# Off-Topic Discussion > Artists' Corner >  >  How to NOT suck at drawing?

## Hwen

Doesn't everybody want to be able to draw? I would love to be able to translate things around me and stuff from my head (mostly the latter) into coherent drawings.
Problem: Me+trying to draw=what the heck is THAT supposed to be?
I've been poking around on the internet, and I know 'Practice makes perfect' 'Everybody can draw' 'draw what you see, not what you think you see' 'turn it upside-down!' and all those other sound-bytes.
When I draw, it's hard, and hard+crappy results=de-motivation and just feeling all around sick (gosh, I've got lots of equations in here, don't I?).
Thing is, I feel the same way when learning something new on the piano. When I'm still learning it, I want to be anywhere but the piano bench, so badly I'm almost physically sick. But once I've nailed it down, I actually find myself having fun with it! But if I don't go through that 'sick' phase, I never make any progress since I'm staying in my comfort zone.
Is it the same way with drawing? Does it have to feel worse before it gets better? And how much practice does it take before your drawings stop looking like something a 4yr old created on a sugar high, and you can start having fun with it? I am currently good at stick figures, a side view of the USS Enterprise (or a demented version of), and some cartoony looking feathers.

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## Linkzelda

Since you already know all those "YOU CAN DO IT!" declarations, all I can say is that it will be worse before it starts getting better.

It's because if you see someone who is pretty good at drawing certain things, you'll start comparing yourself to them, which may be useful in improving yourself, but if you don't know how to take that kind of mentality, it can make your progress even worse. Everyone had to start somewhere, and it will mostly suck the first few times, unless you have a natural aptitude for visualization and spatial recognition, but even with those, practicing as much as you can will augment those skills.

You can't just wave a magic wand and expect to be better, the people you see that are good at art or 3d modeling, whatever, you're seeing them show the good stuff, you never know how many times it took them just to get there. 

Draw everyday, try to draw something everyday, get the motion, get used to having to come up with things off your feet.

I mostly do graphite portrait or figure drawings, and even though it's satisfying when I'm able to almost get the exact likeness of whoever it is I'm drawing, it can be a pain.....A PAIN.

There's always a process, some kind of model you must use...and judging from what you declared above, drawing without some kind of process will only irritate you. I used to free-hand draw a lot (haven't done as much since I'm addicted to gridded drawings), but when I got into gridded drawings, it took me a while to get used to getting proportions right.

Fortunately, all those small years taking art classes in High School, and my desire to just become better at drawing whenever I have the time, it took maybe 3-5 people for me to get used to the process of gridded drawing.

I even drew myself several times for a certain project when I was in High School, drew a few celebrities here and there, and even drew people for free when I was on summer vacation before my Freshmen Year of College.

Like with any type of drawing, Abstract, Traditional, 3D, each has its own unique difficulty.

But again, those declarations of practice makes perfect.....see what you see, and not what your mind thinks...*are true.*

Think about....See what you see, and not what your minds thinks? It may seem like some half-hearted support from others to prevent you from complaining, but those principles are pretty much what you need if you even want to improve.

When I try to do gridded drawings, I can't stay too long on it, because my mind *WILL* trick me, and it will trick you too if you focus on a drawing for too long. Your eyes will play tricks on you, and you're bound to mess up if you don't take the necessary precautions to take a few breaks in between.

Practice does make perfect, you can't expect a Picasso masterpiece overnight, a few days, weeks, or even months.

But if you're doing it for that long, obviously you have some passion to improve. All I can say for the motivation part is that those principles that you don't really take into consideration are true. True in almost every skill you want to acquire in life.

For me, I had to read a lot of tutorials on the internet, go on YouTube to know how to shade this part of the face or body, and how to try and make hair realistic, so much research, but every bit counts.

When you first start out, that's why research is important, since you don't have a basis to establish something, it's good to see the methods from several people, and you'll find that concepts all correlate to each other. Eventually, you'll find a technique that's right for you. It's all about finding the technique, knowing its flaws and benefits, being able to incorporate other techniques to the main technique you use, and having an open mind, being creative.

For me, gridded drawing is pretty much all I need, with some free-handed drawing if needed if I need to add other people than myself, and even with that, it's still a work in progress. I want to be able to free-hand a little more and still be able to capture some kind of realism from it.

Drawing is something that improves through the years. If you want results in a day, week, or a month, and treat it like it's nothing if you're expectations are not met, then you will never improve.

I still screw up a lot with gridded drawings, sometimes, when I want to be too ambitious, I might mess up a drawing, accidentally make a hole on the paper, and when I spend 6+ hours trying to get the figures right, and have a hole on the paper, it REALLY ruins my ego....A L OT.

You're going to have a few bumps along the way, but just use those moments as a reminder that you will never be perfect, but you should always try to reach the ideal. That will make you better at drawing. 

Drawing from imagination is hard, and when people see other people do amazing drawings and whatnot, they compare theirs with the other person, and it's only going to create negative thoughts. Everyone has their own method in drawing some aspect of art, all you need to do is find what is comfortable to you.

There is no perfect way to do all categories of drawings, you have to learn how to be able to grab bits and be very passionate in increasing your competence for drawings in general.

This is one site I used to motivate myself to do more portrait drawings:

Drawing Tutorials - How to Draw Step by Step - Free Lessons

These are a few more related to what I normally do as well:

The Grid Method: An Easy Step-by-Step Instructional Guide for Transferring or Enlarging Images

Drawing With a Grid » OnlyPencil Drawing Tutorials



It's not all that I used to improve myself, I had to watch countless YouTube videos, looking at speed drawings, tutorials, etc. just to add on to convincing myself to keep getting better. Absorb as much information as you can, take what's necessary and keep going.

And there will always be someone better than you, when you think you've failed many times, try to look at other drawers on sites like DeviantArt, and try to imagine how long it must've taken the really good drawers to be able to do things like that. It's all about learning from your mistakes, getting more experience, drawing as much as you can, researching as much as you can, practicing as much as you can.

The passion isn't going to be one long wave, it will be in brief moments spontaneity, it will have its ups and downs, but that is what will make you better. 

Always try to learn from as many tutorials as you can, and when you do find your own technique, still try to look at more guides, experiment, experiment, experiment, experiment!

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## Hwen

Thank you so much for the reply! I wanted to make sure I was going about this the right way, it sounds pretty much like what I'm trying to do; look up tutorials (thanks for the websites, btw), not rush things, et cetera. Was really hoping there MIGHT be some magic trick to getting it, though I doubted that there would be  :wink2:  Actually, drawing sounds a bit like LDing. Amazing when you can do it well, REALLY frustrating to get to that point.
Again, thank you! ((hugs))

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## Highlander

Hi Hwen,

I can only echo what Link has said. His drawings are pretty good also.

In my experience I found that you did have to practice ALOT. I used to spend hours per week on drawings out of my head, etc. 

It is a process of trial and error. Eventually your brain does 'click in' (autopilot) when working on a drawing. 

The best advice I could give (apart from what Link said about practice, etc.) is go to an Art or drawing class like at a nightschool. I went to a life drawing evening class where you see and meet people trying to learn the same thing. You learn alot from being around other people (in my case), more so than as an individual.

One of the things the teacher told me is if you make a mistake when drawing your figure by putting a line down in the wrong place then leave it and use it as a guide rather than rub it out. Because if you rub it out then you tend to draw it in the same place again!
In a life class you also learn about composition, negative space, proportion, measurement, etc. but overall being creative by using different ideas and media to acheive your goal. As LinkZelda said: "You learn to see."

They get you to draw bigger which was a bit of an eye-opener for me as I was used to drawing on A4 paper alot.

Art isn't just about drawing. Give it a go. Find an artist who's work you enjoy. (Maybe Link's or RobStar!)  :Shades wink:  Be creative!

I don't do so much work myself now due to more responsibilities, although I would like to make a new start, or get inspired again. Perhaps I will try to do this in any lucid dreams I have in the future?

P.S: Keep any drawings (inc. doodles or sketches) so you can measure your progression over time - If you get good, then sell them!  :Shades wink: 

Regards.  :smiley:

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## kyndy101

I suggest that you just put what is in your mind's eye on the paper. Don't stop drawing for a break [unless your hand gets cramped] and think about what you're drawing, just draw it. 

 Also, I suggest that you try out a variety of animals or things to draw; see what just comes easily to you. For me it's dragons, but I can't draw a human worth crap, though my sister can draw humans beautifully!

 Anyways, just try drawing different types of plants/flowers, animals-- including dinosaurs--, humans, nature... Whatever you think.

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## hassman789

Mind you I am a mediocre artist, but I used to think drawing anything was a lost cause for me. have you tried using a grid? If not you should! I would imagine it's not a good idea to rely on the grid forever, but I think it's ok to start out with for practice!

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## Alric

Everything in life is like that. Learning a new musical instrument, learning a new piece, learning a new sport, learning a new language, learning to draw. It is just how life is. Before you can do anything well you first got to suck at it. If you suck at it long enough you eventually get decent, suck at it some more and then you are good, and then suck at it a little longer and you are great. 

My advise would be to not judge yourself so harshly. Drawing is something you can probably improve on a lot fairly quickly, but its harder to notice.  You might not feel like you are improving but I bet if you look at an old pictures you can probably tell you are getting better.

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## Darkmatters

What is it that you want to be able to draw? Realistic portraits? Cartoons? Comic books? Or maybe a little of all of it? 

One of the best things I've ever heard about drawing is that "drawings are ideas with lines around them" - meaning that you don't get better by making better lines, but by improving the ideas behind those lines. In other words you need to learn the principles of art - proportioning, perspective, shading, anatomy, exaggeration... and this all begins by learning the basics. 

The progression that worked for me was I started with books showing how to draw cartoons, then moved up to comic book style anatomy books, and then from there to more serious art books. With good cartooning books like Cartooning the head and figure by Jack Hamm you learn how to draw simple - well, heads and figures. This begins to teach you about form and how to render it. It also teaches you the basics of proportioning and anatomy, though in loose and exaggerated fashion. 

Then when you move up to more serious comic book style anatomy (the best series of books I found for this is Burne Hogarth's Dynamic Anatomy series) you can throw off the exaggeration and start to tighten up toward more relistic work. Then after that the only more advanced artistic anatomy books I've been able to find, which go well beyond what Hogarth teaches, is a series written by Robert Beverly Hale. 

There are many other great book that teach the basics of drawing - you know, those exercises where you draw cones and spheres and cubes and cylinders and shade them etc... look for books like that. Or even start by searching out drawing lessons online aimed at the beginner level. 

But the point I'm making is, learning to draw means learning the basics of art and rendering. It's possible to learn that without ever studying art lessons, but it will take a hell of a lot longer and there's no guarantee you would ever learn things right without  lessons. Drawing is not really intuitive - the way most people draw in the beginning (before any lessons) is just flat out wrong and that's why it looks bad.

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## jetta86s

Hi Hwen! just like you am also practicing to improve myself in drawing. We can do this!!! Practice100x  :Cheeky:

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## acatalephobic

For the longest time I only drew cartoons, and never thought I could draw realistically.   But perhaps I just never practiced seriously enough...once i put some effort into a fine arts drawing class, I surprised even myself.

Using a grid really helped me a lot, as well as the textbook we used, "Drawing From The Right Side of the Brain" -  Learn to Draw: Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain.   It taught me how to look at drawing in a new way, even though I've been drawing ever since I could remember.  I lent it to a friend of mine who wanted some help, and it changed his whole approach too.

Hope this helps, and remember...it's important to _enjoy the practice_ (not just a good end result) if you really want to get better.  It's all about the journey, not the destination!

One fun way to practise is to fold a piece of paper in half, draw something with a few lines that connect your drawing to the empty side of the page...then let a friend draw something on the other side.  If you don't peek at each others creation til the end, it's usually good for a laugh or two!  x}

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