stormrots

Hello and welcome to drawabox!

Before I start critique.

It is ok to use also google photos if imgur seemingly hates you ;)

To make photos of homework for submission is also ok (most students do it). I even didn’t notice the difference ;)

And now closer to your submission.

Lines

Superimposed lines are quite good. In the first page you started with some wobbly lines and frying at the end for the longest lines was quite large. But then you straightened them up in second page. Good job. Lines started to be smoother and more consistent. However, your lines are still 'fraying' on the end, but in this stage, it is entirely normal. It will reduce with practice and time. And remember to draw from the shoulder, it will straighten your lines more effectively.

Ghosted lines look quite confident, too. Lines are nicely starting from plotted dot but not always hit the end dot. And it is normal for this stage. However, I notice few wobbly lines. Also, your lines sometimes arc as they approach the end point. It is fine for it to stop short of, overshoot, or miss the end point, because the goal here is – first confidence, then accuracy.

Ghosted planes. You have understood the exercise. The good thing here is – you didn’t forget ghosted technique and plotted dots for each line (sometimes students forget it in this exercise).

Ellipses

Tables of ellipses looks confident and they are drawn through ellipses 2 (preferable) times. I see that you tried keeping the ellipses within the bounds, and tried each ellipse touching each other, without overlapping. Good job. Accuracy here will come with practice. The orientation of ellipses (the angle at which it is positioned) is also in most cases quite consistent within the same section that is good. However, I noticed some pointy ellipses. Remember that goal here is not only confident ellipses but also circular ellipses. Make sure that you draw from your shoulder and your arm is not blocked.

Ellipses in planes. Good job. You are clearly aiming for them to touch all four sides of the plane, but not to the extent that they lose their roundness – that is the way to go.

Regarding your ellipses in funnels - the minor axis does not always cut each ellipse into two equal, symmetrical halves. In turn, degree of ellipses are quite good. In my opinion one thing that could affected your ellipses a little bit in wrong way is that you didn’t use some circular object to draw more symmetrical arcs for funnels. But in any case, in this exercise, the ellipses should follow the axes more precisely.

Boxes

Plotted Perspective. Nice job.

Rough Perspective. Here I see that you a little struggling with boxes. But the good thing is – that you tried to draw horizontal (width) lines of boxes parallel to horizon but vertical (height) lines of boxes perpendicular to horizon. Probably some grasp of it is still needed but you are on the right track. Even though you have mistaken in your estimations, most of the boxes still are likely to look quite close to correct. And for this stage it is enough. In turn, the confidence of lines has decreased compared to ghosted lines/planes (it could happen because sometimes students are overwhelmed by big picture and forget about ghosting method or are more concentrated on not ruining boxes than on confident lines). Remember – each line in this course we should do with ghosting method. Even drawing boxes. And one more thing that is also important – do not correct your initial lines otherwise it looks messy not confident. The marking them as not correct also will not make here help. Just leave it as it is and move on.

Rotated Boxes. Good work on this exercise - boxes packed together with narrow, consistent gaps between them. Your boxes are rotating if we look at visible plane of boxes, but back planes unfortunately are not rotating always. Nevertheless, you managed to draw all boxes required. Nice!

Organic Perspective. Good job. You have constructed boxes along the swoopy line and making the boxes that are closer – larger, boxes that are far away - smaller. And that was the aim of the exercise.

Overall, good starting point for darwabox journey.

Main suggestions for future:

• draw from the shoulder and take care of each line you draw,

• do exercises from this lesson as your warm-ups about 10-15 minutes before each drawing session.

Hi. Before i go to mark "agree" with previous critique here are some small remarks from my side that was not mentioned in previous critique:

• in superimposed lines exercise it seems that in 2nd page for the longest straight lines was not used ruler for the initial lines,

• in ghosted planes exercise and in organic perspective exercise some lines do not have plotted dots that is important to do because ghosted lines technique (including plotting dots) is supposed to be used on every single mark you make through all of the Drawabox lessons https://drawabox.com/lesson/1/9/purpose

• in organic perspective exercise I noticed some corrected lines. Try to avoid correcting your initial confident lines. Let them be as they are and move on. Otherwise they stand out from the whole confident picture ;)

Nice submission!

Good luck in 250 box challenge!

Hello and welcome to drawabox!

Lines

Superimposed lines are quite good. You started with some wobbly lines in first page but then straightened them up in second page. Good job. Lines are smooth and consistent. However, your lines are 'fraying' on the end, but in this stage, it is entirely normal. It will reduce with practice and time.

Ghosted lines look quite confident, too. However, I notice that your lines sometimes arc as they approach the end point. It is fine for it to stop short of, overshoot, or miss the end point, because the goal here is – first confidence, then accuracy.

Ghosted planes. You started with some wobbly lines and then straightened them up. Good job. But it seems that you forgot to plot dots for each line. Remember that ghosted lines’ technique (including plotting dots) should be used for every single mark you make in this course.

Ellipses

Tables of ellipses looks confident. But I noticed that you have drawn through ellipses more than 3 times. Ellipses must be drawn through ellipses only 2 to 3 times (2 times preferably). But it seems you have understood it in the next exercises of ellipses. The orientation of ellipses (the angle at which it is positioned) is also in most cases quite consistent within the same section that is good. However, some ellipses are pointy. Make sure that you draw from your shoulder and your arm is not blocked. I also noticed that in some cases ellipses do not properly fit within their frames and sometimes do not touch neighbour ellipses properly, but in this stage, it is entirely normal and will be fixed with practice.

Almost the same situation is also with ellipses in planes. But here I would point out one more thing - few ellipses are deformed. I would suggest watching recently updated video for better understanding of this issue.

Funnels. Great – it seems a lot of previous mistakes in ellipses has mostly disappeared. Besides that, in this exercise the purpose is getting used to the use of the minor axis line. It seems here you also started a little bit wrongly (i.e., poorly constructed funnels that affected your ellipses) but later everything found the right track – ellipses became quite good - minor axis cuts each ellipse almost into two equal, symmetrical halves.

Boxes

Plotted Perspective. Exercise looks good, you have understood it.

Rough Perspective. I see that you have struggle with boxes in perspective. So, for one-point perspective width lines should be parallel to horizon and height lines perpendicular to horizon. Regarding line correction method – in some cases you extended points/corners of your boxes to vanishing point but not lines/edges of your boxes to horizon that could show how far off your lines are from vanishing point. Even though you have mistaken in your estimations, the boxes still are likely to look quite close to correct. And for this stage it is enough.

Rotated Boxes. Good work on this exercise - boxes packed together with narrow, consistent gaps between them. Your boxes are rotating if we look at visible plane of boxes, but back planes unfortunately are not rotating always. Nevertheless, you managed to draw all boxes required. Nice!

Organic Perspective. Good job. You have constructed boxes along the swoopy line and making the boxes that are far away smaller and those who are closer - larger. And that was the aim of the exercise.

Overall, quite good starting point for drawabox journey.

Wow, your ellipses/circles now are so beautiful in terms of drawabox (actually – almost in all speeds)! I feel that you took care of each individual ellipse. Great job! Even though I don’t know which speed you chose for yourself as the best one, it seems that the sweet spot probably is somewhere in between ‘fast’ and ‘slow’. Really great job! I appreciate it!

So, in my opinion you are ready to move to the next lesson.

Regarding your questions.

I agree that the wording of the sentence probably is unclear. There I tried to tell that in my view some of your ellipses are nor confident, nor accurate. Perhaps my critique is straight-forward but I never wanted to offend you.

Now about “drawing from shoulder” … I only have a few months of experience in drawing from shoulder that started with the “drawabox”. I mentioned “drawing from shoulder” in my critique to remind about it (since I know from my own experience that beginners in this “shoulder” field are not accustomed with it and they forget about it time to time). If I look back on my Lesson 1 submission, I can say that there is mixture of different pivots. Only now (while going through 250 box challenge) I started to get more accustomed to draw each line from shoulder with ‘locked’ wrist and elbow. However, I still need to remind myself on lighter pressure of pen. So far, I have followed only the instructions of the “drawabox”. What really helped me to understand “drawing from shoulder” is this video

and the exercise that is written here when you lock one pivot by one to feel them separately. So, this is my experience with “drawing from shoulder”. It hadn't even occurred to me to try on a larger page than A4 (until your question). Ha, ha, ha :) If you feel that you need some other advices/examples/experiences from other community members I think that you could ask your question here .

And now regarding your re-dos.

• straight Superimposed Lines now are much better, i.e., they are drawn with confidence - no wobbling. Great! Frying on the far end will reduce with practice. The arching of straight lines (that I found in your work) could be due to several reasons described here

• Tables of ellipses. It seems that you havn’t yet found rhythm and pace that fits the best for you to draw confident (and accurate) ellipses. Be careful that you are not confusing confidence with speed. Drawing confident line means execution of line without hesitation once preparation phases of ghosting method are completed. I would suggest watching also ScyllaStew’s live example of doing tables of ellipses (the links to these live examples are available on the bottom of each drawabox page immediately after “example homework”).

• Ghosted planes. Lines now are more confident than previously. In few cases there are a little arching of lines as they approach the end point but I think that you are on the right track :) Also in the ellipses in planes I see that you made more focus on preparation stages before execution of line (compared to the table of ellipses). That is good.

I wanted to suggest you to find the right speed for your ellipses during warm-ups while you are going through 250 box challenge, but I saw that you already submitted that challenge. So, let’s make one more try - finding the ideal speed for your confident ellipses.

Hello and welcome to drawabox!

Lines

Superimposed lines are good. Lines are smooth, consistent, and properly lined up at the start. However, your lines are 'fraying' on the end, but in this stage, it is entirely normal. It will reduce with practice and time.

Ghosted lines/planes look confident, too. However, I notice that few longer lines in ghosted lines exercise have a little arc. If you notice the same problem in future then look these possible reasons of it here. Also, the overshooting is common in your lines, but this is not so big problem right now opposed to undershooting. You'll get better with practice, and it's always better than hesitating.

Ellipses

Tables of ellipses looks also good. The good things: a) ellipses are drawn around the ellipses 2 to 3 times, b) the orientation of ellipses (the angle at which it is positioned) is also consistent within the same section, c) ellipses are round and confident. However, I noticed that in some cases ellipses do not properly fit within their frames. But in this stage, it is entirely normal and will be fixed with practice.

The same situation is also with ellipses in planes – they are confident and smooth, and some ‘strange’ planes did not deform them.

Funnels. Your ellipses here are also good. The minor axis cuts each ellipse into two equal, symmetrical halves. And bonus point - the degree of your ellipses increases as you move outwards from the centre.

Boxes

Plotted Perspective. Exercise looks great.

Rough Perspective. Here I also see really good work on exercise - 2 sets of lines are parallel/perpendicular to the horizon, and 1 set try to converge towards it. Even though you have mistaken in your estimations, the boxes still are likely to look close to correct. And for this stage it is enough.

Rotated Boxes. Good work on this exercise - gaps between boxes are quite narrow, your boxes are rotating, and you managed to draw all boxes required. Nice!

Organic Perspective. Good job. You have constructed boxes along the swoopy line and making the boxes that are far away smaller and those who are closer - larger. And that was the aim of the exercise. However, I noticed for the first time in your submission that you started correcting your lines in few cases. Try to avoid it. When you draw your confident line firstly do not correct it, let it be and move on. Regarding your comment about not understanding exercise (about your nightmare) I can say that the exercise was meant to draw freely rotated boxes in 3D space and it also introduces you to a couple of compositional concepts. If I am looking at your homework – your boxes are rotating (they are not similar to each other in their position/orientation) and you made a composition of them (if you don’t see it then look at your simplest ones – 2nd frame of first page and 2nd frame of second page; other frames are more crowded to see it).

Overall, the homework is well done. I appreciate that:

• you did more emphasis on confidence than on accuracy (the latest one will come with practice),

• you did not forget ghosting lines with plotted dots throughout your homework (many students when start drawing boxes are so overwhelmed of the whole picture that forget about it),

• you did not correct your lines (except these few cases in last exercise),

• you followed instructions (no matter what).

So, in my opinion, you have submitted your homework in the best way of your current ability (that is quite high), so, in my opinion you are ready to move to the next lesson.

Some more comments from my side to make the situation more clear (i.e. how I understand the 'construction' of drawabox comunity).

In my opinion, getting feedback before moving on to a next lesson is the best way to go through this course and get the most of it. However, homework submissions for free community feedback do not guaranty a review of your homework. It depends on the

desire/ability of other community members to make reviews. Looking at the number of existing submissions that have not got a review yet on drawabox (and they are not a few), I would suggest you decide by yourself when it is time to move on. Getting rusty is also not good ;) Just do not rush – let the newly obtained skills absorb in your head and, of course, follow the extremely important 50% rule. Probably at the moment, you could get more quick critique on your homework on Discord server. But at the same time if we are speaking about drawabox homapage, probably you can make your homework be more in sight by making critiques on homeworks submissions of other community members (on those lessons that you have passed already).

P.S. I'm still doing 250 challenge :) So I can't help with your 250 submission.

Hello,

I agree with the previous critique. Overall, I see your improvement during this lesson and desire to continue drawabox lessons. In my opinion, you have submitted your homework of Lesson 1 in the best way of your ability in that moment.

I also saw that you have submitted already 250 Box Challenge. In my opinion it made your understanding of vanishing points and rotating of boxes clearer.

Just made comment that the Community members can label your Lesson 1 completed and you can get a completion badge if they agree :)

Hello and welcome to drawabox!

I noticed that you have submitted more pages than necessary. Next time try to limit yourself only to the number of pages that are assigned.

So, I will look through only the specified number of pages - the first aligned ones for each exercise. The additional ones I will not take into account. In some cases, it seems that some of them cold be made in different time as they look quite outstanding from previous ones. I hope you were not grinding because it is massive waste of time.

Ok, now critique.

Lines

Good attempt in superimposed lines. Lines are properly lined up at the start. That is good. However, your attempt to meet the end point properly made your lines wobbly . It would be better to draw confident, smooth, and consistent lines even it means that in the end point they will fray. In this stage fraying at the end point is entirely normal. It will reduce with practice and time as opposed to wobbly lines. And remember to draw from your shoulder.

Ghosted lines look quite confident, too. However, I notice that your lines in few cases arc as they approach the end point. It is fine for it to stop short of, overshoot, or miss the end point, because the goal here is – first confidence, then accuracy.

Ghosted planes – quite good done but lines are little wobbly. Although this exercise is still about confident lines between planed dots.

Ellipses

In tables of ellipses I see quite wide range of ellipses: (a) confident, ghosted, but less accurate (these are the best ones), (b) less confident but more accurate (these are in second place), (c) ellipses where focus on drawing confident and if possible accurate ellipse with ghosting method is lost (these are not acceptable). I also noticed that in one section ellipses are drawn too small (comparing to three targeting points - top, bottom and left) and therefore they are drawn on top of each other. Some ellipses also do not have continuous line. The good thing in your ellipses - they in the most cases are drawn around the ellipses 2 to 3 times. Also, the orientation of ellipses (the angle at which it is positioned) is also quite consistent within the same section – that is good.

Ellipses in planes. In most cases the ellipses are wobbly and therefore are not confident.

Funnels. Your ellipses are pretty good. The minor axis cuts each ellipse into two equal, symmetrical halves. Also, the confidence and accuracy are in quite good balance.

Boxes

Plotted Perspective – nice and clean work. Well done.

Rough Perspective. Here I see good attempt - 2 sets of lines are mostly parallel/perpendicular to the horizon. However, the third set of lines that should converge to vanishing point on the horizon in some cases is quite far away. Even though you have mistaken in your estimations, the boxes still are likely to look close to correct. And for this stage it is enough. Just take more time to plan your dots for your lines for boxes. However, regarding the confidence of lines – it has dropped compared to ghosted lines. Remember that boxes are drawn from lines – from confident ghosted lines that are drawn through the two planed dots.

Rotated Boxes. Nice work on this exercise - gaps between boxes are narrow and your boxes are rotating.

Organic Perspective. Well done. You have constructed boxes along the swoopy line and making the boxes that are far away smaller and those who are closer – larger. However, it seems that you forgot to plan your dots before drawing a line. But in spite I noticed that you in the organic perspective exercise also considered that ‘parallel’ lines have their vanishing points. That is great.

Overall, good attempting to do Lesson 1. But from my side to complete the lesson fully (to understand the aim of exercises) I would suggest you redo some parts before moving on.

Hi,

Your understanding of the course is absolutely on the right track (no grinding, no correction of faulty lines, just moving on). Also, that is great that you see your mistakes by yourself – it allows you to move in the right direction without waiting for critique. Doing warmups is the best way not to lose your grasp and improve on what did not work out so well previously. In my opinion – you are absolutely on the right way in the drawabox course. I wish you good luck on finishing box challenge! :)