Form Before Detail

Form Before Detail.

Form Before Detail.

Form Before Detail!

These are the 3 most important words in basic drawing. Paint it in big letters on the wall of your studio right above your drawing table so you don't forget. 

 Everything has form... buildings, doorways, figures, trees, the leaves on the trees, the forms the leaves on the trees make when all bunched together, each section of the human finger, a piece of paper, the computer screen your reading this on... everything has form and getting the forms right on a drawing in the first place is the key to making your art so much better and much more interesting to look at.

 It's simple, lightly layout all your basic forms first. It's easier to see your basic layout and easier to erase and redraw simple light shapes plus you don't tear up / damage your drawing surface as much. It helps take away the confusion in getting the human figure into correct perspective and easier to see what looks wrong. Forced perspective becomes less of an issue. Get the forms right first, then you can spend the rest of your day adding details. 

 Here's an example, a very kind artist let me use for this, that shows  some of what I'm talking about. We have a pretty good Colossus card with laser blasts and actual backgrounds you can see and understand. There's an action pose and it's colored pretty well. But, with better form work before hand, this would have been an even better card. More and more practice on the human figure will obviously make you better at drawing it, but learning the basic forms, how they interact with each other, and putting them in perspective will get you there quicker. 

(I've used red pencil on the forms to make it so the forms and the perspective that they're in stand out more) Other than tweaking the first drawing to get the anatomy closer (especially that arm coming at the carmera), I've suggested an alternative pose that would add more movement to the piece and up the action. Another suggestion is to get that tenticle more involved in the picture. Get the forms in more dramatic forced perspective and have it popping out of the card and wrapping around and interacting with Colossus instead of being just a flat object in the background. 

Take the time, learn the art of drawing basic forms for everything and you will see a vast improvement in your art. 

Later

WM