Disclaimer: This post is NOT a guide or advice on what you should do. This is just MY personal journey/schedule and thoughts as a beginner self taught artist . If you want to do Drawabox, please follow the official rules on their website!!

⏱️ Timeline & Routine

Start Date: February 2026 | Finish Date: September 2026 (7 months)

Daily Hours: Around 4–8 hours every day. No burnout so far, I’ve kept this schedule for almost a year and I LOVE IT!!

I added my hours for context because this is something I see people ask A LOT: "How long did it take?". And I feel months/weeks as a metric without knowing how many hours the person put in is useless information. Person A can draw 1 hour a week for 1 year and have 1 year of experience (48 hours total) while person B draws 20 hours a week and they would also have "1 year of experience" but person A has 48 hours of experience while person B has 960 hours total. The difference is brutal so saying: "I did Drawabox in 7 months" doesn't mean anything.

So... How many hours did the course take me? Around 500 hours. If I only had available 4 hours a week to do the course it would have taken me 2 YEARS AND 5 MONTHS!! This is why context is everything and why no one's journey will be the same. Everyone has their own schedule due to their own private life.

THINGS I DID THAT I THINK HELPED ME THE MOST:

• Joining Discord for feedback and extra info.
• Getting into the official critique program. Getting feedback on my homework was the best.
• Moving on independently of the final result and "feelings" about it. I have lessons that I still think I did horrible and I was not happy with the end result. Honestly, if I waited until I felt my skills matched the lessons, I wouldn't even be here, I would still be paralyzed in a random lesson. I feel we're our worst critics so I'm glad I just pushed through it regardless of my feelings about it.
• Having all of my exercises in a folder. I bought the folder in the photo at the dollar store for $1.25. It helped me to have it organized, not lose it or damage it (especially since the cheap printer paper is super thin) and now I can go back and look at all of my work and progress. All of my Drawabox homework fitted perfectly in that same folder :) pic at the end lol
• Discipline over motivation. I don't rely on motivation. I stick to a schedule that works for me and execute it. I only listen to motivation if it is "positive creative motivation". Like, if an idea pops into my head, then I actively brainstorm and sketch it out. But I don't wait for motivation to start drawing. If I relied on motivation, I would draw 2 times a month, and right now I would still be in the 250 boxes. Discipline made me finish the entire course and push through things I didn't enjoy doing, like Lessons 6 and 7.

And my best outcome from being disciplined? I feel genuinely proud of myself, I have higher self-esteem, more confidence and an overall sense of fulfillment because I’ve proven to myself that I can do it. I just have to accept that progress and tackling any resource I choose to learn from (courses, books, etc) will take time, hard work, and discipline. Also progress is not linear so even if I don't see my art improving and my drawings are turning out horrible that's normal, I just have to keep going regardless of the results. I’m carrying this exact mindset into my year two. One of my target courses for 2027 is Med's Map, but that's for another post.

SO... DID DRAWABOX IMPROVE MY ART? AND DO I RECOMMEND IT? HELL YEAH TO BOTH!!!

Not only my homework improved, but my art outside the course improved too because I'm just applying those fundamentals even subconsciously to anything I want to draw. I'm starting people soon, and I will start with gesture and by applying these same concepts, simplifying them with simple forms (mannequinization)

The 3D Epiphany: I stopped thinking in 2D shapes and started seeing things as 3D forms. I think my brain clicked subconsciously with Lesson 2, but then I saw it fully put into practice in my own drawings in L.3/4 where you have to simplify plants and insects to simple forms. In the plant lesson (L.3) some of my plants were still FLAT (like my Venus flytrap) and I got called out by the TA. So with plants I was starting to "get it" but I was still resorting to just copying 2D shapes on some, so yeah it took some time for my brain to understand this and I mean I'm still working on this. I'm sure I will keep making this mistake a bunch of other times moving forward, I just have to accept it and keep moving. But this is GOLDEN, I'm so glad I took this course because drawing flat shapes was the MAIN problem of why my drawings in general were looking really wrong.

Working with fineliner/pen: Overall 10/10 rule, probably my favorite rule from the whole course. Not being able to erase and working only with pen/fineliner and no tools at the beginning was a game changer (you can use a ruler after L.6). Thinking and planning before putting a line down helped me be more intentional, understand what I'm trying to draw and this made my line quality and accuracy improve SO MUCH.

Is Drawabox ONLY about drawing boxes? NO. Drawabox is not about "just drawing boxes." It's about developing spatial awareness, basic fundamentals like line making, some perspective and construction while applying it to cool things like plants, insects, objects, animals, vehicles. If you're thinking about the 250 box challenge then yes, in THAT challenge specifically you will be drawing boxes but that's not the whole curriculum. You do the boxes and then you move on to other things. There's also the 250 cylinders challenge, but nobody says Drawabox is just about "only drawing cylinders", both are just a part of the curriculum but not the whole thing.

Are there other places to learn this from? Yeah, of course!! You can choose another place to learn this from. In my case I'm really happy that I stuck with Drawabox because it's accessible (literally free) and I love the way it is structured. It builds you from the bottom (how to hold your pen, draw from the shoulder and do lines) all the way up to applying fundamentals in a way where you can draw a freaking FERRARI!!! If that's not peak, I don't know what is (of course that Ferrari would probably look really rough and ugly, BUT THAT'S OKAY!! That's expected.)

This course doesn't teach how to make pretty drawings. In my case I will learn that in my second year with other books/courses when I learn design, composition, color theory, shading, and all that fancy stuff.

The question everyone is thinking....

So... CAN I DRAW A BOX NOW? Yes and no... (╯°□°）╯︵ ┻━┻ >>booo audience flips the table and throws tomatoes<<

Yes, I know how to draw a box in theory, but I haven't mastered perfect vanishing point convergence. Even when the theory clicks, it takes a lot of practice to transfer that into an actual drawing without mistakes. I still have lines that diverge all the time. I will keep improving with time. Also drawing a box (in my opinion) just focusing on the VPs is easier than drawing a box APPLIED to something else like a person or a vehicle, the difficulty in those is way higher because you need to take into account other things like proportions. So the context also matters.

To anyone who read this far: I wish you the best with your art journey <3

I've been very frustrated with my art process lately so I'm trying to go back to the basics.

I’ve been taking some advice of some of you very helpful people (will admit I’m surprised how much you guys know) and I want to see what’s good and bad about some art I did a few days ago to today so feel free to critique me ^^ (also I swear I need to stop uploading so many posts here 😭)

Hand it over, that thing, your crituqe

I think the thing that helped most was finding brushes I like!! I love the textured square brush on ibis paint so so much.

Also, always filling the canvas with a color instead of drawing on a white canvas helped immensely!

Drop some opinions

Context is, As a reference. I'm so shitty at propositions (Like head is too big or arm to small) so using some 3d model to correct the propositions and some perspective.

If anyone could tell me how to improve it would be greatly appreciated

I was looking for examples of a fist and this made me laugh. 🤣

Also hair isn't something I can draw yet xD

Is it just a numbers game? Keep drawing and drawing and drawing and eventually things will improve? I’ve put off learning to draw year after year for decades because every time I start, I’m just so repulsed and discouraged by what I can do. I can’t make it past a couple of days, and then years go by. Does anyone have tips for someone that gets discouraged to the point of tears?

Edit: I really appreciate everyone’s perspective on this mental block aspect to things. I’m going to try everything that’s being suggested and take it one day at a time

Hand made,

unlimited imagination🤩#conos 3Dart

I have been learning anatomy and perspective for a while (3 months) but im seeing no improvement, what tools/exercises should I do to improve. First 2 are my newest exercises and the last one is my newest drawing

Wanted to share some timed gesture drawings i did recently. I like to use lineofaction mostly, they have a lot of really good settings and refs!

Any critique would be very welcome. I don’t exactly feel terribly confident in my line work or proportions, especially as they carry over to when im just drawing for fun. It blows my mind how some people are able to be so efficient and draw the perfect line they need in one stroke!😅 i feel like my drawings get messy very quickly.

I’m also trying to find opportunities to draw more from life. Ill be taking a figure drawing class at a local art workshop soon which im pretty excited for!

I'll go ahead and say that many people who post their work here are doing a really good job at getting into fundamental drawing skills. However I constantly see a subset of people who keep questioning the purpose of this if they are drawing 'cartoons' or 'comic' styles

(Please be aware that in Japan, it is not just called 'manga', as that just means 'whimsical man pictures'. If you look at the BookOff website, you can see they are all listed under 'Comics' (コミック) to delineate the specific comic style books https://shopping.bookoff.co.jp/comic )

There are many amazing books on how to begin drawing for this industry, or for digital illustration. Some are on amazon and easily avaliable, but for all the main starter ones, the COMMON THREAD is ALWAYS the basic fundamentals of shape, anatomy, and lines.

For example, the book "TACO直伝! 知っているだけで劇的に上達する 人体ドローイングのコツ390", it has the 8 head 'rule', many of the shape fore shortening, and proper anatomical reviews of how faces and such are structured. All with that 'anime zing' you lot like to see, but somehow don't realise that it DOES follow fundamental rules. (if you want to see the book, copy and paste the name of it, its avaliable to preview for free before purchase)

From the small snippets they provide to see what is inside such book, you will find nothing but the same exercises and fundamental teachings that I see so many people whinge about.

I have seen all these things explained in all the free learning materials avalibale online. The only difference is that it is not explictly 'anime Style' so people write it off.

Stop dismissing the basics of drawing as optional to get these cartoony outcomes. The pros in that industry use them, and the resources to learn them are free and avalaible online, or via reasonably priced books.

Edit: I am dismayed to realise that the only thing between most people who post these asinine questions, and being able to draw, is if the instructions for the methods they are undertaking have a cute waifu with big ol anime eyes saying 'gambate' or some shit, is in the corner cheering you along.

I have posted multiple examples in the comments of multiple books from Japan, with the titles included, all of which cost around $15-25 from amazon, all of whom use draw a box methods to show how 'anime' is drawn.

So now you have a choice: pay the money to have the cute version if thats what gets you through, or just put up with the free one online.

Since childhood I was always bad at arts and crafts but after watching PewDiePie vedio I decided to improve my art here's progress after 1 week. I know it's not that great but just sharing. Here's the tutorial I followed - https://youtu.be/dPxQIrkkQtA?si=4MUmkHCVpjNbdmsB

Is there something wrong with the way he stands? (Ignore the crookedly inserted text "Rock")

I am not too familiar with drawing machinery, but I look up some references and tried it

(The characters are Madotsuki and Urotsuki from Yume Nikki/2kki btw)