Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes
10:03 AM, Saturday November 1st 2025
First page of Super Imposed Lines used a ballpoint pen
Alternated with a sharpie and sakura micron until sticking with Sakura on the 2nd panel of Rough Perspective
Hello Kyrix! Here is your feedback for the Lesson 1 exercises. Overall, great work completing the homework.
Overall Feedback
Thank you for using the recommended tools (fineliners). This gives your lines a crisp, clear quality that is perfect for these exercises.
Your overall line quality is excellent. Your marks are confident, smooth, and consistent across all the exercises, which shows a strong understanding of the core mark-making principles.
You have a good grasp of the 'draw through' method for ellipses, consistently using the correct 2-3 passes without overdoing it. This keeps your work clean and easy to assess.
Your work shows an excellent level of care and attention to detail. You've clearly read the instructions for each exercise thoroughly and followed the process exactly as described. This methodical approach is fantastic and will help you build a very strong foundation.
You're doing a fantastic job of thinking and drawing in three dimensions. Your boxes feel solid and volumetric, not like flat shapes. It's clear you are visualizing them as real objects in space, which is the most important takeaway from these exercises.
Here is the feedback broken down by exercise:
Superimposed Lines
Your lines in the superimposed exercise are confident and straight. Great work on avoiding hesitation and steering the stroke!
You're doing a great job of placing your pen down deliberately before starting your superimposed lines, avoiding fraying at the start.
Ghosted Lines
Your ghosted lines are very well-executed, showing a clear commitment to the stroke without hesitation. This demonstrates a good understanding of the process.
Excellent work keeping your ghosted lines straight! This shows you are effectively compensating for the natural arc of your arm by drawing from the shoulder.
Ghosted Planes
Tables of Ellipses
You've followed the instructions for the table of ellipses perfectly by drawing through them the correct number of times.
You are correctly limiting your passes to 2-3 rotations.
Your ellipses in the table fit snugly within their spaces, showing you are aiming for the target correctly.
Your ellipses are evenly shaped and smoothly executed. This demonstrates good use of the ghosting method and drawing from your shoulder.
Ellipses in Planes
Great job in the Ellipses in Planes exercise! You're consistently making your ellipses touch all four edges.
Even with the added challenge of the planes, your ellipses maintain their even, smooth shape. Excellent focus on confident mark-making!
You've followed the instructions for drawing through ellipses perfectly by using the correct number of passes.
You are correctly limiting your passes to 2-3 rotations when drawing ellipses in planes.
Funnels
You've done a great job ensuring your ellipses touch the edges of the funnel.
Fantastic work on the funnels exercise! Your ellipses show a clear attempt to align to the central minor axis.
You've followed the instructions for drawing through ellipses perfectly in the funnels exercise.
You are correctly limiting your passes to 2-3 rotations when drawing ellipses in funnels.
Plotted Perspective
Rough Perspective
You are applying the line extensions correctly to check your convergence. This is a critical skill.
You are demonstrating good use of the ghosting method for your freehanded lines.
Great work drawing through your boxes in the Rough Perspective exercise. This is a vital habit for understanding 3D form.
Your freehand lines in the rough perspective exercise are well-executed, showing a clear commitment to the stroke without hesitation.
Rotated Boxes
You've followed the core steps of the rotated boxes exercise perfectly by laying out the axes and squares first.
The gaps between your rotated boxes are tight and consistent. This shows good estimation and careful placement.
Your boxes are genuinely rotating in space, with their vanishing points shifting as they turn. This is a core concept that you've grasped well!
Excellent work drawing through your boxes ('x-ray' vision'). This is vital for understanding them as 3D forms.
I believe you could have rotated your boxes more and have consistently rotated them on both sides (Left side is more rotated than the right).
Your freehand lines in the rotated boxes exercise show some wobbling, which suggests you may still be focusing on accuracy during the execution phase. Remember to apply the ghosting method and commit to the stroke you've practiced. This along with the fact that I believe your boxes could use some more rotation has led to to assign a revision for the rotated boxes.
Organic Perspective
You're using the ghosting method effectively in the organic perspective exercise, resulting in confident, clean lines.
Your boxes in the organic perspective exercise show consistent convergence. You've successfully avoided divergence.
You've applied a nice, subtle degree of foreshortening to your boxes. The gradual convergence feels consistent and believable.
Excellent work pushing the variety in your forms! Your boxes have dynamic rotations and proportions, which shows you're actively exploring 3D space and not just staying in a comfort zone.
Your freehand lines in the organic perspective exercise are very well-executed, showing a clear commitment to the stroke without hesitation.
Excellent work keeping your freehand lines straight in the organic perspective exercise! This shows you are effectively drawing from the shoulder.
Next Steps:
Based on the feedback above, I've assigned the following revision(s). Please focus on the points mentioned and resubmit your work for review.
Assigned Revision(s):
Please do one more page of rotated boxes :)
Keep up the great work, and let me know if you have any questions!
Thank you for taking the time to critique my work! Really appreciate you numbering the points I need to improve on, made it easy to spot among the entire critique.
Plotted perspective
"Some of your vertical lines in the Plotted Perspective exercise are not perpendicular to the horizon."
Could you point out where these non perpendicular vertical lines are? Are you referring to the ones for the back edge at the end of each box?
Rough perspective
"The front and back faces of your boxes in the rough perspective exercise should be rectangular (composed of true horizontal and vertical lines). It appears some of your lines are at arbitrary angles."
Thank you for pointing that out, I think I focused too much on ghosting to the VP on some of them that I've forgotten to make them rectangular.
Rotated boxes
I've kept your pointers in mind as I worked through my revision. You can find it at the last image on the same imgur link here (https://imgur.com/a/UQmeHHc).
Excellent work on completing the lesson. The rotated boxes are a major improvment!
Regarding the plotted perspective question, I've marked some non perpendicular lines here: https://imgur.com/a/VRTQsLq
Good luck on your journey!
Next Steps:
250 Box Challenge!
Stan Prokopenko's had been teaching figure drawing as far back as I can remember, even when I was just a regular student myself. It's safe to say that when it comes to figure drawing, his tutelage is among the best.
We use cookies in conjunction with Google Analytics to anonymously track how our website is used.
This data is not shared with any other parties or sold to anyone. They are also disabled until consent is provided by clicking the button below, and this consent can be revoked at any time by clicking the "Revoke Analytics Cookie Consent" link in our website footer.
You can read more about what we do with them, read our privacy policy.