I have always wanted to draw like this,
this
and this,
but ended up drawing like this,
this
and this
Many times, I have stories, cartoons running in my mind but without knowing how to draw them, I have struggled to bring them to a canvas. In my head I always see myself drawing amazing pictures. Having the passion to create cool drawings — I decided to try. It is always the case — unless you try you never know. I am a strict follower of taking baby steps at whatever I am learning rather than rush through it. While I am learning, I thought I’d share whatever I learnt with you as well hoping this would allow people like me to try what they always wanted to do; and more specifically give the much needed push to people who love to draw.
So here are the 5 tips for beginners to improve your drawing.
Get a sketchbook
Fill one book every single month. Pages do not matter. 30 or 100, try to fill one book per month. Don’t worry about what to draw, the thing called creativity has given you permission to draw anything you like — not a problem if it is going to be a flying banana or a dancing building. The act of drawing will motivate you and give you new ideas. So just focus on drawing and rest will fall in place. And hey! Maintaining a sketchbook is not a beginner thing. Professionals do it as well :)
Filling a 100 page book per month sounds too much? Worry not, the minimum goal you can set for yourself is to draw one page a day. This brings us to the second point.
Draw everyday
This is one of the best hands on you can ever get. Drawing anything every day is the best practice that you can have. Trust me, the results and the improvement can be astonishing. Every great artist that we admire, whose work we look up to, became greatest in their fields by constantly drawing. If not everyday, try to draw most of the days. Even if you miss a day, never feel down. You miss a day, draw more the next day.
The hard rule is not about drawing every day, but about being consistent with the practice. If you are only looking to take up drawing as a hobby, but want to get good at it, a 6 minute challenge is something you can give a try. Set a timer for 6 minutes and draw anything. I am sure you will have 6 minutes to spare any day. 6 here is a random number, feel free to replace it with any greater number. You may choose to continue drawing after the 6 minutes or continue the next day.
Learn the basics
Learning the basics is mandatory. Let’s say you are learning a language. You first learn the alphabets, grammar, words and sentences. From there, you put the sentences in a paragraph and from one paragraph you write more paragraphs.
Art is no different. To master it, you need to learn the alphabets of the art.
3 things to learn:
Shapes: Learn to draw the big 5 shapes — the sphere, the cuboid, the cylinder, the cone and the pyramid. Most of the things we see around us can be drawn using these shapes. Learn to draw the shapes in different sizes and perspectives.
Perspective: Putting things in perspective brings clarity to anything in our life. Similarly, understanding the objects around you and drawing them in different perspectives helps you to use them in various circumstances. It brings clarity to the scene you are drawing. A building can be drawn as a collection of rectangles or in a 3D format. Putting in a 3D format brings clarity.
Gestures: Gestures bring life into the art. We need to breathe life into our arts. Have you ever wondered how print media cartoons and comic books are able to make us laugh? Along with the dialogues, it is the way they handle the gestures that makes a scene funny. That is how important gesture is for arts.
There are more basics, but focusing on these big things is a good starting point. The rest will come to you in due course.
Study or copy other artists
One main problem faced by many people is not knowing what to draw. If you are stuck with the same question, a simple google search is what you need to do.
No, it is not wrong to copy art works of others while learning. It becomes wrong only when you use them in your name and claim to be yours. Now that is plagiarism and don’t do that :D
What you can always do is to study the drawings and try to recreate them. Ask yourselves what makes their art tick? This will make you understand how things are done and who knows, you may create and define your own ways to draw anything.
Learn how to see
“Art is not just about drawing something. It is also about learning how to see” — Ed Catmull, Pixar
Your art is only as good as how you transfer what you see into the canvas. So make sure we cultivate the habit of seeing things around us. See the things around us, dissect them and understand what they are made of, know the story behind them, and then you put them into perspective, give them your voice and voila! You will see some amazing pictures coming up.
Your creativity will put that beauty into what you come up with when you learn to see. So, this is how creativity works — it is an in-out machine. You put something in your head and it gives out ideas. You put things inside by consuming those things around you, by living your life doing something useful or productive. This is not only applicable for drawing but others too.
Well, those are the 5 tips. What are we waiting for. Let’s get started! Stay tuned for more updates on arts and design.
Until then… Happy drawing :)
