what kinds of things did you do when you were first practicing digital drawing? did you use reference images? where did you find them? anything you would recommend to a baby drawer with a short attention span for instructions?
Well, first and foremost, Iām gonna take a moment to do a little fangirl wiggle, because Iām a huge fan of your work! Thank you for messaging me!Ā
Iām gonna include a lot of info here, so bear with me! Iāll try to break it down so that itās easy to understand, but if anyone ha any questions, feel free to ask!
The absolute mostĀ important thing for starting out drawing is practice.Ā
Youāre going to hear it from everyone, everywhere, but itās so very true. When I first started digital drawing, I made sure to use my tablet every single day. Now, that doesnāt mean I spend three hours each day trying to do something amazing; some days I only had a few minutes here and there, but Iād try to sketch something rough, something loose, maybe just a doodle. Maybe itās a face one day, maybe itās just a bunch of swirls and stars the next. It doesnāt matter whatĀ you draw, as long as you are developing the habit of drawing! No matter what it is you are doing, youāre learning! Playing with brushes to see how they feel on your new drawing program? Learning! Trying to see if one way of colouring is better than another? Learning! Drawing the same nose over and over and over again until you like what you see? Also learning!
Another key step to learning to draw is to identify what you like!
What does that mean? Well, look at other artists who inspire you! Why does their work appeal to you? What is it about their drawings that you LOVE? Once you realize what it is that makes something beautiful to you, you know what to practice and how to learn to adopt that into your own style!
@burdge is an excellent example for illustrating this. They are a fandom artist that has been around for soĀ long, nearly every fandom artist I know has been inspired by them in one way or another!
So what is it about Burdgeās art that I love? I love the closeness thatās portrayed, and the softness. But those are very arbitrary things that are difficult to identify and even more challenging to implement. I love the noses. I love the proportions. I love the hairlines! I love the body movement! Those are things that are a bit easier to pick out and start practicing!
This leads so well into my next point:
It is okay to copy someone elseās work if itās for practice!
Letās break this one down, just to ensure that nobody accidentally misinterprets what Iām saying: It is okay to copy someone elseās work if itās for practice. It is NOT okay to copy someone elseās work and post it, claiming it as your own! If you use a reference picture, generally speaking, most artists will post which reference they use, but I know that I often forget to do that as well! But using a reference picture is different than copying.Ā
When you copyĀ someoneās work, what youāre really doing is working on identifying what you love about it. Youāre practicing drawing in their style! And thatās totally fine! When youāre first starting out, itās actually really helpful to be able to use someone elseā expertise and practice to guide you to draw something you love! A lot of people have it in their heads that copying = bad. And sometimes it does. But I think itās important for new artists to get rid of that notion in their heads. Practice is practice. When you practice cooking, you copy other peopleās recipes! Youāre not going to post those recipes online and say you created them, but you CAN feed them to your friends and you CAN eat them yourself! And if you do post pictures of your food? You can say whose recipe you used and thank them for a great meal!Ā
We were all starting at one point, and every artist I know started by copying something.Ā
Use reference pictures! Use them liberally! References are helpful!
Yes, some artists are so good that they do not need reference pictures. Thatās fine. Good for them! Iām very proud of them!
When youāre first starting out, you donāt have to worry about that! Donāt get into your own head and tell yourselfĀ āReal artists do XYZ, blah blah blah, etc.ā None of that is helpful. Use whatever is available to help you improve!
Now the question is what actually makes goodĀ reference pictures? Well, everyone uses something a little different. Some people use faces of famous actors, some people use stock photos, some people use other peopleās drawings that are specifically made for references!Ā
What do I do? I save every single photo I come across that inspires me into a folder. I have tons of folders labeledĀ āReference: Poseā orĀ āReference: Remusā orĀ āReference: Gayā. (That one is smut references. :3 )
I use blogs like @posereference and @fantasyartistreference, which I follow on here! Iāve gone through their content and saved photos that I think will inspire me in the future. Sometimes I donāt do anything with them. Sometimes I use them!Ā
I also take advantage of stock photos. That includes ones that adobe puts onto the internet as well as ones that other artists put! Senshi StockĀ on Deviant art is an excellent resource that has made a TON of photos available to artists to use for FREE!Ā
Google is also my friend! I like to google terms likeĀ āCouple Pose Referenceā orĀ āCouple Kissingā. If you include search terms likeĀ āpose referenceā you often find that you get things specifically created for artists to use to help with poses!
Look at all the helpful poses!Ā
Now, this leads us to my next point:
How to use reference images
Everyone does this part differently, too! Iām going to show a few different examples. Letās use this amazing reference sheet by @kibbi as our example!
Some people like to have their reference photo beside their drawing space, to use for them to look at, simply as a guide:
Some people like to have their pose reference in a layer beneath their actual drawing on a lower opacity so that they can trace right over it:
Often times, what you end up doing is using your traced sketch as your baseĀ for your drawing, with your actual drawing over top of it. Essentially, youāre using this time to identify what you DO like about the reference pose and what you DONāT like about it, and changing it!
See how different itās looking already? I put my own style over top of it, but I used the pose as a reference because I really liked it!
((EDIT: I JUST REALIZED THAT I GAVE SIRIUS THREE ARMS. I AM SO SORRY, GUYS!!!!))
Side by side comparison for the curious:
Eventually, a time will come where you can do simple poses like this without the use of a reference. Thatās amazing! You will be so proud of yourself! But if you still need to use references for complicated poses or foreshortening, remember not to beat yourself up about it. It is OKAY to use reference poses, and it is OKAY to take advantage of resources that are available to you! Just try to remember to cite your sources, just like we all did in school! :P
Practice Anatomy
Try doing things like figure drawing! Use sites like Quick PosesĀ to give yourself a timed figure drawing session, if youāre up for it! The more you practice bodies and anatomy, the better you will get at drawing them! Donāt focus too much on anything being perfect; remember to say loose and just aim for general shapes and general proportions.
This isnāt the greatest example, because I didnāt do any dynamic poses, but here are some rough figure sketches:
See how loose I was? See how little I cared about it looking nice? Thatās the best way to start a sketch! Just with loose scribbles!
The same thing can apply to faces:
Learn the rules, and then learn when to break them!
Just like writing, where you haveĀ ārulesā for writing an essay, in drawing, you have rules for anatomy! But⦠I donāt always love to follow those rules. Itās important to understand human anatomy (if you plan to draw humans), and then figure out where you want things to be exaggerated in order to create your own style! Hereās an example:
The same rules apply to musculature! Itās important to understand what muscles go where and how they move in order to properly draw them consistently! However! That is something a bit more complicated that we can go into another time! I donāt think that would be included in my simple break-down of drawing!
And⦠last but not leastā¦
Have fun!
Youād think this one would go without saying, but Iām going to specify it anyway. If you are NO LONGER enjoying drawing what youāre drawing, STOP. Donāt just draw humans because I told you to practice anatomy! If youāre not having fun, youāre going to grow to resent it, and we donāt want that! Draw whatever it is that you want! If you want to draw the same two men hugging over and over and over and over and over (Case in point: my entire blog), you do that! Ignore everything I said about knowing anatomy and about reference pictures and about anything! Just do exactly what makes you happy, nothing more and nothing less. Practicing should be fun, and the moment itās no longer fun, youāll begin to lose your passion. So⦠move on to something else thatās fun! Tired of drawing Wolfstar? (Pfff, thatās impossible, but okay). Move on to Drarry! Or to Linny! Or to a different fandom! Or to flowers! Or to still life! Or to whatever you think will bring back that spark!
Because thatās what drawing is all about. Itās just another form of expression and another way to have fun!
ANYWAY! I know this was SUPER long! I hope it was at least somewhat helpful! Iām not an expert, not by any means, but I enjoy doing this, and I am still working on improving! If anyone has any more questions, shoot me a message!












