Hi there
May I suggest something? Yes? Great! 
When doing figures, have you tried building them up with basic shapes (cylinders for arms and elgs etc)?
Good effort this one. I think you will benefit from breaking down the body into simple shapes though. Steven Stahlberg made a tutorial on this once. I think there is a link somewhere in the tutorial forum…
NR43 Thanks for the suggestions. I think I use a variation on the shapes method. I know when it comes to figures, I start off with something like a skeleton to get the pose down. I then try to flesh it out, but I don’t think I have a consistent method of doing that. Trying a cylinders approach may help me get volume with my figures, something I really can’t grasp right now. Will try in later works.
I wasn’t liking how I was drawing heads from my mind, so I decided to do some practice from a hair magazine. Just a handful of sketches.
One of these days, I will learn to draw twists and dreads in a way I’ll be satisfied with.
15 min ref’d sketch
Note: actual source is sweetcarlotta. I’d link to the pic, but she took off most of her gallery.
Yeah, I kinda disappeared for a while. It happens sometimes. I’m rather pleased to say that I’m taking a figure drawing class. It’s being taught by an area artist, Barrett Bailey. Here are the results of the first night’s class. Comments welcome.
1min gestures
5min gestures
One thing I’m most happy was the teacher pointing out that I tend to draw my legs long (I knew this, but I could never catch it while drawing).
10/20(?) min
15min
Asatira,
Fantastic that you are taking a drawing class! 
I really recommend checking out the Anthony Ryder links posted here. He has a great book that really goes through a nice step by step process which will enable you to make better proportional judgements at the outset before going for the details. I can’t recommend his book enough.
RebeccaK: Thanks. I like his work too. Right now, I can’t afford his book, so the website will have to do.
Last three classes (my camera died, so I waited to take the pics as a group)
5-16
[b]5-21
5-23[/b]
[b]5-29
5-30
6-04
[/b](I’m rather pleased with this set. 10-15min each)
(I don’t like this one. I could not get the legs right, and his face doesn’t look right)
This is my last week, last day tonight to be precise. I hope to be able to take the next class, but in the mean time there are open figure sessions, something I’m looking forward to. In the meantime, here are drawings from the other night. Tonight’s set will go up tomorrow.
1min gestures
this one, just over an hour or so.
Hi Micelle, those are nice figure studies. You are still struggling with proportions it seems. It has a nice stylish effect in the lying figure in 5-23. Keep going!
Very nice drawings! I’m seeing improvement from the start to the most recently posted sketches. A couple of things I’ve noticed:
A lot of your figures limbs look to be on the thin side.
There are some proportion issues going on, but you seem to be improving. I find it helpful to start with a really light, loose gesture to nail down the general pose and proportion and then begin to lay heavier lines in to define the detail as you get further along…you might already be doing that, though.
battle812: Yep, proportions are still a problem. Thankfully, one thing I’ve learned and putting more into practice is measuring. And thank you for your praise of my pics.
wildsheepchase: Thank you. All I’ll say about the limbs is I’m probably still drawing what I think I see, and haven’t adapted them proportionally and accurately to what I see. But I don’t think I saw that, so I’ll keep an eye on that in future drawings. Thanks, and thanks for checking out my stuff.
I’ve been… mildly productive these last few weeks. Only things of note are some drawings I drew at a convention I intended late last month. They had a clothed figure drawing session, and I thought I’d share the ones I liked best. Most were 10-20min.
Some ink sketches I did at an outdoor ballet performance. Audience figures took about 30secs to a minute, the stick/gesture figures of the dancers about 5-15secs (they did not stay in a pose for very long). I think these were all right, and I should do more.
Been way too long since I last posted. I was inspired by another sketchbook thread whose artist (I’m sorry, I couldn’t find your thread again) who was doing a series of 100 portraits. I’m going to do my own, and hopefully later move to other areas of interest.
Enough talk. First one.
Hi
Some ink sketches I did at an outdoor ballet performance. Audience figures took about 30secs to a minute, the stick/gesture figures of the dancers about 5-15secs (they did not stay in a pose for very long). I think these were all right, and I should do more.
pretty hard sketching outside isn’t it? It’s really pushing the observational skills though so yes, everyone should do this more
Your last portrait looks ok. It could be improved by adding volume to the face. You can achieve this by making the unlit (or lesser lit parts) of the face darker. Values are extremely important.
Check out Rebecca’s shading tutorial in the tutorials and workshops forum for more info on values.
Great work!
Thank you. I haven’t been able to either get more observational drawings or using the gestures as foundations. Yet. Always a yet.
I’ll be sure to. I’ll probably have a few masters’ copies in here as well, try to figure how and why they did what they did. Practice practice.
