Greater understanding of fundamental art principals, and the path to improvement

[lunar_prodigy]

Greater understanding of fundamental art principals, and the path to improvement

I have learned a lot in my art program, and after some talks with friends, i was thinking of posting alot of the fundimental ideas and concepts to improving in art which i learned and now follow.  This dose not mean i am a master of them , just that i feel any artist can only do better when armed with this information. Think of it like a map which merely shows you where you need to go and provides many safe well traveled paths to get there, the journey is always up to you, and the while the rewards vary person to person, this information will help you get on your way, or help you on your journey. Mastering these concepts takes years, but knowing what works and why is valuable information. Sometimes we need to focus less on individual methods and advice and more on why we are doing what we do before we start to understand and grow. Knowledge is achievable by anyone but its what we choose to do with knowledge given to us that determines the outcome and often times only then do we truely gain greater understanding of things we thought we already knew. Experience is infinatley expandable and so, we never stop learning, anyone who believes they are done learning has only become satisfied and stops growing.
Here are my 10 levels of progression

1. learning any medium, subject matter,, style or aiming for detail or improvement, is an after thought it comes after the basics. meaning we need to go back to step one and admit that we don't know everything, even be willing to let ourselves believe we know nothing because on a clean slate we can build a better base to stand on later.

2. keeping with this willpower for and ability to change, we act on it, structure is one of the first major traits, anatomy next, finally life study and drawing from memory the basic idea you need to know here is simply that there is a structure, a pattern or steps , or a guide you can follow , if you do it out of order or rush ahead you often feel frustrated or lost but if you progress along the steps you feel progress and achievement and skill and experience just create them selves.

3..sturcture is a general understanding of the basic shapes behind the object, spheres cylinders and boxes, and if this all seems like old information its because people print it everywhere, because its the truth so like the willpower you must find to prepare yourself to learn, you must drop any ego or pre-notion of fully understanding concept , only then can you learn, so start looking around and visualizing shapes, a great example is sci-fi art because its all drawn to scale in perspective, naturally architecture art drafting and layouts are next to study, then you study photographs ( not artwork ) and start to see the shapes. finally you start to find shapes in nature, symmetrical or asymmetrical, a lot of sketching is required but that is also relevant for later reasons.

4 next in line , anatomy is a very specific structure, however it is not limited to animals and humans though a greater study of human anatomy is always required to emulate any character because we all move very similar, however even a tree has anatomy, as do mountain ranges, clouds, or man made objects, its important to realize anatomy isn't entirely exterior detail nor entirely interior workings but rater composition. think of composition like where you choose to place your belongings in your room, which can dramatically effect their usefulness , a human body for example is like a building, stacked in a very specific way, which leads to things like weight and force which are explainable later lead to later topics..

5 next is life study, which keeping in topic is naturally life drawing and drawing of what is in front of you , whether it is alive or not, this is what is commonly referred to simply as 'study' but really means a great optical observance for detail, though not necessarily to draw it, but to be aware of it. also means learning which details or features need to be shown and which can be ignored which is especially relevant when you simplify later . or when you do speed gestures.

6 drawing from memory is a very large topic so ill try to elaborate it minimally. first half is when you understand what you are drawing well enough via the first three steps, you can take similarities, you don't need to stare at the model or object as you draw but glance at it for a reference check, however this dose not mean you turn a model into a furry, change her body size and weight or her pose, it simply means you are training yourself to draw from what you know not what you see, of course without first training yourself to draw what you see, you wont have the encyclopedia of knowledge in you head built up to know how to draw from it without drawing what you are looking at. its a simple idea but that's only the half of it. the other half is training your brain to see things another way, I highly suggest a book called "drawing on the right side of the brain, which will teach you how to understand your two brains, the technical cognitive and the creative expressive. if you follow all this instruction you will start to realize you are already doing both but the book is good at giving you exercises to draw. essentially it summarizes down to taking your focus off what you are habitual while drawing and expands your cognitive process while drawing.

7 the next stage is modification but you still aren't ready to start drawing fantasies creatures and weird human cartoon comic anatomy ect. that's the last step. this step is all bout learning about the principals I made light of before, force weight balance, gravity, muscle contractions so forth. a great book to help teach you how to draw life drawing more alive in it's way is called "force" not surprisingly all these intensive steps are the ones I took as an animator to bring stuff to life.

8 next step is called pushing the pose, since by now you should be able to draw from your head with little reference ( only to help keep your pose on track but not to copy it, you should be ready to start thinking about how you can take the pose and make it better, more dynamic interesting, surprisingly most times this only requires subtle changes such as how a leg or arm is rotated, this is also a great way to fix poses in drawings you are not happy with, rather than make big pose changes try subtle ones first, however, this is also relevant when creating your own poses , visualizing stuff you want them to be doing such as running after a ball, but made even more complex when the are running after a ball, trying to reach down for it, slipping with their foot, and throwing their weight forward while off balance to lunge... cant draw complexity without first drawing simplicity.

9 finally we are ready to start doing what we want with our own imagination but keeping in the nature of this guide we take small steps forward as not to fall on our faces. so before you start making complex creatures or even complex poses, try to think about how to change a model to say fat skinny, a woman to man in the same pose, how the bodies differ, a large man a short man, or stop to consider there are equally different fat woman bodies in the world so even a fat woman can be drawn differently, . this opens up a new universal concept that, " no mater how different we are, we still have similar ideas, body types and uniformity, but even uniformity can be as diverse as finger prints with subtle changes.

10 finally the moment you are waiting for, essentially take everything you now know and apply it to fantasy , comics, whatever you wish, but try to think of what you've learned to help you in your creation, take your time and don't get frustrated if cant do it right away, it may take years of slow improvements and greater understanding of concepts you thought you had mastered.. this is exactly what you cant rely on a mentor or school to make you better, because they will open up concepts to you like I just outlined, but somewhere down the line your knowledge will be expanded and your concepts will grow. they are mere seeds that keep growing when tended, wither when forgotten. which is why study is so important. this is the real reason why we all get better by practice, a simple overused phrase but this is why.

[Haloth]

Got this in Cliffsnotes?  :P

[lunar_prodigy]

XD no, just about 4 years of art school study and 45,000 in debt XD

[Silvermink]

XD no, just about 4 years of art school study and 45,000 in debt XD

I think he was not-quite-seriously requesting the tl;dr version. :)