn from it haha. So I absolutely agree: Leave the eraser – even when using pencil.
Oh yeah, didn't actually think about that with the XYZ-method. It deftly helps me with the smaller boxes, but I agree that it may reach its limits if it was to be used to create something like a ground-grid. In those cases it may be preferable to find the horizon-line and use that for reference, in favor of using the XYZ-method for backgrounds.
Yeah, my university does have a printer with a scanner on top, but they have a major flaw (feature), which is that the machine will not begin your scan, unless the top is completely closed. This means that I would have to pull out each of my drawings from the sketchbook in order to scan them on the university printers – and I'm not willing to do that. So instead, I'll invest in a scanner that actually allows for scans without the lid being fully closed :)
Glad you like it, and always excited to read and answer your comments :)
p.s.
"just 300 supporters" have been updated to "just 299 supporters"
As for the plan B, some random thought process with some assumptions… You’re doing art besides whatever you’re currently studying. A study you want to complete/graduate from in 1,5 years or so. Isn’t that in itself actually a kind of a plan B… I mean you than have degree which you can use to find a job in that specific field if art fails.
Hmmm… that amazing feature, does it allow a sheet of paper to slip through the ‘completely closed top’? If so, couldn’t you put only the page you want into and support the rest outside by hand? Hoping that the borders ain’t to big of the scanner though.
Or some other suggestions: look for other scanners on campus or the city library; make a little photo-booth from an old shoebox or something and play with some camera/flash settings for some uniform results.
Thanks for the suggestions, think I might try the box in case I don't have enough to buy my own scanner – but luckily most used scanners go fairly cheap, so a bit of month or two of saving up should do the trick :P