Looking to improve

On Yo’s recommendations.

I enjoyed this sketch much more than the others and seemed to worry less about making mistakes, or things exactly right.

Will probably stick to the camera theme for a few more…

Thanks again Yo :slight_smile:

There you go, much better!

It is good to stick with a theme and explore within it for a bit. It forces you to build on your last sketch. I bet if you did 25 cameras in one week you would see a massive difference.

That last one looks much more fluid and fun! The very first one was a good sketch, but I wouldn’t worry so much about the shadows being a bit off (I hadn’t noticed until I read it!). I think bringing in some stronger grays into the contours would do a lot to make the cameras curved form pop from the page.

I personally find that a sketch that is too absolutely precise and accurate loses its ability to communicate well. It’s somehow much harder to look at ultra precise ideation sketches than loose ones for me.

Thanks for the replies guys.

I tried a sketch of a canon but realised that the telescopic cylinder and lens is letting the overall sketch down. So i decided to practice this part on its own. Will do some more.



Those metal cylinders are starting to look pretty good! Especially the ones toward the bottom of the middle image. I always have a really hard time with chrome and glossy materials.

Yea it takes some practise i guess. The more reflective the material the more streaks that occur I think…

Messed up the dial at the top but overall ok i think… Next, own design.

getting there. try to get looser with he lifework. Longer, lines. I can see you starting and stoping in the line work.

Hey Michael. I’m finding making clean swift lines on the cylinders almost impossible… But i’ll keep practising. Another thing if i get a line wrong then it screws up the whole sketch LOL. I guess that’s what underlays are for…

I did this before reading your last post… (own design)

It takes a lot of practice. don’t beat yourself up, just keep at it. Notice in my sketch it wasn’t perfect, and I took a few passes at it.

It looks like you don’t quite nail down a concept before jumping to markers, which aren’t as forgiving as a pen/pencil.
It’s easy to keep adding to one sketch, but sometimes its good to get those first ideas down then grab a new piece of paper and overlay w/ clean lines.
I’d say throw a bunch of quick sketches down refining a concept working on proportion (orthographic views help w/ layout/proportions) then jump back into perspective/markers… my two cents. keep it up tho and don’t forget to stay loose!!!

You might be right. I think for my next few I am just going to keep to linework and try and nail getting the lines clean.

Hi there,

You are getting really good advice here, and I agree with all of the above.
Your first sketch wasn’t bad at all, it needed a bit more contrast, looseness in shading strokes, a softer drop shadow and overall a more expressive feel.
What I mainly see is that you are trying to get those ellipses too perfect while as you can see in yo’s sketch, even if the ellipses aren’t perfectly drawn, the overall sketch gets a much better character if you let your hand flow with the lines. Work from the shoulder, it will help you get better ellipses. You can also see how fluid strokes on the outlines that continue past the perimeter of the sketch, and some overall effect and perspective help a sketch come alive.

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Thanks for the input guys it helps.

Decided to concentrate on line work for now and get that clean before i try to use markers again…

1st one


These photos seem to bring out every blemish that i can’t see on the paper lol

That last one is getting much looser. Very nice. You are getting there. Keep pushing through!

These are getting much better! Have you tried overlaying the same sketch over and over until you’re happy with the linework style you’re getting? It’s tedious but I find it helps with actually drawing the line where you want it to be.

Thanks for encouragement guys.

I have been using overlays but with copier paper for the last few - hard to see through.

Latest… Lines a bit messy on this i think but was tired.