Drawing

[Randy Fanger]

For those of you that might be a little intimidated by nice work, .....remember that we all did a bunch of crap....lol (i still do) If an artist acts superior....IGNORE THEM.....they are not worth your time. Art is a little piece of us that escapes into the world.

Something I used to do a lot is buy a box of 10-reams typing paper on sale. I would tear open a ream and sit and do thumbnail sketches for hours.....never spending more than 10-mins on each. Most were a couple mins. Maybe take an can of vegetables and sketch fast and sloppy-quit-and do it again. Then pick something else and do the same. Just hundreds of sketches each sitting........use the backs too. I always sketch with pen.....got tired of leadded palms from pencil....lol.

Also do wireframe sketches for human form. I still do hundreds of these each year. I will post some thumbs soon. If you're not poor like me, lol, get the book, How to draw comics the Marvel way. This will teach you the wireframe or action line. It helps in any kind of drawing even tho you might not be doing comics.

When i start a painting, like Richard here, I put down a sloppy sketch that looks like a mess. I slowly get things into place paying attention to the canvas or any surface i might be painting. On canvas i make sure the texture is still showing until I have everything where I want it. This is more fore detailed stuff but might be useful. If you decide to go over a dried line, the line will be showing. If you're painting wet-on-wet it doesn't matter.....new strokes will be replacing old ones.....as long as you realize you'r mixing color when you do.

Hope this was helpful.

[Gail Runciman-Nicholls]

Thank you Randy.

You are the only one I have seen mention thumbnail sketches. It is good practice and a good way to get to know your subject. I also journal my ideas. I don't necessarily use everyone of them, but they remind me of the train of thought I had at the time. Some, I have worked up into full blown paintings.

I have many journals...! :-))