i second that. yeah, there may be times where you don’t do this before you start sketching, but make an effort to work on these simple exercises. over the summer during co-op, there wasn’t much going on, especially in the morning, so i made an effort to spend an hour to an hour and a half (time permitting) to fill pages with lines, circles, elipses, and other sketching exercises.
you would be suprised how something so simple can dramatically improve your sketching abilities. once you feel comfortable in your sketching skills, you put less focus on drawing the perfect ellipse, and more time on the idea and design…the sketching will start to flow with a lot less effort.