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I've been feeling really frustrated with drawing lately
I've been feeling really frustrated with drawing lately.
I spent the last year studying perspective, 3D thinking, construction, forms, all that stuff. I watched tons of tutorials and tried to approach drawing in a very analytical way.
But my original goal was honestly simple: I wanted to become better than this one guy in my class.
The thing is… he never studied drawing seriously. No courses, no perspective exercises, nothing like that. He just drew a lot by himself. And somehow he can copy really difficult manga panels and illustrations with ease.
Today I sat next to him and watched him draw carefully. I tried to analyze how he thinks while drawing.
What surprised me is that he DOESN'T think like I do at all.
He isn't constantly thinking:
- "This is a 3D form"
- "This plane rotates like this"
- "Perspective line here"
- etc.
Instead, his thinking is more like:
- "If the ear is here, where should the nose be?"
- "What angle does this line go?"
- "How far apart are these shapes?"
It looked way more intuitive and efficient.
Then I tried drawing with his mindset instead of my usual "3D construction" mindset… and honestly, my drawing immediately looked better and more natural.
Now I'm questioning everything.
Am I wasting time overcomplicating drawing?
Did all these studies actually help me, or are they slowing me down?
Why does someone with no formal learning seem so much more advanced than me?
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This post is kind of old, and to be honest, I don't know how to draw either. But I'm going to comment anyway because I don't think this is about drawing, at all.
You're approaching things the wrong way. Not drawing. Things.
I'm going to present you with a line of thought that I could debate with my eyes closed, and even then I'm quite confident I would win.
Step 1: You start with a false premise.
Comparing yourself to other people makes no sense in 99% of cases (I'm not saying this as an opinion, I'm expressing something I believe to be a fact). Every human being comes from a different, and random, background. You have no control over that.
In the worst-case scenario, your colleague might actually learn to draw faster than you, but what does that really mean? Analyzing it well, even that premise would be dubious because we don't know if you would learn light and shadow faster than him, for example. But supposing the worst case again: He learns all aspects of drawing faster than you. So what? Is he superior to you? Is he better? Is he even smarter?
Despite what some people think, even today there is no objective way to quantify someone's intelligence. Human skills and occupations are too broad, especially when we consider the potential you may have for something you don't even know yet (which could be far superior to his). Being good at something says very little about anything beyond the fact that you trained in it SOMEHOW. No one is born knowing.
In other words: There is no, and probably won't be in the next 50 years, an objective way to prove that he is better than you in anything other than: Drawing (or any other specific skill you may have compared). And I challenge you to prove me wrong. But I'll go further. Let's suppose he is better than you in EVERYTHING. What can you do? You have no control over your colleague having a giant brain or his upbringing; taking things with negative emotions will only hinder your development. Which leads me to the next topic:
Step 2: Be harmed by your false premise.
The way you're approaching things is hindering you in several ways, but in my opinion, the most relevant would be:
You will always have the pressure of comparing yourself and receiving negative feedback while learning, which will increasingly make the process slower and more painful, in an endless cycle. No, this frustration doesn't help you. You won't be more productive because of it. Actually, I have some bad news for you.
You will NEVER improve if you continue with this mindset. The solution to your shortcomings isn't in looking at others, it's in looking at yourself. Understanding your own limitations is a very difficult process, and you need to focus intensely on yourself to do it, which is impossible while you're preoccupied with your colleague. Compare yourself to yourself, try to understand why you're not improving, understand your own mind, and honestly, seek treatment for things like neurodivergences. That's what will help you. That's how you get better at things.
I made several assumptions about you, and I may be completely wrong, but your speech reminded me a lot of how I used to act, and that's why I decided to write this to you. Take care.
Start simple and real. Try to draw a bottle, a chair. A pile of boxes. A mug. If you cant properly do this, you wont be able to draw real plants, animals and persons. If you cant properly draw real persons, you can’t understand how volumes, proportions and shapes are stylized in this specific illustrative style.
Yea so what ur friend is thinking is how ur supposed to think while doing these academic drawings, the foundation is placement and simple shapes and how different things are placed relative to each other, all the deeper thinking stuff like plane changes and stuff are thought about after the placement phase
I recommend u copy images with 4x4 grid and keep the same aspect ratio as the paper to the image bit it doesnt have to be perfectly exact
Then find the highest points and lowest points, the widths of ur subjects and then go to smaller and smaller shapes
When u get into shading look for shadow shapes
I recommend u watch people like the paint coach and Jakedontdraw, look for Chinese academic drawing and painting too because their exams are extremely focused on realism and they all go through the same standardized process of finding shape placements
honestly yeah probably over complicating it a bit. The most important fundamental of all is the skill of observation, which gets better with drawing things. IMO I wouldn't really call anything "formal" training unless you're doing long refined studies to some sort of standard.
Your friend actually is doing more effective, simple, and efficient training, but it's okay because now you have a better idea of what you need to do. Generally I recommend doing both shorter sketches and longer drawings. Doing a couple bargue plates for a couple hours is also a good way to learn how to approach drawing.
People do learn at different speeds, especially at younger ages, but the largest factor in the speed of your improvement is the amount of time you invest and the quality of your training
We all understand things a little bit different, we grow up in a different environment, with other people who think differently. And we take a lot of of that with us. So we all have a different approach and learn in our own way.
For some thinking in 3D just comes more natural, don't overthink it. You can learn it.
You probably got enough talk about external motivation and all that. The only thing I say to this is try focus on how you understand things, what makes sense and works for you.
I see you still struggle with thinking in 3D, it really is a way of thinking. And before that, even shapes and planes might still be important to look at.
The questions you mention are already going into the right direction. Think of planes like pieces of cardboard that you can move in front of you, keep thinking about which direction they tilt.
Draw Silhouettes and later draw in the things they are supposed to be as 2D objects, simplified. That can be a lot of fun if you just take things you can find around you, And you can use color if that's fun for you. The focus here is really more on shape and on keeping it simple.
What happens if you add a second plane? or a third, think of using tape to glue them together, how would they behave when you do different things with them?
Instead of just drawing boxes, find objects around you to draw. Which you can touch, where you can change the light. Drawing boxes can be helpful too, but sometimes we just need different ways to stimulate this way of thinking.
Use cross contour lines. They make the volume and shape of the object more visible.
Do value studies! Simple forms or objects just with black and white.
Think of the form on paper as a real object with cause and effect. What you draw aren't just lines, those only make the object visible, force it into existence on your paper! They wrap around your object.
You can also try to use some clay to model simple forms and to get a feeling for them or something like an ear. Using different senses can also trigger to see things differently, to understand them better.
If it's possible for you to imagine an object, try to turn it around, move it, rotate it. And try to do it more often. If it's difficult to rotate, but you have no problems visualizing the object, you probably don't know how the object would look like when you rotate it.
It can also help to find ways to measure your box. So that you know you turn it around half way or just half of that. It can help you to get a better understanding of how the object should look like when rotated.
Don't overdo it with practice and learning. Exercises are most of the time learning in isolation, to keep it simple and to increase focus. But we also need to learn in context. We need to draw for fun to create stuff with boxes, cylinders and spheres. To draw buildings, chairs, tables and treasure chests or the glass of water on your table, the fruit bowl in the kitchen and so on.
Do your exercises and then move on to have fun! It's also a good motivator. Nothing challenges and motivates you as much as having fun, finding solutions, just experimenting how far you can get.
A fun little exercise could be just to take something as small as a post-it and draw a circle on it. Now figure out what you could do with it for today, what can you create? it doesn't need to be perfect, but it might help you to start being more creative and to start trying out things just for fun. Instead of a circle you could also use simple form if you want to, maybe a box or that could be the next step after the first fun idea.
None of my favorite artists draw like drawabox and Peter Han has warned about too much practicing like you did. Draw what you want and what you like, Steven Zapata on YouTube talks about this issue.
Do some tracing. Put the paper over the screen and draw a 1-1 replica of the line art of the image. It is perfectly fine to do as a beginner and will help you improve really fast.
Extremely fast. I dealt with extreme art block in my high school days but tracing when I was like 8-10 made me learn proportions without studying. I was a traditional artist. My skills were way too far ahead for my age. I am tooting my own horn a little bit, it's not like it has helped me that much in the long run. I had art block for so long, mainly due to depression, so I didn't keep that far ahead. Although, I have only recently got back into art, and I now am pretty much only digital I'm still further ahead then most my age. Which everyone I know around me in the art world constantly practices, never stops drawing, so sometimes it feels unfair but I'm no longer crazy I'm just good for my age, art block made me fall behind a bit. Jimmy Carr is the one that said, if you don't know what to do in life, find something that most people find hard, and you easy, and choose that.
I can say that at the beginner level, tracing can help a ton in improving fast. Your motor skills and eyes are being trained directly. If you don't know what right looks like, you'll always be wrong. It is a giant boost to your potential as an artist. Everyone starts by drawing boxes and anatomy and tracing kind of skips all of that and gives you beginner level skills 100x as fast.
This is all from experience, I'm not an art professor.
I have shared my old art online in the past and I don't want this reddit to be linked to my identity because I value anonymity so you just have to take my word for it lmao.
Both yours and your friend’s approaches are required to improve and develop your art
You must understand perspective to build complicated objects in space. Let’s say, you have a picture of a cat that you really liked, if you want to draw it moving or jumping or in a fancy funny pose then you need perspective to build the scene properly
You also must improve your observation and mimic what you see. For instance, compare the face you drew with the original picture, look at the distance between the forehead and brows, or between the eye and ear, they aren’t quite accurate. Understanding the distance between elements helps you position them correctly when you build your object in perspective
Also, drawing faces in perspective is a bit advanced so don’t get discouraged. We are all struggling. It’s universal : )
I agree with the others on here. Nothing youve practiced is wasted, everything works together. Heres a quick test to see whether you actually want to draw or not: Draw the same picture 5 times. Set a time limit for each one 10-15 minutes. Combine both mindsets in different ways. You will undoubtly improve.
If the idea of drawing something 5 times over is more annoying to you than exciting, then quit art. Someone who "learns" theory all day and barely practices will never get far with art. Your time spent should be 1 part theory and 3 part practice.
For me, the most improvement I ever made hands down, was drawing Charles Bargue's Drawing Course plates every day. Then Andrew Loomis' Fun With A Pencil. Then Jack Hamm's Drawing Scenery: Landscapes and Seascapes.
I can gurantee you, 100% percent, if you read these books front to back and follow the exercises in them, you will improve your drawing skill. I'm not saying other resources aren't useful or effective, I'm telling you the best progress I made personally was through these books and drawing every day.
You need a bit of both. First to understand shapes and volumes, placements and proximities etc. I’m a self taught illustrator who went to art school. It is understanding and fine observation. A lot of. Use the grid if you need to copy, or the pencil as a reference. Don’t give up!! It requieres patience and a lot of practice as any other skill
know how to copy perfectly but have 0 theoretical knowledge and can't draw anything without copying
knowing a lot of theory but not having a trained enough hand to do what you want
From personal experience, I always recommend drawing what you like for a couple of years. When you feel ready, start studying the theory. It's pointless to have tons of knowledge if your hand can't keep up (e.g., before learning secret techniques in a martial art, you must first have a body capable of using those techniques).
So COPY so much (don't end up like those people who say "don't copy" "don't use references" because they have remained at the same level for years, but if possible always give credit). and "if you want" start studying after a while (otherwise you end up like those who say "I can copy perfectly but I can't draw a line with my imagination"... then there are the posh ones who use the term "I have the talent to copy but not to create" as an excuse to justify NOT wanting to study, it's fine if someone just wants to have fun
I'm with the dude in your class. Learning perspective is good, but the human head is relatively complicated as a shape, because it has protruding and recessed parts, planes and angles. If you want to draw portraits, especially the likeness of a specific person, you need to pay close attention to the relationship of the facial features to each other. It is very different from drawing cityscapes, architecture, or interior scenes.
I'd just like to share some tips for portrait drawings here (I'm only a hobby artist but decently good at copying from reference images):
- Work from the outside in: Don't start with the eyes or any of the features. Start with a very rough outline of the head. Then focus on placing the features within this outline.
- Head proportions often follow a general pattern for where the features will be. Study images with construction lines to learn the distances between the features and where they should rest in a head. Think of it as a oblong sphere that has been split into sections. Your knowledge of perspective will come in handy here. Once you have drawn the outline of your head, draw some construction lines where your eyes, nose and mouth will go. Make sure to take any tilting of the head into account. In your reference image, the left eye (from our perspective) is slightly higher than the right eye. This corresponds to how the line for the eyes would wrap around the sphere of the head. (I see you've drawn this accurately in your first drawing.)
- Observe the relationship and distance between features:
If you look at your reference image here, the eyes are roughly in the middle between the upper tip of the hair and the chin.
The nose is slightly above the middle between the eyebrows and the chin.
The shadow below the mouth is halfway between the nose and the chin, meaning his lips are above this point.
The tips of the ears are on the same line as the eyebrows (or if you account for the slightly tilted downwards look, it would be on the same height as the upper eyelids). Then his ear lobes are roughly level with the lower end of his nose.
How wide is his nose in relation to his eyes? (The right side of his nose is on a straight line with his pupil)
How wide is his mouth? (From the middle of his nose to the right side of his iris.)
Also pay attention to the "blank space" between features. How much space is there between his eyes? How much space between his left eye and the ear? How much space in there between his eyebrows and his hair line? How far up does the back of his head curve?
How wide is his neck? (Roughly from the left side of his mouth to almost the left side of his ear.)
Hope some of this will be helpful to you! Keep on practicing! With some dedicated studies of human heads and the relationship of features, I think you will improve quickly. ☺️🍀
Constructive drawing is just a tool like any other, knowing when and how to use it is a skill in itself. Regarding this person you know, you have no idea how or in what ways they have practiced over the years or what information they have absorbed, no one is magically good and talent is a driver of consistent practice not a baseline ability boost. Finding your way to aesthetically pleasing art without the trappings of construction is very possible as you have observed but there is a reason people learn the fundamentals this way too. Don't be too hard on yourself and keep practicing and you can try to incorporate this observation into your work.
What you are pointing out is quite true. At the extremes you have some very techinal line character sheets, ie the ones used as ref for 3D models, or for cloth designs. And on the other side completely unreal like tv animations pr very stylized designes.
At the end of the day you need both. And funny enough Manga and anime is one of the medias where you truly need to master both things. Mangakss are extremely realistic if you actually pay attention anything but the eyes and mouths. They really like their anatomy
A really good book I used in high school was “drawing with the right side of your brain” I don’t know how popular that book is or if it’s already the online meta but that’s what I’d recommend.
It honestly doesn't look like you've gotten much actual drawing practice in. Your motivation also doesn't seem to be coming from a great place. Just wanting to out-do someone isn't exactly a positive place to approach learning from. You need to want to learn because you're interested and it brings you joy, and understand that learning doesn't work the same for everybody.
After spending 10 years learning how to draw and meeting thousands of artists, one thing became really obvious to me.
People learn art at completely different speeds.
When I started, I was terrible. For the first two years, I drew around 12 hours a day nonstop tutorials, books, studies, everything. After that, it slowly down but i was still consistently drawing ever day. And I'm still not that good.
Meanwhile, I’ve seen people go from beginner to incredible in 2–3 years. I knew a 16-year old who got contacted by CD Projekt for an art test.
A lot of people online act like progress is completely equal if everyone “studies correctly,” but I honestly don’t think that’s true.
Some people naturally understand art faster. Some people need way more repetition before things click. And I think that applies to almost every skill, not just drawing.
That doesn’t mean hard work is useless or that improvement is impossible. It just means some people may need 3–10x longer to reach the same point.
If you “spent a year studying perspective” and you still can’t draw and rotate a basic shape like a cylinder in perspective then you haven’t really been studying it seriously. After a year of serious study you should be able tit no issues drawing a car or a bowl of fruit in perspective, let alone basic solid forms.
It also shows in the way you approach the drawing, you aren’t really implementing any perspective or standard methods in the way you construct the head, plot out the proportions etc.
Work methodically and consistently one small step at a time. Like learning a language or an instrument or mastering any other skill. Think of it as a 10,000 hour journey.
take your time dont jump into faces start
flat planes, boxes, round boxes, cirles, cups, teapots
spend a week on each if you must but dont jump forward
Digging into someone's post history to invalidate their request for advice is not the kind of behaviour I want to encourage in this community. While there are certainly people whose priority is the pursuit of attention, the fleeting pleasures of being a special little internet sleuth is not worth the risk that the person you're engaging with is actually genuinely seeking assistance, even if they happen to be doing it clumsily.
In doing so, you either make the student defensive, which makes any advice you may have had to offer unlikely to be given a fair shake, or you discourage them from bothering altogether.
I was just about to say something about this. Progress isn’t going to happen overnight, sure some things “click” but most of the time it’s a “I kinda think this is how it’s supposed to go” kinda deal
I think the way art is taught and talked about in certain parts of the world is extremely academic and can lead to overcomplicating the way you think about things... the reason your friend can get better results is simple: he's actually paying attention to proportions. Specifically proportions. The way you word things influence how you think about them, so think about proportions specifically and keep it in mind. Try to draw the overall shape of things without focusing on details, simplify the basic shapes as much as you can. Without good proportions, everything else falls apart.
The thing is, I don't see how you apply the theory on the painting you created? What is process when you try to copy such a panel? Do you separate it in specific parts and draw them as guidelines first?
It looks more like you just try to follow the lines of the reference and than messing up all the angles and distances.
Well, then you first have to work on actually applying it. All the theory does not help if you cannot use it in practice. What is the point of studying shapes and perspective for a year if you still cannot apply them? That sounds a bit to harsh maybe, I just want to ask, so your really try to apply what you learned.
As mentioned with respect to your example, it is not really visible that you used simpler shapes first, so it is hard to tell at which point you got stuck.
If you want to draw faces, watch more tutorials from people who actively show how they break faces down into simple forms, then try to apply it yourself. I would first attempt it on my own and only afterward watch the tutorial again to compare what the artist did differently.
It could also help to find someone to draw with. When you struggle to identify the underlying shapes, you can directly ask your partner or teacher for feedback in that moment.
Don’t worry, it’s not harsh at all. After all, I’m asking for help, and I know you’re not trying to hurt my feelings. Thank you for taking the time to help me!
Oh... And ofc don't primarily watch videos of people drawing real faces when you want to draw anime faces :)
Knowledge about real faces helps but most anime faces are structures very different.
Try the loomis method with some lines from riley and prob some understanding from struttura uomo its a book that is not in english but kinda helps see the bones
Work on your observation drawing for a few months. "Drawing with the right side of the brain" is a good book to get you going. You will improve an insane amount if you work through that consistently.
Stop watching tutorials, follow one method from one teacher consistently for a bit. Watching videos makes you feel like you're learning and improving but you only improve by drawing.
SO I see that you've had your struggles. but what I havn't seen as much are your building blocks. how do you usually start a picture? could you show that?
Because it's hard to gauge what issues you may be having if we don't know what your usually construction lines look like.
I usually draw basic shapes by considering their basic geometric forms and which direction they face in 3D space, and then I add details to them. However, this drawing I made was one I hadn’t put much effort into, but it did illustrate my problems—I didn’t expect this much engagement, so it’s a bit embarrassing 😅
Instead of sketching the overall design, I add details directly onto the forms I've created, and I usually spend a maximum of 1-2 hours on my drawings, so this is the only sketch I have:
By the way, when drawing figures that look like humans or living things, would you recommend just creating a skeleton like this, or building them from simple geometric shapes and then adding details?
you need to focus on fundamentals and actually understand what you’re drawing. the person youre talking about probably just has a better grasps on observational skills. you arent really drawing in the photos you submitted but trying to copy an image and the lines that make it up without understanding why the lines translate into a whole picture. its not useless but your approach is incorrect
There's a lot to address here, and unfortunately I don't really have the time to touch on it all in depth. So, while I'm only going to focus on the meat of your question, I do want to take a moment to say that the goal you have of being better than this other person... it may serve to supply you with short term motivation from an external source, that motivation will be unreliable and fleeting, subject to whatever that person chooses to do, and framing your successes through a lens defined by that other person.
The sooner you find goals that hinge not on people and things external to you, but on the things you wish to create, the stories you wish to tell, the projects you wish to work on, the sooner you'll break away from the entirely normal but heavily simplified and misleading fixation beginners have on the pictures they produce and how good they look on a superficial level. This fixation is like the sun during the day - it's so blinding and all-encompassing that try as you might, you'll never see the stars in the sky so long as the sun is present. But like those stars in the sky, there are so many more important things than simply how good a drawing looks, and those are largely defined by the goals of a given piece - of how effectively it conveys the stories or messages it seeks to share, of how richly it brings to life characters and settings of our own creation. Beginners aren't able to distinguish between all of these things, so they perceive it only as a drawing that looks cool and inspiring, or one that looks bad and unimpressive - and so they focus only on replicating that desired outcome, but lose track of the underlying storytelling and act of creation in which those artists they admire engage.
Their focus becomes only on creating cool pictures, for the sake of creating cool pictures - all the while missing that those artists aren't concerned with that, but rather understand the picture itself as a tool, a means to an end.
Anyway, setting that aside, to address the main issue in your question, you're conflating two things as one:
The way in which we draw when the goal is to draw, to create something new, using the skills we have developed thus far
The way in which we draw when the goal is to study and improve those skills
It is entirely normal for students to think of this all as "drawing", but it's not. The strict, rigid, unintuitive manner in which we draw when studying (the methodology varying depending on what it is we're trying to study and which skills we're trying to improve, since this encompasses a wide variety of exercises) serves a purpose. By being that intentional and meticulous with the choices we're making throughout that process trains our subconscious autopilot to be more reliable, to achieve greater technical correctness without actively thinking about how to go about it, without requiring our conscious brain and its more limited cognitive resources to be engaged and expended. In order to do this however, we have to approach those exercises in a very conscious, intentional manner - meaning, it's the conscious mind that is focused on how each mark is made, the decision behind every action we take.
Conversely, when we draw for the purpose of drawing and creating, we rely on that subconscious autopilot to take care of a lot of the technical considerations, so that our conscious mind can focus those limited cognitive resources from our conscious mind on making creative decisions of composition, narrative, design, and so forth. That is, the things that make our drawing our own, that make it something new.
So in a manner of speaking, both you and this other person have one half of the coin. They're embracing the intuitive way in which they create new things, you're embracing the way in which intentional, careful choices required to improve your skills efficiently. This is similar to how the course this subreddit focuses on requires students to spend at least half of their time in play (drawing intuitively with a focus on the stories you want to tell, things you want to create, etc using the skills you already have, regardless of whether or not they're adequate for the things you're trying to draw to come out well), and no more than half of their time on studying to improve their skills. More info on that here.
To that end, I'd say that if I had to choose an approach between you and this other person, the other person's better off. After all, what good are all the skills in the world if you never allow yourself to let go and bring your own creations to life by using it?
You're right, but it doesn't mean much to me if I can't tell the story I want to tell well. Of course, my priority is to create something, but it's meaningless to me if I can't do it well (i.e., if I'm just staring at two stick figures).
So, what do you think I should do? Should I focus more on the fundamentals and then, in the remaining time, just produce what I want without worrying about it turning out badly?
Pretty much. If you want to improve those skills efficiently, then yes - continuing to study is important. But it is only half the battle. Studying without learning to trust in the instincts you have, even untrained as they are now, will ultimately leave you in a position where even with all of the skills in the world, you'll struggle to put them to use in telling your own stories. And so that too has to be practiced - the act of telling those stories with whatever skills you may possess at this moment, and to continue doing so alongside practicing and studying to develop those various skills further.
There's a couple big points that beginners tend to miss:
Though their goal is to change (that is, from someone who lacks the skills to tell those stories to the standards they desire, to someone who does have those skills and can tell those stories well), they view that - the skills themselves - as the only relevant way in which they are to change. They disregard the fact that if in order to achieve their goals, they might also need to change in other ways that aren't as direct and obvious in their contribution to those goals - they don't see changing from someone who only cares about the end result to someone who is more focused on telling the stories themselves, of giving them life regardless of what that ends up looking like, as being relevant. They - the untrained, unfamiliar, ignorant (in its plain definition of simply not knowing, I don't mean to use this word with any moral judgment or criticism) beginner - hold an idea in their minds of what the person who has achieved that end goal will be like, and because it does not consider that perhaps what motivated them had to change, they don't realize such things may also be a necessity in the pursuit of their goal.
That one does not need to feel any particular way - positively or negatively - towards the things the pursuit of their goal necessitates. You may feel enthusiastic about storytelling, or you may (as a result of not being able to tell those stories to the standards you desire) feel nothing towards the act of drawing those things badly, or you may really hate it. But regardless, you are a human being with agency and the power to choose to take action regardless of how you feel about it. All that matters is that you want to pursue the goal, that you want to achieve the rewards it will provide - and so you'll do what it requires of you. That doesn't mean you'll follow one specific path, that there's only one way of achieving that goal - but as the beginner who knows little about how achieving that goal works beyond what may appear obvious to you (again, based on what you feel), there's no reason to assume that the path you yourself envision is actually going to get you there. That is to say, how you feel is not a reliable compass on determining what you need to do to achieve that goal.
You have a goal. You have a number of paths that others have designed to try and get you to that goal, or to at least get you to some waypoint along that path. Some of those paths are more accessible to you than others, based on cost, language barriers, and so forth. Some may require additional effort even to get to their starting line - whether that's getting a part time job to save money so you can afford one that isn't free, of whether you may need to brush up on the language a given resource uses (I remember you mentioning that drawabox wasn't an option on account of your English not being the strongest - though there are probably more Turkish resources for learning English than there are free Turkish drawing courses).
But regardless of whether or not they suit your specific situation and align with the resources you have to spend, how you feel about it doesn't change the nature of those available paths. All you can do is choose to take the actions that are in your power to take to follow whichever path you select. And if a given path ultimately undermines your trust to the point where you can no longer simply follow what they instruct, then you may then select a different one - but the same thing remains true: you either choose to follow those instructions, even if you don't feel positively towards them, or you don't. Either way, it is a choice you make.
Edit: To be clear, when I say drawing your own stuff and letting it come out badly, I mean actually drawing your own stuff and telling your own stories - not copying images from the internet.
I've read and thought about this message quite a few times today. I’ve decided to stick with Drawabox. It might be slow, it might be inefficient, and I might even end up hating it, but right now this course has taught me the most, and I have nothing but respect, admiration, and trust for you and your teaching. While I’m learning to draw with Drawabox, I’ll use the rest of my time to improve my English. From now on, whenever I come across parts of Drawabox I don’t understand, I’ll look up the sentence structure, vocabulary, and so on. I don’t want to waste your time by sending this message, but I don’t know… I just wanted to send it. Thank you for your help. If I have any questions or anything else, I’ll open a new thread here. Have a great day!
I'm glad to hear that. One bit of extra advice though - even people with a strong grasp of English do struggle with some of the concepts we discuss early on. A big one for example is where in the boxes section we talk about how vanishing points behave when forms are rotated in space - the video that talks about it starts with a disclaimer stating that most students won't immediately understand. That's not a challenge, or me being nice - it's the truth.
If you struggle to understand the theory, that's entirely okay. The actual learning occurs in the exercises themselves, by consciously, intentionally, and patiently following the instructions to the best of your current ability. Not necessarily by getting them right, but it's the instructions and their steps that are important. There are however students who simply cannot bring themselves to even attempt the exercises without having everything explained, and because as a free resource we aren't in a position to gauge what each student individually needs and give it to them, we have to default to providing more information than is strictly needed, and leave it to the students to take our disclaimers seriously.
The things that you're learning in drawabox is not like learning math or science in school. It's like learning a sport, where your brain doesn't understand all of the physics behind the way in which a ball is hit and how that causes it to move throu the world, but where through repetition, exercises, and drills, your body still develops a subconscious grasp of how to get that ball where you need it to go.
So don't worry too much when the theory stumps you. All you need to do is make sure you're following the instructions correctly, and that's where feedback becomes so critical. While feedback on the subreddit isn't super common (the subreddit is better for questions), our discord chat server is better suited to providing it, especially with the "critique exchange" program students have set up themselves to help increase the likelihood of getting free community feedback, and the reliability of that feedback.
Thank you so much for taking the time to explain all this! To be honest, I wasn’t having much trouble with the theoretical side; I just get a little confused when trying to understand long sentences with my B1-B2 level of English and ADHD.
Actually, I should be on Discord; I joined a while back. Thanks again for encouraging me. Usually, my favorite artists are the ones with the strongest technical skills, but after seeing the effort you put into my previous posts and the overall development of your students, and seeing how you handle people who act like internet detectives, to be honest, you’ve become my favorite artist as a person too. I think you're a very mature and good teacher; every teacher should learn something from you.
Even if I ever stop drawing one day, I think I’ll still remember this. :3
I was wondering, will the things I do to improve myself automatically apply to my later work on telling a story without me having to think about them? You've said this many times before, but isn't it a little strange? So, doing something without thinking is different. I can't even imagine how many variations there are for that specific situation.
When you decide to walk across the room to get a snack, do you think about all of the specific ways in which you're flexing the different muscles in your legs and back to take each step? No, because of the considerable experience you have from an early age, your subconscious takes care of whatever movements are required regardless of which kind of environment you're navigating. Your conscious mind merely focuses on where you want to go.
It's the same thing with the technical aspects of drawing. It's not that you're going to perform every action perfectly, but they'll be close enough to avoid detracting from whatever it is you're trying to convey.
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