TRSE: How To Draw Tutorials: Tools to Help Improve Your Skills

TRSE: How To Draw Tutorials:
Tools That May Help Improve your Drawing Skills.

Basic Tools:
    A ruler is which I consider the most important tool for any drawings. A simple ruler helps make your drawings look more accurate, symmetrical, and leveled (especially the face). It was very common for me to see the pictures with lopsided eyes/face as if the artists haven't used something to keep the faces leveled. The tutorials demonstrate how a ruler is used in the drawings. The triangles also can be of a big help too, and an example is that they help make the lines be perfectly perpendicular ( + ) to each other. As for the pencils and inks, each artist has different preferences, so try many different pencils/inks until you find ones that suit you best. It helps to try different medians such as oil painting, watercoloring, pencil coloring and computer coloring. An artist performs best when he/she is most comfortable with the use of a specific medium and specific tools, her/his drawing style preferences, and at her/his own pace.
    There are many different types of papers out there, and they have different characteristics that can affect the drawing quality. The newspaper type would be best for practice on pencil sketching. Computer papers are very smooth, so they're good for inking. Someone threw out a large box of old printer papers now obsolete due to new printer technology, but I got that box, and started using all of those old printer papers for sketching. ^_^
    I have found that being familiar with anything science to be very valuable asset especially when it comes to doing stories. "Bad science" (misinformation and "flying pigs" stuff) tend to result in lousy stories (and lousy drawings in several cases too). So it helps to take few general science classes. For example, if you understand the science behind the roses, you'll able to draw the roses well. ^_^
    A drafting table that can be tilted at various angles can be useful too. ^_^ Another good tool is the cel method which the animators used to produce the cels making up the animated shows. It involves tracing a blank paper over a sketched drawing resulting in a clean drawing. You can make a box with glass on the top, and put a light inside it (but leave an wide opening to let the heat out). Tape a blank paper to a pencil sketch, put it on the glass top, and then, trace what you want to be traced with ink, resulting in a very clean drawing that can making coloring in any mediums (pencil coloring, computer coloring, watercoloring, etc.) much easier, no more hassles of using the eraser. ^_^

Books on Human Anatomy, Fashion and How To Draw Stuff:
Many advanced/professional artists (including Naoko Takeuchi) reply on the knowledge of human anatomy to draw the human figures very well. By being familiar with human anatomy, the artists are able to make their decisions on their drawing styles and preferences, decide on exaggerations (like making legs longer), and to draw the characters properly especially when they're in actions/poses. For example, the muscles under the skin stretch and thicken as the limbs are moved. The knowledge of human anatomy also helps the artists understand the limitations of the limbs' movements. For example, a head cannot turn more than 160 degrees from one side to other side. So it helps to get your hands on the books on human anatomy as well as any books on fashion, and How To Draw Figures books.

Speaking, many human anatomy and How To Draw books contain nudity, so you may have to learn to shed the "misconceptions" about (or any problems with) nudity and get used to it if you want to be a very good artist. What i mean by "Misconception" is that the people just get the wrong ideas about nudity and get "conditioned" to scorn the nudity. There's nothing wrong with nudity (you need to be naked to take a bath, right?) and nudity already have proven to be useful in humor (as in case of mangas) and reflecting the personalities of the character (how modest, how pure the heart is). Pornography(Hentai/Ecchi) is a different matter. Pornography which we came to strongly dislike involves sexual INTENTIONS (dirty and ugh-y stuff) and that is what separates pornography from simple & innocent nudity. Let's take two examples: nude Usagi (Serena) at the last episode of SMStars season, and Chobits mangas (Rated +16 for older teens) by CLAMP. The nudity of Usagi in that episode demonstrates the purity of her heart. To acheive such purity, she must to shed everything including her modesty as in accordance with an ancient Greek philosophy concerning nudity (ancient athletics were completing against each other, all naked). Because of that, it's just nudity, NOT Hentai/Ecchi/Porn.
In the Chobits manga, The main character, Hideki found unconscious Chi, an "android" with realistic body wrapped in bandages in some trash heap. He carried her back to his apartment, and figured out how to "turn her on". When she wakes up, the bandages just fell off her body, Chi didn't seem to care that she's naked. Her lack of modesty demonstrates her innocence (as if she was just born) and it was very funny to see how Hideki react to such sight. It gets funnier when Chi jumped on Hideki, hugging him in the same manner as a toddler happily hugging a father, getting Hideki all over-blushing from such contact. She may be naked, but that was drowned by the fact that she's so innocent, so cute, and so funny.

That demonstrates how nudity can be an useful tool to assist with storytelling, KISS Doll ("Digital Paper Dolls") making, and drawing. For example, I find drawing nude characters to be helpful when drawing the characters wearing swimsuits, tight fitting clothing like Sailor suit (fuku), even have the dresses being blown against their bodies and legs, or even designing some clothing for your own characters. Many famous artists (like Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello, and even Naoko Takeuchi) are known to draw beautiful nude pictures (both male and female).

Mirrors, Pictures and Modeling:
You can use a mirror to observe your own body, and see how your limbs move, but that could be a problem if you're not a slim person, and you want to draw the slim characters. Any artists also may have problems drawing the characters of opposite sex. For example, I'm a male drawer, so I'm not completely familiar with a female body. But it can happen that some male drawers would know more about the female body than female artists do and vera vice. Observing other people, and the books and magazines containing the pictures of people in various poses can be of a help, but they do have the limitations.
There are ways an artist can learn a really lot about the human anatomy. They can figure out and sketch the patterns on the printed pictures or to study a live model. If you want to draw a character in a complicated pose, but you couldn't get the pose right, you can ask for someone to pose for you. For example, Michiru(Michelle) needed someone to help get her painting of a mermaid look anatomically correct, so Michiru(Michelle) asks Minako(Mina) to pose for her...

Oops, better give her some privacy. ^_^;; Obviously, there are no limits to what an artist can do with a live model (with the consent of the model that is). I can admit that the artists can learn even more from the use of nude models, and many professional artists and many advanced college art courses use nude models to help them learn more about the human anatomy. But such study is optional.

Leonardo De Vinci, both scientist and artist, was very well known for his human studies using the live (or dead in many cases) models, and he used a real woman (clothed) as a model to paint his famous Mona Lisa painting. Another excellent example is Boris Vallejo, well known for his extraordinary fantasy themed art pictures, enlisted many different types of models (including nude ones) to help him produce his artworks. I'm including the examples of his works:
-A young woman riding a horse with a dragon in the background.
-A muscular man guarding wounded woman from the winged enemies.
-The mermaid and merman (Warning: nudity) (the models must have hung from the supports)
The pictures are scanned from some cards given to me by some art-loving guy.

Your Decisions on How to be an Artist:
    You as an artist make the choices of how much you want to learn, how you should draw or not draw, and what type of drawing style. For example, I hate Hentai/pornography, so I chose not to draw any Hentai pictures even I'm capable of drawing them, and I don't have any problems with drawing the SM characters as beautiful nude mermaids, fairies and spirits (or even humor related nudity scenes) without any sexual tones (or anything dirty). As mentioned before, you can choose your own drawing style. For example, I want my drawing style to be similar to the Anime version of Sailor Moon, but I chose to draw the characters in my own way by shortening the legs, and adjusting some features. But even, I'm already working on developing my own style.
     The artists have specializations too. You can choose which to specialize in: comedic art, technical stuff (machines), landscape, nature, fantasy, and anything else.. Or you can choose to be more versatile, learning a wide range of specializations, but the downfall to the versatility is you won't be top-notch in any of the specializations because of the limited time availability to be allocated to such studies. Being versatile can be quite advantageous when tacking your own mangas on your own.
    But you'll have to learn the drawing basics before you start pursuing your preferred specializations.

Now the four most important tools of all.... Brains, Patience, determination and LOTs of practice. If you lack any of those four, it would be very hard for you to become a good artist. Remember, DON'T expect yourself to be a great artist in a short time. It will take time for you to a good artist, and all you need to become a respected artist is be smart, patient, determined, and keep practicing. It took me more than five years to be this good, and I'm still improving. So good luck!!! ^_^