Learning to draw better...?

Question

I've decided that I want to get more into my artistic side. I'm very analytical person, so drawing can be difficult for me to do, although I love to look at and admire other's creations. I want to find simple pictures, ones that are fairly basic, without a ton of detail, to begin with. Does anyone know of some really good pics or real life things that I could start with? I just want to be able to use the other part of my brain to become a more creative person.

Answer 1

You could sketch photos, but if you are displaying them, change your pic and use the photo as a reference.

Answer 2

Stephanie, Good for you. Start by going to the library and getting a book on beginning drawing. There are many. Use a soft pencil and start out drawing shapes and shading or shadowing them. Like draw a circle and say the sunlight is coming at the circle from the upper left hand corner of the paper. Shadow and darken the circle to look two dimensional. Try other shapes: squares, cones, them after you feel good about your shadowing, try a tree. You can go wrong because trees are not perfectly shaped. They all look different so who can say that it doesn't look right, get my drift?

Answer 3

I think fruit, pottery, and other opaque colored inanimate objects are the easiest to start out with. You will learn to draw with more realism if you start with the grid method. Get a photo of a still life picture and draw a grid over it, then draw a grid on a blank sheet of drawing paper. Draw each grid one at a time. This teaches you to just draw the lines and shapes, and get a sense of correct proportion. To practice with light and shadow its good to practice drawing balls. There are tutorials for this online and in almost every book that teaches basic drawing technique.

Answer 4

Take a simple picture look at it and sketch it out. What I use to do is, take a picture, have an imaginary graph over it and draw one square at a time. It works pretty well. I have been drawing for over 20 years. You get better as you practice. I teach the kids I work with.

Answer 5

I think tracing really helps from time to time, but if you use that technique all the time, you will always just depend on tracing and forget how to draw freehand, which is bad! I personally was super bad at drawing portraits a year ago, but I got so much better by simply just pracicing and learning how to actually exactly draw the facial features one by one! I dont know how to improve exactly but I myself am trying to find out.

Answer 6

Take a simple picture look at it and sketch it out. What I use to do is, take a picture, have an imaginary graph over it and draw one square at a time. It works pretty well. I have been drawing for over 20 years. You get better as you practice. I teach the kids I work with.
♥♥..♥♥..♥♥.♥♥
NIKKI

Answer 7

I'm totally serious about this- try a paper bag. It's simple, but not too simple as to not be challenging, and it's something you probably have on hand right now anyway. The important thing to remember is to OBSERVE. Don't just look at photos or follow the directions in how-to-draw books; you'll never learn that way.

One more thing- eschew outlines, they don't exist in nature.

Answer 8

I would sincerely reccommend, Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain", by Dr. Betty Edwards. This is a technique that will help you get in touch with your other hemisphere, that is its primary purpose. Dr. Edwards developed this over many years at Arizona State and has even come out with a video and a workbook.

Answer 9

Still life is probably your best bet to start with.
It is really boring (in my opinion) but you will have the opportunity to get all of the details and lighting on paper without having the object shifting (like you would get by drawing people) and without having the object be altered visually (like you would get with pictures).
Good luck... Drawing can be easy, but it takes A LOT of practice and determination...

Answer 10

I answer many questions a lot like this, you can take art lessons at your local art supply dealer, also you can check for tips on the Internet (Don't take lessons on line because you don't get much hands on work.) You can look at books also. But the most important thing you have to know is that no one can teach you how to draw, paint, etc. You are the only one that develop your own style of art. =D

Answer 11

leaves and houses are nice and easy to draw ...i draw a lot and i have took a lot of classes when i was younger.. but i mostly draw what i see just start of slow when you are drawing take a lot of time with some of the lines you draw and it helps a lot but i think you are of to a good start by starting of with simple things that dont have a lot of detail.