/ic/ - Artwork/Critique

I drew fairly regularly from around kindergarten to the end of high school. In middle school I got into my school's magnet art program and did art assignments for three years, plus stuff outside of class. Fundamentals weren't emphasized (I mean, it was middle school), but it was valuable in the sense that I had some guidance from a teacher and being around other student artists encouraged me to keep drawing.

By college, though, I all but stop drawing. Since first grade I had always wanted to do something art-related, first an architect (thought it would allow me to draw and make money), later I wanted to get into animation. But I got a pretty clear message that you'll starve doing art, so I didn't study anything art-related and stopped drawing for 8 years, besides some notebook doodling. Plus, I thought I just didn't have much talent for it--my stuff was mediocre while some people my age or younger were doing amazing stuff.

Then, March of this year, I discovered /ic/ and learned you can actually improve at drawing, same as with anything else. I fell in love with it again and drew every day, though not always as much as I'd like. Didn't have much patience for Loomis, but I did learn what he teaches from other sources.

I mostly draw people, but my problem lately is that I've hit this wall where I can draw the figure in more complex poses and angles with photo ref, but I struggle to make them convincing from imagination. So I'm trying to draw more from life and internalize gesture and basic bodily shapes in tougher perspective rather than just photocopy.

Here's some recent stuff I don't currently hate, and some stuff from April for comparison. Middle is photo-reffed, right is imagination (see, an easy straight-on pose). I'm still not close to where I want to be but I think I can get there. The best thing I did is to draw from life--particularly lots of my own right hand. If you can draw a good hand, you can draw any body part, just a matter of internalizing it.