Right now, I'm writing a fantasy book where the main character is a dragon. Naturally, I wanted a visual representation of what he looks like. Sketching and drawing is helpful (though not mandatory) for the character design process, so I went to draw it. One problem: drawing-- and art in general--is not my strong suit.
I've been drawing since high school, but admittedly, I've never been very good at it--especially not with creature designs. Here's my attempt at my dragon designs:
Not terrible, but not great--certainly not what was in my head for these characters. I needed help to improve my art.
So, I was browsing on Youtube and came across this video--"How to Improve Your Art in 1 Hour" by Oridays:
Improve my art in 1 hour? Really? When you see a claim like that, it's easy to be skeptical. Usually, nothing worth doing comes easy or fast. But I thought of my dragon designs, and decided I'd try the method. It's always good to learn, right? Plus, I had just watched another video which seemed to add veracity to this claim. So I found a dragon pic I liked and followed the steps: basically, I studied/traced the drawing, then hid and tried to draw it from memory, then looked back at the original pic and correct the mistakes I made while thinking about why I am making those corrections. Repeat.
And it worked! By the following week, I had improved to this:
I'm not saying this method will instantly improve everything about your art, but it is a good start. I still have a long way to go before my character designs are complete. I need to go back and find another dragon to study--a full body one, so I can work on making a full body pic. So far, I'm getting close to what's in my head.
So meet Thatch and Hazel:
I'll be tweaking these designs for a while still. I've also been wanting to make a dragon field guide for years--a book of dragon sketches with descriptions of the ecology and characteristics of each creature. I already have most, if not all, of the descriptions written--I just need to do the drawings. It's scary when art is not my strength, but we have to be brave, right? Maybe I'll share my progress here?
What about you? How will you improve your art? Got anything you want to draw? Why not watch the vid and give the tips a try?
Later,
-*heart* M.R. Anglin
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