The only thing you wanted to do was art, you were good at art, you had a style of art that inspired you, you could draw from reference and life, you had technical understanding of your materials, and you still felt like giving up. Yeah, I should probably give up. This was helpful, thanks.
Don’t give up!! Yes, I was good at copying references, but I wasn’t drawing the things I wanted to draw, because I couldn’t draw from my head. I wasted a lot of time copying photos, and it didn’t improve my skills, that’s the point I was trying to make. Honestly, just start with perspective, learn as much as you can about it, and go and learn other subjects from there. You can do it man, don’t give up.
@@thomasalexander3630 I'll leave the art to the people who actually enjoy it and get something out of it. And no, spending years on perspective exercises never helped ^_^
@@johndoe-rq1pu out of curiosity, what kind of art were you hoping to create? Was it character designs, landscapes, architecture, sci-fi…? I found having a goal in mind helps navigate through the tricky world of art
If you were 25 years when you started this journey, how old are you now ? Just so that I can know how long it took you. Thanks in advance. Great video.
I am 30 years old now. I was 28 when I finally felt like I was making serious progress in my art. So 3 years, which isn’t a huge chunk of your life in the grand scheme of things
aw, my man... sounds like you're out there rediscovering fire when a few books could've saved you a LOT of money and time 😢 but yeah.. I feel you. I'm glad someone else is out there drawing realism based on the masters! there's not a lot out there on youtube for our kind. [I myself haven't begun my art journey yet... i am delayed by grad school at the moment]
True, and when I started reading books, there were many that kind of led me astray. I plan on talking about that too, about how important it is to choose your teachers carefully. Will save a lot of people money and time for sure. Best of luck to you on your creative journey!
My secondary education was in Fine Arts. My bachelor's degree is in Fine Arts. My master's degree is also in Fine Arts. My advice to myself is "Don't expect someone to teach you. Be the teacher you never had" and "The best education is self-education." Yes, I have been through universities, but many of my colleagues have also gone through universities, yet they do not achieve their goals, because they expect someone else to sit down and learn for them. Perhaps I did not encounter the right teachers, or it was because they were close to retirement and no longer felt like teaching, but those experiences taught me to fend for myself and seek my own development, without relying on others. Even in the best environment, with the best teachers, if you do not take the initiative yourself, you will gain nothing.
1000% !! Be the teacher you never had, and take the initiative. Equip yourself with the fundamentals, and then keep learning and exploring niches that you enjoy. That’s how you grow as an artist. And of course, never stop learning. The moment we stop learning is the moment we plateau
Around a year ago I enrolled into a drawing course that is taught by russian art teachers and honestly it was the best decision I ever made! Sure it was a bit expensive for me, but I have a curriculum, I learn constructive drawing, which allows me to easily draw the subject from imagination and anytime I struggle with something I just e-mail my teachers and they help me out!
The Russian way is the way, for sure! Their focus on constructive drawing is second to none. I never studied at their academies, but I did pick up some art books written by one of the professors of the St Petersburg Academy. Best art purchase I ever made. How nice is it when we can draw whatever image we conjure up in our minds at will?
Interesting that we had a similar jumping off point. I was huge into Warhammer particularly the painting and sculpting aspect. My artistic journey has been quite unorthodox in the sense that I started painting 3 dimensional figures and something inside me compelled me to paint in 2 dimensions. I quickly learned that if you cant draw you cant paint (realistically) so I found perspective drawing and havent looked back. Your perspective course is great btw.
Thank you so much, glad to hear you enjoyed the course! I was trying to teach everything in a way I wish I had learned years ago, so it’s always great to hear when people have enjoyed it. Perspective is the key! I sound like a broken record but it really is the most important thang to learn about drawing I still like looking at those Warhammer illustrations, never gets old
My advice for drawing from imagination is to move quickly and imprecisely. Use a small piece of paper and a blunt pencil and go over your own lines multiple times. The image isn't something that appears in the mind and is transfered to the page, the drawing itself is the stage in which the image is conceived. The pen and paper is an extension of your own mind and thought. You throw lines at it and the lines suggest ideas back at you. One thing I have realised is that there are different types of drawings for different types of objectives, and they require different philosophies and attitudes: Creative, imaginative drawing, such as a drawing the rough for a comic book frame, or designing a character, requires a playful, almost careless attitude. There is no such thing as a mistake at this stage. Inking a frame however, requires a slow merticulous, steady hand, total patience and certainty on where you are putting the lines. One mistake can ruin the whole thing. These two attitudes are totally, mutually incompatible, and you have to understand which part of the process you are at.
Absolutely! I’ll do another video soon where I show people all of my messy, scribbly sketches to then draw something that is more refined. You have to let go and loosen up a bit, and “search” for the final image. Our imaginations have a hazy idea of what it is we should draw, we refine it through quick sketching
I swear when people think of drawing from imagination, they think you can either do it like Kim Jung Gi or you can't do it at all. Like mate, if you aren't using references, you are still drawing from imagination, construction lines or not. When you look at it that way, everyone can draw from imagination. For me personally, I like having construction lines on the page because it's cool to see the drawing build itself over time. Also, great video! The newbies really need this. ❤
100% ! Kim Jung Gi also recommended people should study from references first before drawing from imagination, but a lot of artists want to skip to the latter. It’s all about patience I love construction lines too, it shows the journey of how the drawing was created
22:56 That is really an impressive Cerberus drawing; I love realistic and horrific design. Well done, man. I have always seen Cerberus primarily as a cartoon or fantasy design, but this one is awe-inspiring. I hope to see more creature drawings like this one.
Thank you! I want to make more time for creature designs, too, they are so much fun! I think for the Cerberus I looked at baboons and gorillas, and combining it with canine anatomy. Always helps to think outside the box a little
Hi Tyrant, happy to hear you enjoyed the video! I thought maybe this video would help artists who are self-taught and feeling a bit demotivated in their creative journey. Thank you for watching!
A very preciouss video for self thought artists. Amazing that a academicaly trained person follows you! Thanks for telling us that. It gives us hope. Like you did, also we think that not going to an art academy is a big problem. Also great tips for self though artists: decise what you want to draw, keep learning the things you need for that particular drawings (perspective, anatomy, ...) but also keep drawing even if your work is not perfect. Really great and thanks.
Thank you for watching! There is so much information out there on the internet, it’s a great tool for self-taught artists who can’t go to an academy. We just have to choose what subjects we want to learn. Perspective drawing is absolutely crucial though, so make sure you get some practice in that! Perfectionism is always out of reach, but we must draw because we enjoy it.
Even your simple primitives look AMAZING! Glad that I found your channel. Definitely one of the best perspective tutorials on YT. No nonsense, straight to teaching. That's what I like. Subscribed!
My I ask, these top three geometric bodies are standing on the same surface, like on the same table, for example? Otherwise a fantastic approach to draw perspective.
Hi, Thomas. Does your course teach how to put several different geometric bodies (cube, sphere, pyramid, conus,.. ) on one paper in relation to each other: like on top of each other, intersecting each other, beeing cut out from another; or same geometric bodies one one page but in different directions? Namely, that is what I am having trouble with. I can draw a cube in perspective but dont know how to draw another one next to it in different direction or higher, lower to look realistic. I need to know that before I buy the course. Thank you.
Hi Maja! There are video lessons in the course where we combine the different the shapes into one drawing, and even intersect them with each other. We then take the principles we’ve learned from the geometric bodies to draw and render the Doric column from imagination. I hope this helps, good luck!
This is the link to the video. Unfortunately I never got round to completing this specific tutorial. I do however have a Classical portrait available on Gumroad if that helps. Good luck! ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-SAU1xEKd0Qg.htmlsi=HaE9eIjhH1WOP33C
2:16 This new cube is perfect because it looks the same size as the cube on the left, but how was this new one drawn? Namely, It would be so great to know, how to draw cubes of the same size but in different positions (turned up, down, rotated). It would be super appreciated if you could also do a video on that.
Good question! This method basically relies on how accurate you draw the angle that hits tangent with the ellipse. Tangencies are difficult to draw in perspective, and if you're off by even a single degree, it can really mess up the final result. Practice and experience are definitely needed.
There's a kind of parallel tradition that's formed in Western art education, I think: illustrative artists (including games, comics and animation) are still really interested in building imaginative scenes, while the academy gave up on that in favor of more prestigious modes. And there are schools that focus on illustration, but in a very industry-trends context, where it's a mishmash of a few fundamentals and the new technologies, often with instructors that are underprepared to keep up with each wave of changes. That creates an environment where the education is less important than the fact that it puts enthusiastic young people in a place where they can teach each other. It seems to be really common to see comment threads online that say something along the lines of "art school never taught me this". When I was a kid in the 90's I was interested in both comics and games. In both cases, it was hard to get anything resembling instruction for these things - like you say, "drawing" in terms of copying felt disconnected from "making images where impossible things happen". I wanted to skip to the good part, so I doodled without getting very deep into the drawing. I did have Andy Smith's book, which basically follows the plan in the earlier "Draw Comics the Marvel Way", plus what I later learned are things from Joe Kubert's school where Andy studied. I did not really know how to use it in a well-rounded sense though - I read the words, but I really needed to copy the pictures as well(this is what I did later when I really began my self-taught journey). Some questions to people who were farther along also pointed me to "Rapid Viz", which exposed a lot of the conceptual stuff of perspective, but again, I wasn't directed to copy from it. And as far as the games, there was material on game programming, but it's a quicksand environment where every assumption about the tools changed every four years, so I did eventually pick it up at great effort in college after doing some computer science courses. The programming took precedence over the drawing, thus I only got deep into art at age 37, three years ago. However - and this is basically the case through the gaming industry - I knew how to program things and work on a production that copied something else, but not how to design something original that made sense. I had to figure that part out by studying philosophy(no joke 😂) By the time I picked up art again there was tons of video content, and while a lot of it is the video equivalent of "draw circles and then draw the rest of the owl", it adds another dimension to master studies, because now you can match the motions of the master, not just the result. This "monkey see, monkey do" method, although it isn't given explicit emphasis, may actually be the best way for beginners to get the right habits. And it helped give me insight into what the comics pros were doing and thinking, and how to make use of traditional materials. There are so many crafting channels run by housewives that have taught me interesting things to do with art supplies. What I've learned from the comics folk is that there's a certain lineage of American illustration deriving from the NY Art Students' League, where Bridgman taught. That's the source of a lot of cartoonists in the early 20th century, and the books that they referenced and passed down. A second source is from the Disney/Warner productions where animation was first perfected: from that you get Preston Blair, Ken Hultgren, and a few others, whose books I've studied from to help gain a sense of liveliness and motion. The Russian schools probably are the best at conserving older practices, but in today's online self-taught environment, I see good stuff coming from all over the world. Most of the difficulty comes at the beginning and finding a way through all the noise and cargo-cult teaching.
I think you’ve absolutely hit the nail on the head in regards to today’s art education, especially how Classical ateliers have separated themselves from the technical aspects of drawing in perspective and illustration. And you are absolutely correct, the most difficult part is knowing where to start. I firmly hold the belief that perspective is the best place for beginners, but I think everyone eventually finds their own path with what they want to do in their creative journey. The information is out there, we just have to take advantage of it!
It is my dream to be able to draw what you are drawing. I am mid-40 and just learned to draw a Loomis head and I might never reach that, but knowing that I can get there halfway motivates me.
The biggest advice I can give is to keep reading about perspective. Being able to understand 3D shapes helps you to draw anything! Second bit of advice: try to enjoy the learning process. It used to bother me a lot that I wouldn’t be able to master all the subjects I wanted to draw, but I’ve since realised that it is a good thing that there is always something new to learn. It keeps art interesting!
@@owlytedailer-sg5cq hahaha true! 😂 I think I should re-attempt this one with more accuracy. Still a cool method though, it’s cool seeing how the different geometries relate to each other!
Something I have always wondered (as it’s something I can never get quite right) is whether there is a proportional relationship to determine the depth of the nose tip.
Very good question! I was taught that (generally speaking) if you draw a straight construction line from the center of the chin to the center of the bottom lip, continuing that line should determine the length of the nose. So, in essence, the chin, bottom lip and tip of the nose should be aligned diagonally when viewed from the profile. I explain this technique in much more depth in my Classical Portrait course, but that is the basic idea. Of course, noses come in a variety of different lengths and sizes, so the above rule is merely a general guideline
Only the classical portrait course is monthly, as I plan on supporting that one long term and am currently in the process of making more content for it. I think it’s also been more flexible for people in a sense, some people subscribe for one month only if they just want to access it for a short time to find a particular lesson / lessons
@@Germania9 I have a chapter in the Classical Portrait Course dedicated to drawing the nose. There are videos that cover proportions, construction and drawing the nose in perspective If you do end up subscribing, just make sure to check out the chapter on geometric shapes in that course, as my drawing method is quite constructive. I’ll leave a link to the video lesson of the mouth that I upload here on RU-vid, so you can get a better idea: ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-z7WgYY1XX4g.htmlsi=LnEQ_KNWwMCcT8ts
Hey Tom! I got your perspective fundamentals course a while back. I just wanted to ask one question: why do we only work in 2-point perspective throughout? What about the others, like 1-point, 3-point, and 5-point? I'm still learning a lot from the course though, so thank you! Oh, and great video as always. ❤
Great question! I will try to answer without making an essay 1 point perspective is a bit too restrictive for the techniques we are learning in that course. 2 point perspective however, is a great comfort zone to be in when learning a lot of complicated geometries such as sectioning, planes, duplication etc. In my perspective course, I really just wanted to show students a great technique that they could use to create a natural looking perspective without vanishing points and horizon line, completely free from distortion. If we add more vanishing points, then of course that comes with more complications, but there is nothing to stop students from taking the techniques they’ve learned and applying it to 3 and 5 point perspectives. I think I failed at not writing an essay, but there is my answer 😂
Hi I love your videos and starting my art journey. Can you provide any resources towards architectural drawing. I love your drawing style and trying to understand perspective myself!❤
Your work is great some interesting videos. I just wonder why you always seem so negative about doing the videos, you make it very clear that this comes second in your life and something you don’t really want to be doing. As a viewer there seems no need to tell us all this as the content is good.
Art will always come first in my life. As for videos, I like creating it, but I recorded this video when I was completely burnt out. I was running my own hair studio (that alone takes over your life), running online courses, as well putting some time aside to study online and upskill. I've made some changes since then, so I'm looking forward to putting out more content, but in a more sustainable way.
You can choose any point along the curve of the ellipse as a point of rotation. Just make sure draw the straight line perfectly tangent with that curve
Hi @thomasalexander3630. amazing channel my friend,i have a passion for classical architecture and basically learning to draw the 5 orders and designing actual architecture buildings ,columns , villas,churches etc... i'm not going to endebt myself through school in this day and age,would like to be self thought ,will that course"Fundamentals of perspective drawing "help me in any way?for i'm about to pull the plug on it for sure beacause nothing else out there i can find... another question is :please direct me to any classical architecture books or works focused on "How to draw,like a step by step" etc... anyways great channel man, @MarcLaisneARTVenture recommended me to your Channel and i'm glad i found you...Keep up the good work!
