It seems that I have no talent for drawing. However, I want to draw. For years, I have spent hours and hours, almost every day, to try to draw. I have grand stories that I want to bring to life, even if just for myself.

I have read hundreds of tutorials but none of them make any sense to me. I have watched video tutorials but they all go so fast even in slow motion and they don't explain why they do what they do in a way that makes sense to me.

I can see this perfect character in front of my eyes but when I try to draw it, it disappears. Next, I think what did it look like.... I think... he has a head. What does a head look like....... head.... head.... ?????.... I draw something, draw again again again until it looks something that might be head.

I spent over 48 hours on this one. It's not a "doodle" or sketch.



These two were originally the same character. Somehow they just turned different.



This one is much better than the others because it actually looks like a human.



Another really bad....



A bit better



Worse.... supposed to be the same as above



I am getting nowhere. I try try and try but never improve. Usually I won't make as "good" drawings as these. What should I do? How to improve? I practise practise practise and practise. Every now and then, I make something that is OK. However, I can never recreate them.

Hm, how old are you? And when did you first begin to draw?

Older than 20, younger than 25.

Small children always draw and there were many drawing classes in my schools. I don't remember exactly but I have been drawing seriously for.... 7-10 years.


Every time I succeed in drawing, the result is not what I tried to draw. Sometimes the mess just starts to look like something and then that becomes what I try to do.

Hmm....

• - First you need to draw lots of things from daily life, start by drawing simple things before you go into anatomy.
• - You need to understand that quick drawings will lead you nowhere, if you want to draw something that looks nice you need to be ready to spend several dedicated hours (even pros take many hours to draw their manga pages).
• - Build yourself a library with references for what you wanna draw (poses, techniques, examples...)
• - To start drawing anatomy you first will have to practice simple wired models that will allow you construct the poses, only after making the wired model you can actually start to draw the character based on it.
• - Get yourself some copies of "How to draw manga" volumes, they're quite inspiring and tech you a lot of stuff with drawings made by pros.
• - Also you need to tech your brain to remember the anatomy concepts, you need to look at a lot of anatomy poses, muscles, gravity, that way you will build a memory in your brain and the next time you will draw it correctly without even noticing
• - Draw a test story even if your drawings are not very good, it will allow you to practice and in the future you may come back to it for refinements
• - Try to draw digitally with a tablet and manga studio, you'll have much more undo options and you'll get less frustration

Do this as a regular hobby in your free time and in 1 year from now you'll be drawing much better

Spending more than 48 hours on a drawing that looks 100 times worse than most peoples 5 mins drawings is quick drawing? I never draw quick. One year I managed to draw only one drawing. Thats how long I spent on it and I'm not happy with it. I have no idea how to improve it. I need to be able to draw faster too. If it takes me 3 years to draw one manga box with 3 characters.....

Sometimes I can do better in 4 days than what I do in a year. Sometimes something just starts to look like something. I want to be able to draw what is in my mind before I start drawing, not just what the drawing starts to look like.

I have tried those "wired models" and stuff like that but they always go wrong too. After spending a full day and using lots of reference, I manage to do one. Next day I have to start all over again.
I can't use tablets/pens because of my hands.
I spent a month (many hours every day) to draw a test manga page. The page is white.
The first thing I want to do is to find a way to draw a person from direct front perspective. Then from side. But I can't replicate the same character anymore, even from the same angle.

I am desperate. If this keeps on, I will die before I can draw 20 pages of manga. Seriously. I even thought about drawing sketch manga pages and hiring someone to finish them but I couldn't even draw sketches that looked like anything.

Dude you need to work hard the basics...until you dominate them you cant simple jump like crazy and getting frustrated...


Sorry to ask but whats wrong with your hands?

I can't hold pens/pencils. Trying to forcefully hold one makes my hand shake and hurt a lot. After that, controlling my hand is hard for a while. I have talked to doctors and there is nothing that can be done, at least not in the near future.



How many years does it take to dominate the basics? Doing nothing but them means 200 failures, 1 success, 200 failures, 1 succes...... It's the same as with drawing stuff, except that when I draw stuff, those rare successes produce something. It just seems that no matter how much I watch anime and read manga, no matter how much I draw basics or full characters, I just can't learn. I will never give up but this is ridiculous.

Edit. Something was wrong with one of the pictures in the first post. I reuploaded it twice and now it works.

Not to say it's impossible to draw with less than perfect hands; but how the f*** are you drawing if holding a writing/drawing implement gives you aches/shakes/pains and what have you.

your hands having medical problems might be something to consider for your difficulty in drawing, not to say you seem to have other problems like by the sound of things you don't use guidelines ( those stickfigure things ( that is what you were talking about clafann1?) are over rated but you need some form of guidelines) your tendency to get way too frustrated and just general holes in your knowledge and understanding.

I draw with mouse. No big problems with that. Sometimes I can't draw a line the way I want but then I do it again or remove the part that is wrong and do that part again. The rest of your post is a bit confusing. Anyway, I have tried all kinds of guidelines and tutorials. I have read and tried stuff on this website and many others. I'm usually calm when writing but when I think about it later and the lack of results, I get frustrated.

Nowadays I usually start by drawing somekind of face and possibly adding hair. Then I draw stick figure body (with joints) that fits the head.Then I try to draw the body. If I somehow succeed in that, I draw clothes. If I manage to do even that, then I start adding details and fixing problems.

My best work so far is this: http://img836.imageshack.us/img836/5568/ycd.png

It's far from perfect but I wish that I could do at least that when I draw. Doing that took me 4 days. 1 day for head, then 1 day for body, 1 day for clothes and 1 day for finishing.

Doing this took me over a year: http://img834.imageshack.us/img834/808/test2rd.png
I can't find the finished version though but to get it to that state took me a year.

After those two, I have only finished two drawings, both took a couple of months to draw and their quality was much worse. I was working on them simultaneously

I can't do comp. drawing for shit, so I can't really help you there. I was going to say start drawing early, but it seems a little late for that. Only thing I can say is practice, practice, practice.

Do you have photoshop? If not, download the 30-day trial off of the Adobe website. Do your sketches the way that you are now (I'm assuming with a brush-like tool in whatever program you are using), but try using the pen tool for your final lines and your colors.

The secret to drawing is being able to understand. Simply put, if you can't draw something, then you don't understand it. No buts. That's the signal for you to take the initiative to understand it. Research. Learn. Apply. Otherwise, you're no different to someone lazy trying to perform good without prior knowledge.

In the end, even if you consult over 9000 tutorials and apply the bullshit it dictates but not even a percent of information from these you grasp then it is pointless. How do you expect to understand things by seeing through how other people understand it? Your efforts for taking things seriously are useless. I can't even call it taking it seriously. May I even ask how much about the musculature of the body you know =____= How serious could serious be for you?

In fact, the bulk of your problems are the typical set for people just starting out. If you can't go out of your comfort zone, you won't go anywhere else. Drawing is not an ability you can simply turn on and off because you want to. You work hard for it. You can't beg for it. You seize it.

I do work hard. I didn't just start. I have read about human anatomy. I can look at myself from mirror too. I got objects in my house. I keep trying to draw manga, objects and who knows what. I keep thinking for ways to make it possible. I can see things in my head but they disappear when I try to draw. It's like I lost my memories when I try to draw.

I have gone to many perspective drawing classes. I supposedly know how to draw rooms with different perspectives. But all that knowledge goes away when I try to draw. My imagination completely dies when I start drawing. All I can see in my head is words (long hair, eyes, nose, table, wall...) but not the meaning of them. They are just voices.

I can draw stuff in my head. I can see myself using the tools and the lines form up what I want them to do.

Read or looked at pictures of anatomy? Big difference. First one isn't too good for you.

Also, don't start with manga, start with the realistic shit.

So can everyone else (as I have found) the two aren't related.

What I suggest is to draw A TONNE of referenced pictures. Keep doing them A LOT and don't stop. Figure out where the lines go, where the shading goes, how bodies and faces look. Trace some if you have to. Once you get to know these things, your drawings will get better. Ref pics also give you ideas for clothes and other things, which is really helpful if your imagination isn't working for you. There is no shame in working with refs at first, and it can drastically change the way you draw.

Once you get to know body shapes and have a good sense of anatomy, start trying to draw things from your mind. Don't rush, and if it doesn't turn out good KEEP IT. The one thing I do is I keep all of my drawings so I can't see what went wrong if I decide to try drawing that thing again.

One of my favourite tutorial people is Mark Crilley on Youtube. Check out his videos if you haven't already.

Hope this helps, and try to draw at least once everyday. Practice is an artists best friend.