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Hello! I’ve been subscribed to NMA for about a year now. I’ve been working through the Linear Perspective course and now also going through the Beginner’s course.
I’m considering signing up for Level 4 coaching next month. I feel stuck in my development at the moment. I’ve been drawing ellipses and boxes and cylinders and trying to get my brain to comprehend a 3D space.
My goal is to be able to draw comics with lots of spaceships, vehicles and sci-fi environments.
I am striving to be more disciplined in my practice and am hoping that having coaching will help me stay consistent in making progress. I love drawing but I feel like I mostly scribble and doodle. I often find it difficult to stay focused on drawing exercises, like spending hours drawing a portrait or a figure, because I am always eager to get to drawing sci-fi stuff, but my drawing is terribly hindered because of it. This is also why I’m hoping a coach will help. I fear if left to myself I’ll just scribble and never improve.
Does anyone have any advice for how to get the most out of coaching? How to prepare or what kind of portfolio to put together over the next month to show where I’m at?
Anyways, I am hoping to interact here much more! Especially since we’re all stuck inside.
Hi Cassandra and welcome 🙂
I think you picked the perfect courses to start off with, especially with your artistic goals and direction. I really admire comic artists and sci-fi is awesome. I draw cubes and cylinders too, I think it’s important to do so frequently. I move them in a lot in different ways in space to practice viewpoints, foreshortening, el vs. hl, overlapping and depth, and generally as a way to train my mind to see the 2D picture plane as one to work in 3D.
I think taking on some coaching is a fantastic idea. It will be very valuable and excel your learning. I myself would like to get some coaching soon. Have you seen the new video critiques NMA has on their youtube channel? If you haven’t, you should check them out. It’ll give you a good insight as to how instructors do their vid critiques.
As for getting the best out of it, I think you should devote as much time as possible – you can never get enough practice in. Set up a daily and weekly timetable to give you clear structure and direction. Allow room for error in timetabling i.e. if a project takes longer than you anticipated, something in your personal life comes up etc, so that you have a bit of flexibility. But try to not have it be too flexible. Do your lessons – watch the lectures, write notes and draw along, draw what you learned separately, do the assignments, get your critique and apply it whilst it’s fresh. Do all the things you need to, but allocate yourself some time to doodle, make thumbnails, draw from imagination, draw things that interest you. Given you love sci-fi, you could do some of your personal studies with sci-fi related imagery, e.g. if you need to draw a portrait, maybe do one of a actor/actress in a sci-fi film. I think it is important to do things that remind you the kind of artist you want to be, and to help develop your artistic voice. But the main focus should be on technical mastery – that is ultimately what will best help you express yourself.
I’m not too sure when it comes to putting together a portfolio, sorry. Maybe someone else will give advice for this.
Keep us updated with how it all goes!
Stay safe and keep drawing 🙂
Hi Josseline! Thanks for the welcome!
Yes, I’ve been watching the critique videos. They are incredibly useful and are making me eager to sign up for coaching. I am amazed by how much the master artists see that beginners don’t.
That’s some great advice! I am working on getting my schedule together and being more disciplined to devote as much time as I can to my art.
What courses are you taking/have taken here at NMA? What are your goals as an artist? I see you posting in critiques and I hope to interact with you more!
Very nice to meet you!
Yes I feel the same way! I find it difficult to critique my own work, but seeing people engaging and providing it here, along with the video critiques by the instructors, is helping me to get better at doing so.
Same here 🙂 I’m fortunate that I am in a situation right now that permits me to devote a huge chunk of my day to learning and practicing my art. It is currently a matter of building up the capacity and endurance to use all that time.
So I’ve taken :
* Head drawing for beginners course – it is excellent! I came in not being able to draw a head at all, to being able to draw one with a solid foundational understanding and ohk- good competence in my drawing abilities 🙂 There’s a heavy focus on construction which is the fundamental important part of drawing a head. They have a number of different instructors which I found great to learn different yet interrelated approaches. I really enjoyed the Reilly section, particularly learning to understand the head in three different layers – bone, muscle, skin. It helped me to better see what all the bits and pieces of what you see in a face actually signify and are. Really helped support all that I learned throughout the course on construction. Having said that, I enjoyed all the sections.
*Colour Bootcamp course – one of my favourites so far! Colour is one of my main loves, so I knew I had to take this course early on, especially given I do a fair bit of painting, so I wanted to learn about colour theory to be able to improve my use of it. It is so so good, and the section towards the end is challenging but an incredibly valuable learning tool: you have to do 20 30min colour sketches working on elements you learn in the course – Hue, saturation, colour temperature and complimentary colours. That section REALLY pushed me, but I have a much better working ability with all of them when I paint.
*John Asaro approach to painting – I learned how to create better gesture in the figure, including the arms and the legs, and how to not make them look stiff. I learned how to push hue, saturation, and colour temperature further than what is given in a reference, which I liked a lot, given my love for colour. I followed along with the painting he did and came out with something I quite like 🙂
* The Spirit of the Pose- it’s a course I’m currently taking as I want to learn how to draw the figure. Love his approach to learning gesture. He teaches you to develop a self-correcting system for figure drawing so that you can be able to better see what aspect of your drawing you need to work on. I’m enjoying this a lot.
*Contemporary Realism in Oils – this course I’ve only watched, not painted along with, but gosh it was such a joy to watch. I adore Hollis Dunlap’s work, so I was thrilled to see he did a course for NMA! I learned a lot about how to build a painting up in layers, which I struggle with a lot. I just do things in one pass, but find my paintings look flat. Part of it is needing to improve my values, but another was what he teaches you – going from broader to more specific. And such a valuable lesson – that you correct a lot as you go along and not to fear that. You get to see how much he corrects his paintings, changes things, a lot. You see him struggle in parts, which is so reassuring. I want to sometime paint, using his approach, using the photo reference of the live models he worked with.
*Russian Academic Approach to Drawing – I started this one at the beginning of the year, but left it aside because I wanted to focus on painting again, as it gives me a creative boost and inspiration, as I was feeling burned out pushing myself quite hard last year. I am going to get back into it this week, as I really need to improve my drawing. I like the constructive approach with Russian drawing, as I find that only working through sight and observation didn’t serve me enough to see objects more conceptually.
I am a painter at heart, so all my artistic education has the underlying goal of making me a better painter. For subject matter I’m not sure yet what I want to focus on for my painting career. I have a number of conceptual ideas. I’m always writing things down that come into my mind for possible future development. I am working to develop my artistic voice and style, but allowing it to emerge organically rather than pushing it. My interests are VERY varied so I find it hard to focus in on any one. Doing some old master studies has made me see that I would love to focus heavily on composition in my paintings. I’ve painted master studies, still lifes, portraits, lanscapes, figures. Still in extremely early stages but the more I paint the more I realise that painting is a part of who I am. So glad to have discovered it, even if a bit later in my life compared to others.
Oh btw, I too like Sci-Fi! I’ve read a number of sci-fi novels, including Isaac Asimov’s Foundation series – which is great! Have you read The Three Bodied Problem? It leans a bit more on the harder science side, but the story is SO captivating. Do recommend. I played a few sci-fi games when I was younger – Mass effect series (though I cannot get myself through Andromeda), Halo, Doom. Movies – too many to name. Surely Terminator: Judgement day is on everyone’s favourite movies of all time list.
I hope so too and nice to meet you as well 🙂
Wow, you’ve taken a lot of classes!
I am in the same situation where I am lucky enough to be in a situation where I can devote as much time as possible to my art. I am working on building up endurance and discipline to get more practice out of each day.
I have read the Three Body Problem! I loved it! I’m on the second book, The Dark Forest now. But yeah usually I’m into more Star Wars stuff, and even Marvel (I’m so mainstream right now lol — damn you Disney!) For some strange reason I am really into Spider-Man right now. Not what I thought I’d normally be into but I love it. I love all the dynamic poses and how Peter is always trying so hard to do the right thing but is often perceived as a menace.
Sometimes I wish I played video games, but I fear that if I did I would never truly improve my art skills. Video games are so amazing these days with incredibly complex storytelling. It’s quite impressive.
I did four or so over 3 months so I powered through them. But I’ve slowed my pace this year… too much. Back to it! Yeah likewise, I’m hoping to be able to do 5 soild 8 hour days, something I’m not accustomed to.
It’s so good right! I read Dark Forest too, and 2/3 through Death’s End. I haven’t picked it up in about a year though, so I’d have to reread it. Nothing wrong with Marvel at all! I think it’s great to have a very wide range of interests, gives you more places to draw ideas, lessons and inspirations from.
I hardly play now, especially in the past 6-8 years or so being quite busy with adulting, haha. Oh and yes, video games are a form of art that aren’t appreciated as much outside of the gaming community as much as they should be.
I’m thinking of making a forum where we can out together suggested learning paths for people depending on their goals with feedback from the community. Think that would be helpful?
@JoshuaJacobo I think that would be very useful and helpful to current and future NMA students. It’s easy to get swept away here at all the sheer volume of content. I’m sure most would appreciate even the slightest bit of suggestions to help them direct their learning better.
@joshuajacobo that forum would be so helpful! I’m just reading through the advice from Josseline, “Set up a daily and weekly timetable to give you clear structure and direction. Allow room for error in timetabling”
What is your daily and weekly timetable look like?
I try to sketch for an hour everyday after work, but I missed my sketching time the past few days due to work, I sometimes feel like when I break off a good streak, it takes alot more motivation to get back into the routine again.
It’s been a struggle trying to complete the A Beginner’s Guide to Drawing lesson for me..
@joshuajacobo I think that would be a great idea too!
I am struggling with getting into a solid learning routine as well. And I wish I could take every single course! But of course, have to start with one and go from there. It is hard too figuring out what I should do, vs what I feel inclined. Like should I spend more time on rendering, when I am more inclined towards gesture drawing?
@josselinejeria I find your advice very helpful too. I am going to try and post more on here.
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