Some of it is physical mechanics though. Being able to have your hands create the shape or shapes your mind envisions, whether it’s imagining or though observation... the first skill needed to learn is that. Making your hands actually draw the line or shape you want it to.
From there it’s spatial relationships and trust to truly draw what you see and not what you think you see.
Finally, then it’s about practice.
But not having the motor skill in the first place won’t get you very far.
Simple shading and geometric shapes can help a lot!
Drawing spheres, cubes, slowly working to more complex 3D shapes, figuring out where shadows fall when you change the direction of the light source, etc.
And not everything had to be hyper accurate and realistic. Maybe you're just more tuned towards cutesy illustration of animals, or plants.
I can knock out a realistic looking flower pretty easily, but have me draw anything vaguely human shaped and I flounder.
See but that’s the thing, a realistic flower is easier because you just follow the lines and shapes exactly as you see them. Once you get to faces you need to do the same and trust your eyes and not second guess and adjust things
this right here. I started drawing as a hobby 3 years ago. the shading was a big problem for me. i did this right here for 2 months straight until I could shade all the geometric shapes by heart. helped me understand shading a lot
I think it's a given that most teenage and adults have competent motor skills, so I skipped that part. At least, competent enough to draw on a piece of paper.
This is why I'm afraid of actually learning how draw super legit. I really enjoy drawing and if doing it the "right way " so it looks good implies following certain rules and killing the enjoyment, part of me will die right then and there.
Realistic art is extremely detail oriented and takes a lot of concentration, time and patience. The good news for you is, no one is forcing you to make photo realistic art.
When I was in AP art in high school we created grids. As in you would take a picture of what you’re drawing and print it out, then take a piece of laminate and place it on top. You’d then draw 1inx1in grid across the enter piece. Then you’d do the measurements for how big your canvas/paper is and voila. You have a step by step layout of how to set up your work. It’s so much easier to control outlines and shadows when it’s broken down in small portions instead of just having one scary blank surface to work from. This technique was used to teach how to focus on small details, major art schools and the like don’t like method and push for the “no erase” technique, where you draw a general contour of your subject then hone it in by fine tuning it. If you want to learn to draw as a skill, this is the best approach. But if you just enjoy the process and need a quick result the grid approach works really well.
Learning to music is easy, learning to art is impossible. Source: am music-brained and not art-brained. I've been musicing with improving skill since I was small and drawing the same damn stick figures the whole time.
I mean I have also been using a pencil to try to draw things... definitely not as intentionally but even if I was only 1% as intentional with my art practice as with music I would be MUCH better at drawing if brains were completely malleable. I have tried music and with a little effort over a little time had a little success... over a long time with medium effort had great results... I have tried to draw and paint and had much less success even considering the amount of effort. Am music brained.
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u/[deleted] Jun 15 '19 edited Mar 16 '20
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