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Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes

3:21 PM, Tuesday May 19th 2020

First, I apologize for inconsistent pen usage, some ran out, I have ordered more, but they are two plane rides, one truck, a taxi, a bus and a burro away (I'm locked down in the mountains of Veracruz), where I stumbled across this very cool Drawabox

Direct Link: https://i.imgur.com/zsWBCD7.jpg

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Lesson 1: First, I apologize for inconsistent pen usage, some ran out, I have ordered more, but they are two plane rides, one truck, a taxi, a bus and a burro away (I'm locked down in the mountains of Veracruz), where I stumbled across this very cool Drawabox group. I have zero art background (retired businessman) and am just trying to figure out if I have the cerebral bandwidth to pursue drawing..would SINCERELY appreciate any input.(PS..I had to cobble together supplies..instead of two 8.5 x 11, sometimes I would use one 18x24 ...)...I'll get my act together when new supplies arrive if you encourage me to continue....stay safe amigos.

https://imgur.com/a/zsWBCD7

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2 users agree
6:04 PM, Tuesday May 19th 2020

Hi there! First of all, wanna say that you can use ballpoints for all these lessons, if you choose not to go for the official critique. Fineliners are definitely better, but ballpoints do the job pretty nicely. So don't worry about the materials and use them on the meantime.

Lines

Starting with your lines, they're pretty confident and good, keep focusing on confidence like that, and you'll nail the accuracy. A thing I've noticed is that some of your lines have a bit of fraying on both ends, when starting a line, you should carefully place your pen on the start of each line, so only a maximum of 1 end can fray. Plan each stroke you make carefully.

Ellipses

Ellipses are p good too, though they have a bit of wobble. Remember that on ellipses just like with lines, you should prioritize confident strokes over accurate ones. Don't hesitate to sacrifice accuracy to get them as confident as you can.

On the funnels exercise, don't forget that the minor axis should cut the ellipses in 2 identical halves, it's pretty hard, but be sure you're keeping it in mind while drawing them.

Boxes

Boxes are looking pretty good in general, though they have some issues:

-First is that you're having some wobbly lines here. Just like in the ghosted lines and superimposed lines exercise, you should prioritize confidence over accuracy always.

-Second is that you're repeating some lines that were off, no matter how off a line is, keep going as if it had been correct.

-On rotated boxes, some of your boxes weren't actually rotating, careful with that, this mistake is explained here.

-You've also not kept corners between boxes close on the rotated boxes as well, don't forget to do it

-On organic perspective I recommend doing more overlaps. You can clarify after the overlaps by adding a confident, drawn with the shoulder superimposed line on the part of the silhouette of the boxes that overlap. Perspective on them has issues but you'll work on it on the box challenge, so don't worry about it!

Overall pretty good job!

Next Steps:

First of all, congratulations on finishing lesson 1! Your next step is the box challenge.

As I marked this as complete, you are now qualified to critique lesson 1 submissions.

-Doing critiques is a way of learning and solidifying concepts. I can atest to that after having done hundreds of critiques. There are a lot of concepts that I did not understand, and thanks to critiquing I started understanding them. Which made me learn a lot more through the course.

-Another thing is that as the number of current submissions is super high, if you critique some critiques, those would be less critiques I'd have to critique before reaching your next submissions, so you'd get your critiques faster.

It's totally optional of course, I won't force anyone to give critiques. But me and the other people who are critiquing would be super grateful if you gave it a shot.

Good luck on the box challenge, and keep up the good work!

NOTE: here's a quick guide on critiquing lesson 1 submissions.

There are a few people that feel hesitant to critique because they feel they aren't ready to it so hopefully it'll help you in case you are one of those people.

This community member feels the lesson should be marked as complete, and 2 others agree. The student has earned their completion badge for this lesson and should feel confident in moving onto the next lesson.
1:14 AM, Wednesday May 20th 2020

Very helpful comments, thank you. I agree with everything you recommend!

The recommendation below is an advertisement. Most of the links here are part of Amazon's affiliate program (unless otherwise stated), which helps support this website. It's also more than that - it's a hand-picked recommendation of something I've used myself. If you're interested, here is a full list.
Faber Castell PITT Artist Pens

Faber Castell PITT Artist Pens

Like the Staedtlers, these also come in a set of multiple weights - the ones we use are F. One useful thing in these sets however (if you can't find the pens individually) is that some of the sets come with a brush pen (the B size). These can be helpful in filling out big black areas.

Still, I'd recommend buying these in person if you can, at a proper art supply store. They'll generally let you buy them individually, and also test them out beforehand to weed out any duds.

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