How to thread!!!

[Crombie]

Basically this is a thread dedicated to posting tutorials on whatever you need help with while drawing. Giving you plenty of references, various techniques, and how to's on a lot of stuff, so get posting and see what you can find that comes in use.

[Learner]

Here's a tip: Draw and draw while you are still young, never stop until you can't make art anymore.

[vortexblast]

Here's a top tip from me.

Try to draw and copy artists artworks. Doesn't matter which genre it is, could be manga, could be comics and when you finished drawing it or copy it, study the image, the composition, the perspective, the proportions and so on. You actually train your mind and hands to draw and when you've done enough, you should notice the difference when you'll try drawing your own.

Another top tip:
When drawing hairs, make sure you have a well sharpened pencil (preferably mechanical), try to relax your hands and fingers and don't be afraid to do repetitive fast strokes.

[Crombie]

Oct 17, 2011 16:22:31 GMT -5 vortexblast said:

Here's a top tip from me.

Try to draw and copy artists artworks. Doesn't matter which genre it is, could be manga, could be comics and when you finished drawing it or copy it, study the image, the composition, the perspective, the proportions and so on. You actually train your mind and hands to draw and when you've done enough, you should notice the difference when you'll try drawing your own.

Interesting you should mention that, I wanna ask. Will you be participating in Pinoyshot95's 1000 subscriber special/drawing contest on YouTube? The deadline is November 15, if you still wanna join. I'll link via message if you want.

On advice I'm gonna post: Study shapes and how they are changed to perspective and how their proportions are in comparison to the head and the rest of the body. Also, if your work looks like a jumbled up mess while you're working on it, don't worry, your doing something right. Finding the image and guiding the lines to the desired image is the task.

[Shadow Major]

What is the name of that basic font that is used in most comic books? It slightly resembles Comic Sans but is in capitals.

[Crombie]

Comics use a lot of different fonts, but you can download and make your own fonts very easily. There's a lot of tutorials and websites for that like this one:

www.dafont.com/

[dvandom]

Generally speaking, the best comic fonts are the result of a regular letterer getting his hand-lettering made into a font, with a randomly cycling selection of several options for each letter.

---Dave

[Shadow Major]

Well, here's are some tips I kinda learned on my own:

If you make a mistake while drawing, e.g. incorrect placement of the eyes, or head shape is wrong, don't throw that drawing away. Believe me, it pays to keep all of your drawings which you think have mistakes, so that you can learn from them. Compare your drawings to an artist's artwork and you can sort of learn from your mistakes.
Also, don't be too hard on yourself if you keep making mistakes; it's only natural. I made mistakes all the time when I first started manga and I was just about to give up, but determination is a great thing. You will definitely improve if you push yourself; it worked with me.
Yeah, so don't stress out too much about making mistakes. Remember what that genius said (I can't remember what his name was), "He who does not make mistakes has not tried anything."

[Shadow Major]

Okay, I've got a question. I'm just beginning to draw bodies for characters, so how should I approach this? Where should I start? I've more or less mastered drawing heads.

[ajaxx15]

I'm still not all that great with drawing bodies myself, but i do know some things. I know that it's good habit to sketch out a rough basis of the body position first and then go back and flush out the image of the body. Also, if I remember correctly from my teacher, when drawing the whole body or even some of it a good thing to do is to measure. Especially when practicing some real life poses. You measure the body parts to other parts to make sure they are lining up correctly.

Hope this helps a little, it's just a few things I've learned that sometimes helps me. If this doesn't help, well at least I tried.

[Crombie]

For bodies you need to get an idea of: Proportions, anatomy, physiology, and a good understanding of what shapes will help you get an idea of the space the body is taking up.

[Shadow Major]

How to learn to use guidelines properly? I tried to use guidelines once, but they made my drawings look proportionally incorrect. How can I learn to master them?

[PJCzar]

i used to use guide lines alot but they started to make me mess up more then i got it right. I slowly reduced the number of guide lines until all i draw for them now is the top of head and bottom of feet. the rest comes naturally BUT i still mess up the knee height, so i have to remember to put those guide lines in once i get the hips done.

It seems to me like each person has to do it thier own way and most of use still have to figure out what way that is.


ALSO if any of you have finished a piece and you look at it and say "it looks to sharp" or you can see you mistakes too easily, try out this cool trick i found on deviant art.
pjczar.deviantart.com/#/d2ljygd

[Caliber Mengsk]

Did a few video tutorials a couple years ago. They are only for photoshop, but meh

www.youtube.com/watch?v=u4uldTE1AWM - Clouds tutorial
www.youtube.com/watch?v=eXE9ShVZPBg - Digital Line art

[Crombie]

Some tips I thought I'd give to try and help out. I don't consider this a tutorial, but I feel it might help some of the starting out people.

When starting out on your drawing make sure you have a clear idea or concept of what you're drawing, don't just put the pencil on the paper and expect it to make it for you. (This is fairly a no brainer, but I hear people talk about how they go in with no intentional image in mind.)

If you're having a hard time figuring out what would be best way to display your character and the emotion you want to portray, make multiple thumbnails to mark down a few of your ideas and considerations.

When going in to sketch concentrate on what you want your image to look like, think 3D and constantly correct anything that does not aid to the illusion of volume or supports the image you want to correct.
-Remember you can always correct pencils simply by erasing and redrawing.
-Note: Before you focus on anatomy, and physiology make sure the guidelines and 3D shapes used work with the perspective as well as the angle
-Note: Perspective and volume are far more crucial than anatomy (only say this because everyone keeps talking about anatomy ). Because, even if you have correct anatomy,if it lacks perspective, people will much more easily be thrown out of the illusion of volume.

If you're confused on how a pose looks, then look for reference or use yourself for reference.
-Remember you are your on best model and visual reference. (You can't escape yourself, so why not use yourself?)

If you come back to a finished piece later and you realize a mistake you made that you hadn't detected mark it down as a side mental note, and keep it mind as a reminder to help you check over your own work better.
-You can correct it if you feel it'll help you improve. (Optional)

Remember to try your best to keep an omniscient mind over the project, and constantly make sure everything is in check.

I hope some you find this useful.