Art Journal

A sketch of a random character I came up with. I actually did a couple more rough sketches before
this. They didn't look like this character at all, and they were all aborted mid-drawing.

With how much time and difficulty it took for me to finally end up with a sketch that I was kind of
satisfied with, the lack of practice I've had with drawing in recent months really dawned on me. I want
to start learning to draw from scratch, I think I really need to in order to be satisfied with my drawings,
and continue art as a proper hobby of mine.

I got a drawing practice book! It's an online PDF version of "Drwaing for the Absolute and
Utter Beginner" by Claire Watson Garcia. I went through a couple of pages, skipped few
that didn't seem too necessary, and started from page 38.

You can barely see my writing at the top there. Basically, the pages I went through covered lines,
circles, ellipses, plumblines/levels, cylinders, bowls, and finally, an underdrawing practice.
I'm feeling pretty confident with all these basics so far, but I think I'll probably practice all of these
again very quickly tomorrow, before proceeding with the next exercises in the book. I've noticed that my
vertical lines tend to drift left as I draw them from top to bottom, which is a bit annoying. I'm trying
to stay conscious of this as I draw ever since I noticed it, but it's still difficult to fix :/

For the underdrawing I used a candle I have as a reference! The book drew a bottle, but I thought it'd
be more interesting to use a reference of my own. I've attached the picture of the candle alongside the artwork.
The top of the candle is a bit more elongated in my drawing. I'm assuming this is because I changed the angle
from which I was viewing the subject mid-drawing, and didn't really account for it. I'll be more careful of that
next time (hopefully I remember to).

I was thinking my speed with drawing sketches could use some work, and it just occurred to me that I
should probably time my drawing practices in the future...I've gotten too used to the convenience of
Procreate doing it for me.

Continuing some basic practice from yesterday! The first picture is a warmup of the lines and shapes I practiced
last night. The second page is me going through Day 1 of "How to Draw for Beginners: The Easiest 15-Day Drawing Method
Course" by Amelia Khouri. I was thinking of continuing to use the book from yesterday, but I wanted to explore
my options a bit, and try find one that best suits my current skillset. I still want to return to the previous book, maybe
tomorrow, since it seems to cover a lot of fundamentals, but swithcing things up keeps things interesting for me :)

Anyways! Some reflection for today's practice. So the drawing book told me to first draw an eye, a house, a flower, a face,
and an animal of my choice (a very scrappy-looking pallas cat). I didn't really use a reference for any of them but the cat. I've
attached its image as well. Then the drawing book showed how to draw an eye properly, and introduced some fun, simple, cartoon
styles. Drawing the eye following the instructions, I realized just how little contrast and shading I use in my drawing.
Even when I do use them, they're often very faint and indiscernable. I guess it's okay for stylized art styles? But to build
basic drawing skills and fundamentals, I should probably get into a better habit of using darker and more intentional contrasts.

Made an oc/fursona? Name's Myul, inspired by a weasle. My friend encouraged me to make one so we can draw a cutesy art of both
our characters together. I made the sketch on the 26th, and decided to try trace and colour it in on Procreate today (stayed up
way too late doing this lol).
Not quite done with the digital yet, but I'm pretty satisfied with how the original sketch turned out, and the fur rendering.
I tried to make a Deltarune fanart a few months ago and I gave up halfway through because I couldn't figure out how to render Ralsei's
fur for the life of me, but maybe I'll give it a second attempt?
I've attached all the drawings I've mentioned and the reference I used above :)