HanaoKiku

Hi! I'll go through your submission for lesson 1.

Starting with superimposed lines, you mostly did a good job of lining up your pen before making each line. Some of the curves on page 1 have fraying at both ends, which shows that you didn't line up the pen each time before starting the line. However, I don't see that issue as much on page 2, so as long as you're aware of it, you should be fine.

Ghosted lines look good as well. There's a few that have a bit of a wobble to them, but they're fine overall. Ghosted planes as well are good. I will mention that you seem to have extra marks around the lines on the page occasionally. Not sure what they are, but as you get into later lessons with more complicated drawings, it's probably best to avoid unnecessary marks to keep things neat. It's not a huge problem, just something to keep in mind. If those are accidental marks from ghosting, just make sure to keep the pen just a bit higher off the page!

Table of ellipses is looking good too. It's a bit messy, but you're drawing through each ellipse, and your line confidence is great. Your accuracy will improve with practice, so keep it up! For ellipses in planes, this is again where the small paper marks are confusing me. If they're the result of ghosting, try to ghost without making marks on the paper. Or if you edited the photo by turning up contrast/exposure, it'd be better to leave them unedited so we can see exactly what you put down on the page. Your goal in these exercises isn't perfection, so don't stress out if your lines were off or something- it's more helpful to you if we can get a better assessment of your skill levels so we can help. Besides that, a few ellipses don't touch all sides of the planes, so when returning to the exercise in warmups, just keep that in mind. Funnels is looking pretty good as well.

Plotted perspective and rough perspective are fine, though for rough perspective, try to avoid putting down multiple marks for a single line. You don't have to go over the line, as you want to practice putting down a single confident line whenever possible.

For rotated boxes, your spacing is inconsistent. You want the boxes to be pretty close together so you can use the angle of the lines on one box to figure out what the angle of the lines on the boxes near it are. You can compare the difference in this image: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/9a16c189.jpg

to this image: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/9a2db6a0.jpg

Notice how the gaps are much smaller, which means that it's easier to figure out what the angle of each line is going to be! Additionally, once again, only 1 mark for each line on the box. These exercises are not meant to be art on their own, they are for learning, so embrace bad lines and let them be. Remember to ghost each line, and not go over them once you put them down.

Finally, organic perspective is a tad rushed. There's not many boxes on each exercise, and the size could be pushed a bit more. I encourage you to compare yours to the homework example and notice how much less empty space there is. You'll get more practice on rotating boxes in the 250 box challenge, but first I'd like to recommend some revisions. I hope this helps!

Hi! It looks like you've done well overall on this lesson. I'll go through each exercise individually.

For superimposed lines, you're making sure to line up your pen correctly, so the fraying is only on one end, which is perfect. Your accuracy will improve with time, so keep at it! Your ghosted lines are also decent. Some of them have a bit of a curve or wobble to them, but I think that will go away with practice. Just remember to draw quickly and confidently even on short lines.

Your table of ellipses and ellipses in planes both turned out well. Keep at it in warm-ups, as you're on the right track. The funnels are also looking good. A few of the smaller ellipses towards the center are a bit tilted, so keep the minor axis in mind- it should cut the ellipse in half evenly, so the major axis (going from top to bottom) is perpendicular to the minor axis. It's a bit tricky, so just keep that in mind as you work.

Both perspective exercises look good. Some of the vertical lines are a bit tilted, so just keep that in mind moving forward as well.

Rotated boxes has the common issue of not actually rotating the boxes. Here's an example: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/d73eea49.jpg

I can see that you caught the mistake a few times, and this exercise is meant to be really hard, so as long as you're aware of it, you should be fine. It's tricky even if you know what you're trying to avoid, so just keep at it!

Organic perspective looks fine overall. A few of the boxes are a bit off, and the size difference could be pushed a bit more, but it's looking good overall! The second one is a bit rougher, with some size being inconsistent and the boxes not completely following the curved line. Just keep that in mind when you revisit it in your warm-ups. I would say you're ready to take on the 250 box challenge!

Hi! Looking through your submission, it looks like you've done really well overall! Your lines are overall smooth and consistent, and there is minimal fraying on the superimposed exercise. Your ghosted lines as well are overall solid, although there are a few that are a tad wobbly. You're fine as long as you keep doing the exercise in your warm-ups! I do notice you occasionally going over a line again. This in itself isn't too much of a problem, but it shows you're worried about accuracy too much in my opinion- these exercises aren't meant to be finished artwork you show to people, so it's ok if you have the occasional wonky line here and there. Your goal here is confidence first and accuracy second, so it's always better to have a smooth line that misses the mark over a wobbly line that hits it.

Same with your ellipses- they're overall good, and you've followed through on all of them, which is great. Once again, and it's really minor, but on a few it looks like you might have slowed down to increase your accuracy- especially on a few of the ellipses in planes exercise. Again, accuracy isn't the primary goal.

The funnels exercise looks good overall as well. The center line doesn't always line up perfectly with the minor axis of each ellipse, but that seems to be more due to it not being centered between the curves.

Your perspective exercises both look good as well! The rotated boxes also turned out well. There are a few on the left-hand corners that are a bit distorted, but my guess is that you did those first, as the right-hand boxes seem to be correctly rotated. Great job!

My only major criticism is with the organic perspective exercise. The boxes seem a bit rushed, and they're not really rotated that much. The shading on the side should be clean hatching like you did before, not scribbled in. In addition, most of the outer lines look like you drew over them multiple times. The boxes are mostly evenly spaced and don't rotate that much- try boxes from mostly straight-on, or in 2pt perspective, or upside down, or with one of the side planes only slightly visible.

While it seems the organic perspective is a bit rushed, you are meant to struggle with it, and the 250 box challenge works on those exact skills, so that's the next step. Good luck!

Thank you very much! I definitely agree with what you pointed out, as it was frustrating to logically know that I made exactly the mistake I was trying to avoid. I'm excited to return to these after I do the 250 box challenge and see how much I've inproved!

You did really well! I honestly can't see anything that you misunderstood or got wrong that won't improve with warm-up practice.

The only thing I would mention is that, when drawing ellipses, you generally want to loop around only 2-3 times. You seem to in general be doing that already, but I notice that a few of them have more than that. It's ok if you make a bad ellipse here and there, as it's all for practice!

Besides that, just keep doing these exercises for warm-ups, and you'll be fine.

It looks pretty good overall! There's just a few points that I'll mention.

One thing I noticed about the ellipses in planes exercise is that you seem to be circling many times on some of them. In general, you should keep it to 2, at most 3 loops around a single ellipse. Rather than feel out the proper placement of it while you're drawing, you should be ghosting the ellipse until you feel good about the placement, then draw it. Most of them look fine, so just limit how many times you go around moving forward.

For the funnels exercise, you seem to not be taking into account the minor plane- that's the line cutting the ellipse in half along its shorter edge: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/cf2c3057.jpg

The goal of the funnels exercise was, in part, to draw an ellipse when the minor axis was already defined.

The mistake: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/58039837.jpg

As you can see, the ellipses are not cut equally in half, and they are slanted. The line through the middle should align with the minor axis, and be perpendicular to the major axis.

Besides that, make sure you're increasing the degree of the ellipses as you move outward. It's good practice to make sure you can comfortably work with the degree of the ellipse.

The last thing I noticed was the rough perspective exercise. The goal of the exercise was to estimate the angles of 1 point perspective, then use a ruler to check how close you were. The second step is really important, as it lets you see where you're going wrong so you can correct it. The only other point was that you should double check that all your lines that aren't converging to the vanishing point are either parallel vertically or horizontally. You should place dots to get the placement of the 4 back corners before drawing the line to make sure they are parallel.

Congrats on finishing Lesson 1!

Overall, I feel you did really well. There were a few points that I noticed you got caught up on, so I'll list them below.

First off, while your lines aren't generally wobbly, they tend to have a curve to them once they get a bit longer (looking at the ghosted lines exercise). That's natural, but you might need to sacrifice some accuracy and draw faster in order to maintain a consistent trajectory. As always, accuracy comes second to confident lines! If it feels impossible to keep it straight, that might be a sign you're going too slow, and you might need to speed up a bit. It's just practice, so as long as you keep practicing it in your warm-ups and consciously try to correct the error, you should be fine.

Besides that, one thing I noticed in your elipses in planes exercise was that you are sometimes deforming the ellipse in order to keep the 4 edges where it touches the plane on the midpoints. While it's true that an ellipse on a plane receding into space would still touch the edges of the plane at the midpoints, you should also pay attention to the curves between the lines. Touching the plane at the midpoints wasn't the goal, so you should prioritize making a smooth ellipse over that. That being said, I did redline some of them to show how the ellipse would properly deform on a receding plane: https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/425968709106925580/793391406588755968/unknown.png

Just focus on making the shape smooth, then you can worry about specifics such as where the ellipse touches the edges of the plane!

For the funnel exercise, it doesn't look like you're lining up the minor plane correctly. If you go back to the "mistakes" section of the funnel exercise, you'll see that the minor plane is the line that cuts the ellipse in half, and that the goal of the exercise was placing an ellipse on a minor plane that already exists.

As far as I understand, you can mess up the minor plane in two ways- one of them is having it too high/low (such as your top two horizontal funnels- where the line cuts some ellipses along the bottom and others towards the top), or if the ellipse is tilted so the minor plane cuts a bit diagonally across the ellipse (such as some of your corner ellipses- such as the third largest on the bottom funnel). I feel part of it was just misplacing the line between the curves before you started, so just keep that in mind for next time and be very careful to place the line as close to the center as you can.

I don't have much to say on the box exercises, as they look fine for the most part. The only thing I would mention is on the rough perspective, where you sometimes curve one of the back lines to match up two misaligned corners. I recommend placing a dot for all 4 corners of the back of the box before drawing lines. After all, a dot is an easy way to see if the back edges are all properly vertical/horizontal before committing with a line. That way, you can fix it and avoid wonky back-facing planes, and make sure your vertical and horizontal edges are going in the right direction.

It looks to me like you're still struggling with line quality and confidence. I'll include a few of the stand-out assignments I noticed, and summarize at the end.

For your superimposed lines, it looks to me like your lines are not very confident. I would recommend rewatching this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wsqyKW0iFw

Your lines are in general very accurate, but are very wobbly. It seems to me like you were drawing very slowly and trying to be as accurate as possible, but remember that accuracy isn't as important as making a smooth and confident line. If you're having trouble with loosening up, it might help to just make curves and loops on a piece of paper, like this: https://s31531.pcdn.co/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/skbk_feb01_gesture22.gif

If you have no particular goal when making a line quickly, your brain can't get in the way by trying to slow down and be accurate. Just draw whatever feels good- smooth spirals and curves and figure 8's and such on the page with your shoulder. It'll probably mean you're drawing very fast in order to be smooth, but with time you'll be able to slow down and improve your accuracy while remaining confident as well. Remember, accuracy is not your main goal- it comes secondary to smooth and confident lines! If you feel you're wobbling, try making the mark faster.

This applies as well to the ghosted planes. While your accuracy is great, it feels like you've missed the point. The lines are once again shaky, so while they all hit the target, they are not useful lines. It's ok to miss your mark- in fact, you should expect it! Even Uncomfortable's example homework and videos don't always hit their mark, and unless you're a drawing god with decades of experience, you will not have 100% accuracy, and that's ok! Returning to the ghosted lines exercise might be useful, and just focus on drawing as straight a line as you can without any wobbles.

Next, table of elipses. Again, you're trading confidence for accuracy. Your elipses are bumpy and overall are not very smooth. Once again, if you watch Uncomfortable doing the exercises, he is not always accurate, as that's not the ultimate goal. It's ok if you go a bit outside the box, or if the lines don't match up at the end, or if going around multiple times means the lines drift apart from one another. This is especially something that will be helped with the smooth scribbling I mentioned before- just make smooth loops and spirals around the paper to understand how to make smooth curves. Once you are comfortable with that, use that same loose method to draw the elipses. They will be much less accurate (especially if you're new to drawing), but they'll be much smoother (and feel better to draw!)

I would say that's the main problem I noticed, so that would be your first priority to work on.

In reality there are no hard and fast rules of art, just a set of best practices that people agree in general make "good" art. My general approach is that deviations from the fundamentals (i.e. style/exaggeration) is valid as long as the artist is aware of and consciously choosing to break that specific rule. For example, an artist who uses chicken scratch because they are uncomfortable drawing from their arm is someone who I'd recommend relearning how to draw from the shoulder to be able to make long and smooth lines. But someone who isn't limited by technical skill/knowledge and chooses to break the rule to create a desired effect is perfectly fine. Yoshitomi is a clearly skilled artist in the fundamentals and chooses to draw that way, rather than it being the only way they know, but a beginner shouldn't take that as a sign to never learn how.