Krameflow is bad at sketching

Sooo i am starting this thread because I am terrible at sketching and i wanted to just post to get some tips and help. Honestly i didnt want to post anything but everyone says that its good to post, plus you guys can keep me accountable so i don’t become lazy. So a little about myself. I am currently on my first semester in junior college planning on transferring to CSULB to major in Industrial design. I haven’t taken any art classes in my life so to help me I’ve been watching some youtube videos and getting some books on sketching. Right now I’m in the very beginning of my journey so bear with me as my sketches will be terrible lol.

here are my bad drawings lol

Ive been using some of pensols shoe templates to get a sense of the shape of shoes

lemme just throw this in to show how bad i am at drawing cars :mrgreen:

Hey krameflow!

Congrats on deciding to major in ID, that’s really exciting!! It’s great that you are interested posting your sketches and improving. I totally understand where you’re coming from about being nervous about posting your first sketches but don’t worry, everyone has to start somewhere. Along this journey it’s important to track your progress here, especially when things don’t come out they way you want them to. Being able to scroll through your first posts see where you started really helps keep the motivation up when you’re struggling on something down the road!

Since I’m still very much a learner in this area, I’m going to reserve all drawing comments to the pros of Core77.

You’re doing all the right things by looking at youtube tutorials and and picking up a few books (great collection so far btw :wink: ). Having all of those books, I would say stick to ‘How to Draw’ to use as your core learning text, especially in the beginning. Scott Robertson has some great lessons on straight lines and ellipses that you should start with. Buy a stack of computer paper and work on your straight lines and ellipses following his exercises and just do as many sheets as you can every day. If you run out of exercises don’t be afraid to make up your own and have fun with it! This will help to build up your muscle memory. Don’t feel like you only need to do the basics though, sketching more advanced things like cars, shoes, and others will be fun and you’ll learn things by just sketching them! Just make sure to dedicate a good amount of time to learning the basics.

The other two books are much less technical and give you more of a taste of the bigger picture of design sketching as a communication tool. They cover lots of topics and don’t go into as much depth but they are really fun to read!

I’m really wishing you all the best and can’t wait to see you progress! Have fun!
gmay3

Thanks!! Really means a lot!!

Off to a good start !!

I would second everything said above. The “Drawing Ideas” book is one I just read last week and had a huge impact on the way I sketch, but I don’t think I would’ve digested all the information when I was just starting out.

Practicing primitive shapes, both in 2D and in perspective, will be a big help. I still sketch a page full of circles if it’s been a couple days between sketches.

For quick improvement I’d suggest doing an overlay of your shoe sketch, without the “fuzzy” lines. Use long and overlapping strokes, rely on pen pressure to get different line weights.

Cars are tough - there are so many compound curves and volumes that it’s hard to convey it all cohesively. Try making a rough car shape out of primitives (cube, rectangles, cylinders) to get the proportions right.

Good luck!!

Was waiting to see when you were gonna finally post! Good job :slight_smile:

Based on the car sketch, the first thing you should definitely study is perspective. Practice drawing cubes and rectangular prisms of various sizes and in various views. Let’s get your perspective down first.

Some key words to look up in your books or online “how to set up perspective guides” / “1,2,3 point perspective” / “cone of vision” / " horizon line, eye level" etc… it looks like you already have a couple books… Im sure you can find and lear the basics in the first chapter or two. Foundation is KEY! Get that down and it’ll be smoother sailing for you.

You are off to a good start. You just need to practice a few more hundred times, and you’ll be in a good place :wink:

As sketchstone mentioned, the fundamentals are very important. Practice lots of cubes, basic forms, straight lines and ellipses. After lots of practice, you’ll start to develop an eye for perspective.

In addition to that, collect reference. Collect sketches that you think have a nice style. Even copy that sketch line for line. You’ll understand what that designer is thinking.

Thanks guys for all your tips gunna be posting again soon. Really means a lot!!! Thanks

Hey Krameflow - getting better at sketching will be a long struggle. It’s well worth the effort though!

My personal suggestion would be to not even think about sketching any type of real product until you’ve done (literally) hundreds of pages filled with straight lines, ellipses, and planes in perspective. From there I would move onto sketching different proportion cubes in a range of perspectives. Once you feel comfortable with all of this then you can move onto tackling actual products. You could easily spend a month or two doing this daily before moving onto products.

So this is what I’ve been doing for the last couple days. A few pages of these every day. Ive also been trying to do perspective boxes but theyr still shaky so ill post some after i feel confident in my straight lines :smiley: Just trying to take this one step at a time. Thanks for all the support!!! :mrgreen:

Uhhh… what the heck…is this? Seems like a big waste of time unless I’m missing something… What are you trying to accomplish in that sketch?

It looks like an exercise in which you place a dot and try to hit it with a straight line. Its a great way to practice arm control. Don’t be afraid to evolve this into boxes.

lol yah its supposed to practice control. lol I’ve been practicing perspective boxes so ill post them next. lol

Oh icic, in that case cool! lol. But Krameflow, maybe it would be a good idea to have a description of what you post next time. :wink:

oh quick question i was thinking of squeezing a beginner drawing class (drawing 1) in my schedule sometime before transferring. It isn’t in my major requirements but do you guys think it’ll help me?. I was planning on taking 2d design next semester and 3d design the next, will that be enough or should i take this drawing 1 class also.

Your straight line exercises are looking good krameflow! Keep it up!

@krameflow… if you’ve never taken a beginning drawing class i would highly recommend you take it… the biggest mistake you can make is to skip the foundational classes because u think it might be too easy for you. With a weak foundation, you will hit a road block very soon and you might have a hard time figuring out why. If you do sign up though take it seriously even if it is easy for you. I would definitely say try to challenge yourself so you still get something out of the easy assignments.

cool thanks for the advice ill prob take it :smiley: