The first week of #aprilDrawing was intense! I decided to grab the bull by the horns and enrolled in an online class to draw from the very beginning.
Drawing Course
The class chosen was “The Ultimate Drawing Course – Beginner to Advanced” on Udemy. At the time of this post, the course has 150K students enrolled and a members-only Facebook Group where you can post your progress and get feedback from the community. Pretty impressive!
The first assignment was actually an assessment of my drawing skills. This is the Assessment Drawing on a notepad sheet on #day1 and on drawing paper on #day2.
Tools
You need a pencil, paper, and an eraser. Voilà! Now, let’s take the next step. I decided to get me a set of 4 Prismacolor Scholar pencils, a sketchbook, and a 12-inch ruler. Combine that with the sharpener and eraser found at home and you’re good to go to become an illustrator.
Drawing 101
- Basic Concepts
- Lines are the fundamental units.
- Lines create Shapes.
- The Basic Shapes are triangle, square, trapezoid and circle.
- Shapes will help you to visualize the final end. For example this:
- Form is the three-dimensional part of drawing. Form is create out of simple Shapes or using random line patterns.
Three Forms made out of Shapes (left) and two out of random lines (right).
- Form is the three-dimensional part of drawing. Form is create out of simple Shapes or using random line patterns.
- Shadowing
- Always define a light source before drawing, therefore you will know where the shadow exists.
- Shadow Types: Hight light, Midtone, Core Shadow, Cast Shadow.
Shadow Types. The difference is the Value applied to each one of them.
- Another drawing concept – Value – is how light or dark something is. You can see the Value differences in the Midtone, Core and Cast shadows in the image above.
- Perspective is the lines that makeup shapes in a three-dimensional world.
- Tricks
- Never work only in one area of your drawing and neglect the other ones. Always jump between areas. It’s an iterative process and every part needs to be worded gradually.
- Your pencil must be sharpened always!
- Don’t push the pencil too hard. Start sketching with soft lines until you picture where your drawing is going.
- Before you start any draw remember that everything is created out of simple Shapes.
That’s it! that’s all that you need to evolve from doodles to fancier drawings. Stay tuned for more updates of #aprilDrawing!