Hey there Caskroom! Welcome to Drawabox! We're really happy to have you as well and glad you chose us for your curriculum. As for your questions, the first I can't give a fully informed answer to, so I've asked Irshad.

At the end of the day, we each use the exercises towards different ends. If I remember correctly, Peter used the exercise to focus on accuracy. I, on the other hand, choose to use it to focus on confidence of execution. As a result, depending on who is assigning it to you and with which purpose, it becomes one of many different exercises, despite on its face being identical.

As for the second, I recommend trying it the Drawabox way first, as there's no harm in learning more than one technique, and then after that, you can go back to the way you're comfortable with, if that's still the case. There's a great deal of value in being able to choose the technique you use rather than simply being tethered to a single method.

Anyway! On to the critique!

Lines

These are looking quite good! You're a little shaky when it comes to your superimposed lines, but your ghosed lines show very little wobble and are fairly accurate! I say you're moving quickly in the right direction.

When it comes to your super imposed lines, I'm noticing a little bit of feathering at the start of each line. This is important because this is telling met hat you may be going a touch too fast. You want to be going quickly enough with your marks that you're creating a smooth, confident line, but you also want to be going slowly enough to be thoughtful about where you place your pen down. The feathering indicates you were rushing through this initial placement, so I just wanted to point that out before it became a habit!

Otherwise, though, very nice work on your lines, especially after the ghosting technique.

Ellipses

These are looking great! Again, slightly wobbly to start, but as you get into the groove, you improve quickly. Your ellipses are smooth, confident, and they sit snugly in their planes, tables, and arcs. You demonstrate clear control over your mark-making here, so I would say that once again, you're moving in the right direction.

Good work with your funnels! You do a decent job keeping them aligned with the minor axis along the whole set in each funnel, which is great to see. This will be important for later lessons.

Rough Perspective

Very strong work here as well. Your line work is looking clean and efficient and your perspective is coming along nicely as well. You keep your horizontals parallel with the horizon and your verticals perpendicular, which helps eliminate unnecessary guesswork. Your depth lines are pretty accurate as well, so I would say your sense of 3D is developing quickly, or you're coming in with prior experience. Nice work!

My main critique involves your tendency to go back over a mistake with an additional mark. Unfortunately, this has the effect of drawing the eye rather than covering up the mistake, so try to fight the urge to put down another line. Unless a mark is very far off target, it will generally go unnoticed.

Rotated Boxes

Really lovely work here. Again, your mark-making is clean and concise, even in your hatchmarks, which is great to see. Likewise, in terms of rotation, you get pretty close to the 180 degree mark, your gaps are consistently spaced, and even your corner boxes are looking pretty solid! Really lovely work here.

If you attempt this again, and I do recommend that as it is an excellent bench mark, if you want to achieve a fuller rotation, keep an eye on each box's VP. If you move it along the horizon by a wide enough margin past the VP of the previous box, you get it rotating instead of simply moving back in space.

Organic Perspective

Really lovely work here as well. Now I'm definitely settling on the conclusion that you're coming in with prior experience in 3D. You have very few convergence errors, which is great to see, and your application of line weight is looking smooth and thoughtful. Nice job!