Questions about the quality of drawing sessions

[A. K.]

Hello.
I'm new to art and was wondering if I'm heading in the right direction.
My ultimate goal is to draw characters.
I will first write what I draw every day, and then the points I don't understand and want an answer to.

- Page of atoms (circle and 4 ellipses in the main 4 directions inside)
- Page of (2 parallel lines + all variations of ellipses inside from circle to very narrow in the middle and then again to circle)
- Rotation of cube from imagination while maintaining proportions and convergence of the lines (30 min)
- Snakes made of wrapping lines (30 min)
- Gestures (45 min)
- Bent cylinders (25 min)
- Bent boxes (25 min)
- Twisted boxes (25 min)

1. Am I correct in understanding that one must first develop spatial thinking before taking on anatomy? (That's the reason I'm doing these exercises). Is there anything that needs to be added or removed from this list? Better/more interesting exercises maybe?

2.  Twisted boxes. So far they're the most confusing to me. Is there any point in looking for a reference for them? Or should I draw them from imagination right away? I can't find anything for a reference. I use plasticine for the bent ones.

3. Gestures. I first drew on a timer (60-120 sec) but didn't notice much result. I switched to thoughtful drawing with thinking about each line and the movement/fluidity. So, should I use timer or not?

4. Snakes. Сomes out rather unevenly and with a not very believable perspective. Continue to draw or try to draw rings purely to practice the distance between the half-elipses and the smoothness of their turns? I don't understand the sharp turns.

Sorry for my english.

[darktiste]

Q.2.  Twisted boxes. So far they're the most confusing to me. Is there any point in looking for a reference for them? Or should I draw them from imagination right away? I can't find anything for a reference. I use plasticine for the bent ones.

A.I recommend you look for semi naked male dancer or belly dancer for women because you want as much skin expose as possible.You can also search for contortionist but it less likely that they will be exposing enough skin to be useful for proper analysis.(You could at leaster stage study the cloth figure)But first it better to learn the underlaying structure (aka anatomy).

Q.3. Gestures. I first drew on a timer (60-120 sec) but didn't notice much result. I switched to thoughtful drawing with thinking about each line and the movement/fluidity. So, should I use timer or not?

Use a timer you are building muscle memory you will not see result right away.What you are doing is building an understanding of how to achieve more in less time will maintaining quality.Basically your building making better choose.But you need some form of accountability that is measure in how much you can achieve in that set amount of time.Dropping the clock is a reason to procrastinate and not to be thinkful so no i do not advise that.

Q.4.Snakes. Сomes out rather unevenly and with a not very believable perspective. Continue to draw or try to draw rings purely to practice the distance between the half-elipses and the smoothness of their turns? I don't understand the sharp turns.

Try to draw half pipe basically you do a curve cylinder and you place ellipse inside it.The key is to understand that when an object turn away from you there is a side of the ellipse that is closer to you and one that is further the one further converge toward the vanishing point which make them bunch up as the go further into distance will the close side is relatively near us so it does converge as much.

Where the ellipse bend the ellipse will bunch up because there is a shift in rotation of those ellipse. 

You should probably learn about foreshorting my explanation is very weak at best.

The key is to understand the view point and where the object point at.You should probably start copying those sheet and try to extrapolate what you learn into building basic scene with ellipse.

The image here only show pipe not half pipe which is a curve cylinder.

Also draw ellipse fully for better understanding

[A. K.]

Q.2.  Twisted boxes. So far they're the most confusing to me. Is there any point in looking for a reference for them? Or should I draw them from imagination right away? I can't find anything for a reference. I use plasticine for the bent ones.

A.I recommend you look for semi naked male dancer or belly dancer for women because you want as much skin expose as possible.You can also search for contortionist but it less likely that they will be exposing enough skin to be useful for proper analysis.(You could at leaster stage study the cloth figure)But first it better to learn the underlaying structure (aka anatomy).

Q.3. Gestures. I first drew on a timer (60-120 sec) but didn't notice much result. I switched to thoughtful drawing with thinking about each line and the movement/fluidity. So, should I use timer or not?

Use a timer you are building muscle memory you will not see result right away.What you are doing is building an understanding of how to achieve more in less time will maintaining quality.Basically your building making better choose.But you need some form of accountability that is measure in how much you can achieve in that set amount of time.Dropping the clock is a reason to procrastinate and not to be thinkful so no i do not advise that.

Q.4.Snakes. Сomes out rather unevenly and with a not very believable perspective. Continue to draw or try to draw rings purely to practice the distance between the half-elipses and the smoothness of their turns? I don't understand the sharp turns.

Try to draw half pipe basically you do a curve cylinder and you place ellipse inside it.The key is to understand that when an object turn away from you there is a side of the ellipse that is closer to you and one that is further the one further converge toward the vanishing point which make them bunch up as the go further into distance will the close side is relatively near us so it does converge as much.

Where the ellipse bend the ellipse will bunch up because there is a shift in rotation of those ellipse. 

You should probably learn about foreshorting my explanation is very weak at best.

The key is to understand the view point and where the object point at.You should probably start copying those sheet and try to extrapolate what you learn into building basic scene with ellipse.

The image here only show pipe not half pipe which is a curve cylinder.

Also draw ellipse fully for better understanding

Thank you very much for explanation. One last thing:
"(You could at leaster stage study the cloth figure)But first it better to learn the underlaying structure (aka anatomy)."
I'm not quite sure what you mean by that. You mean the actual cloth figure or clothed models?

[darktiste]

By stage study i mean to create a challenge(study) for yourself by deciding what kind type of cloth you are trying to emulate.

From experience having done some nude study class before  you would not deal with clothed figure as first subject so from that i can pretty safely say that logical progression is learning the anatomy of the naked figure first.

You can learn the basic of cloth using basic drapery study you dont need a human figure to learn the principle but you will want to later make study of clothed figure regardless but for simplicity sake you do not need to complicate thing by mixing to many complex subject.You will always have time to bring all your fundamental together or to combining some fundamental as you see fit but when learning you gotta ease yourself into new subject matter if you want to be able to see yourself progress and not stagnant but you need to apply what you learn and that can be hard when you need to shift between analytic study and application because study is copying when you dont understand how to dissect a fundamental you need to make the distinction betweeen copying and understanding if you dont you are a slave to the reference and you cant make the jump into assembling image because you see thing as unit rather then as building block.

Enough with thing advance concept it only going to confuse you.

The human anatomy is a complex subject matter and long subject matter to master by itself.

Observing dissecting recomposing reinterpreting combining that the analytic way to learn to draw.

[A. K.]

By stage study i mean to create a challenge(study) for yourself by deciding what kind type of cloth you are trying to emulate.

From experience having done some nude study class before  you would not deal with clothed figure as first subject so from that i can pretty safely say that logical progression is learning the anatomy of the naked figure first.

You can learn the basic of cloth using basic drapery study you dont need a human figure to learn the principle but you will want to later make study of clothed figure regardless but for simplicity sake you do not need to complicate thing by mixing to many complex subject.You will always have time to bring all your fundamental together or to combining some fundamental as you see fit but when learning you gotta ease yourself into new subject matter if you want to be able to see yourself progress and not stagnant but you need to apply what you learn and that can be hard when you need to shift between analytic study and application because study is copying when you dont understand how to dissect a fundamental you need to make the distinction betweeen copying and understanding if you dont you are a slave to the reference and you cant make the jump into assembling image because you see thing as unit rather then as building block.

Enough with thing advance concept it only going to confuse you.

The human anatomy is a complex subject matter and long subject matter to master by itself.

Observing dissecting recomposing reinterpreting combining that the analytic way to learn to draw.

Okay, I get it now. Thank you again.