Let's do How to Draw Gesture together (nudity)
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I was scrolling through my phone for something else and spotted some older drawings from about 6 months ago. Figured I'd toss these up for comparison. The improvements are from about 30-60 minutes of short gestures a week tops. The flow and proportions are really coming more "naturally" for me now. It's nice to be able to actually see the difference limited practice has made.
I'm finishing up the final video now. This was a good idea to run through the class together @Susan-Marks !
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@SketchyArtish I agree your gestures are improving! More flowing now. I am also watching the last video. It's actually really good and could be watched earlier!
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@Coley @SketchyArtish --I've finished up the last video and I really enjoyed it. I can see that gesture is an interpretation-and 2 teachers see things a bit differently-which was helpful.
I did some copy over of SketchyArtish's previous set of drawings. That helped me loosen up and feel with my fingers how the shapes could be much smoother. Then I tried some of my own.
I really felt seen when Marshall Vandruff spoke about the "itchy/sketchy" lines. In this set I helped myself out with a brush with some streamline. These are 60 second poses, and I used the first 10-15 to "look."@SketchyArtish'-I was so pleased to see your earlier drawings and how progress can be made. For this 6 months, really doesn't seem long. Like they say, regular practice...
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@Susan-Marks
Are any of you finding direct ways to take what you're learning in this course and applying it to your work?I looked back at my original thoughts-and its now clear to me that my stories don't have a lot of big gestures in them. They have expressions-and I may tackle that next. I know some of the figure pose sites we've been using also have sections on expression.
I've really enjoyed learning with you!
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@Susan-Marks You're really starting to see those long flowing lines in the poses. Nice ones! The proportions are just a matter of time and practice (Marshal talks about that in the video).
As for the work, Proko's videos have improved my ability to draw poses a lot. It's allowed me to add action to characters (even those quick warm up ones from the Virtual Studio thread), which really helps bring a character to life IMO. One of these days I will buy that full course, but there's a ton of great info for free on his website. I can't recommend the "bean" and "mannequin" videos enough for anyone looking to build poses from imagination.
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I was able to get back at it this morning before work, but didn't take pictures of what I did. One thing I noticed is that I'm drawing the legs on every single gesture drawing waaay too short. Def need to keep this in mind from the beginning of a drawing - make the line of action long enough to actually have legs in proportion to the rest of the body!
I've still got the critique video to watch, and a ton more practice to do. Good to go through this class with others as it's helped with accountability a great deal!
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@Kat I'm still working my way through. I didn't do much for a couple days then a fair amount today. The bloopers at the end of the critique video are worth watching lol!
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@Susan-Marks and everyone else
i haven't done much for three days or so but a lot today. One thing I'm finding is that my lines are getting longer and looser but proportions are going to ...ahem ...well, not a good place lol! I am determined to get those longer lines so I am putting up with the proportion issues . It will take a lot more practice to be able to do those long lines in a way where I am "in control" of them.
I am not sure I can use this in my other drawings too much yet, tho I think it is influencing things already. It is making me look at the rigidity of some of my drawings and the poses, and I really want to figure out how to do better linework now! So I think it will REALLY help to keep this up.
One funny thing is that the one thing I drew from memory, over and over, were horses, when I was a lot younger. I tried gesturing out a few horses and they were pretty good! I probably have some practice and drawing memory built up there! It was how I used to spend my days at school when I was a kid........but I'm almost 50 now!
anyhow, thanks a bunch, it was fun to have some motivation to keep going! I am still working on things and still have the third video I am watching in bits and spurts so I expect to post a little more here in this thread. -
@SketchyArtish Thanks for the kind words of encouragement! And thanks for the recommendations of the other free courses on Proko's site (and I'm happy that they are different content and not competition for the great courses here at SVS).
I too want to take the full figure drawing class-but I think I'm going to keep up with the gesture practice and I've also been checking out the expressions on Line of Action. I think there's probably a bit of carryover-in expressions don't work as well, either, when I overthink them and "itchy-sketchy" draw them. So much to learn. I'm actually grateful for that!
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@Coley I think I was the only girl who didn't draw horses growing up!
I found that one of the things that helped me get an idea about what a flowing line looks like and "feels" like was when I drew over @SketchyArtish's posts. It opened up some closed door in my mind and they pretty suddenly felt more possible. I've learned lots from the few master copies I've done-so maybe I've hit upon something that helps my learning. And I've stuck to it more due to the accountability we shared working on this course. -
Hi, I’m doing the draw gesture class too, may I join in?
Here is my attempt to the 30 sec and 2 min poses. I decided to go old fashion with pencil/paper combo, since these two buddies were waiting reallyyyyyy long time for me to use them.
it was quite fun, I can’t wait for my next morning drawing session.
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@mag Welcome to the fun-and I really like your sketches. I'm struck with how adding the angle of the chin really provides direction or gesture to the head in your images.
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man, i miss doing gestures. I haven't been able to go in a while! These are 5 min drawings and some 3 min. quick sketches.
SVS Faculty Instructor
www.leewhiteillustration.com -
@mag these are great, they have such personality!
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@Lee-White wow! These are incedible!
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@Lee-White These are fantastic. I like the way you used shading to extend the movement. That's really cool.
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@Lee-White Totally cool!
For the second "quick" ones-do you lay down blocks of shape with a charcoal and then go back over them with ink for the lines? And were these from reference photos or one of the sites with gesture photos? The poses are very interesting. -
Just in case anyone is still hanging around this thread
a couple of recent ones. Even tho finished the course I amm still going. Not doing gestures every day but most days. These are three I have done today (the best three lol, I actually did 50 today!) . Having trouble with uploading, camera is being difficult so I had to email it to computer and it was rather laborious lol !
I am improving for sure. I guesstimated how many I had done earlier this week sicnce starting the course almost three weeks ago and have been counting every drawing since then and I think I am at about 450 now and planning on getting to 1000 before end of April!!!!!!!!! I am learning a lot and it is becoming more natural to me. I was trained as an occupational therapist so I have a good knowledge of anatomy ,,.........it's the drawing skills I need to work on! Though the anatomy is something that constantly needs refreshing as well. I wish I had been drawing back when I was in university 22 years ago!
Luckily the gist of anatomy and how the body works has stayed with me "somewhat." -
@Coley Well done! I’m continuing to do 9 on most days. (I have a 3x3 grid).
With so many under your belt and so many on your horizon, have you found any other good collections of images? I’m already cycling through the Line of action images. I did expand my pool by including images with clothing.
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@Susan-Marks I have been drawing mostly the same ones repeatedly
no new sources! In one way I think drawing the same ones over is helping me understand the anatomy and gesture of the pose a little more. And in another way I guess I should be expanding my pose knowledge so to speak. Though the other thing I'm doing come to think of it is making poses up from what I've learned and they're often ok, I haven't been able to do that before. 
I like your grid idea 
