# Please help a complete beginner!



## LeonTheLucario (May 8, 2017)

Hello, I've been interested in this sort of stuff for a long time at this point, and have been recently looking into creating this art myself, but I feel overwhelmed and confused by where to start. I've been drawing with literally just a pencil, and an awful set of coloured pencil's that I had from when I was a kid somewhere for about a year at this point, and I don't think I'm particularly great, but Its been a start I guess.

Can someone help me out and point me to anything that can help me to get started, like software/hardware or anything else that can help because I'm quite desperate to start creating my own art but all I know to do at the moment is pencil and paper drawing, and nothing past this.

And a pre-thank you to anyone willing to give me some starter advise!


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## Calypso Mooncaller (May 8, 2017)

I've been wondering the same thing myself, but I never asked ><


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## LeonTheLucario (May 8, 2017)

Calypso Mooncaller said:


> I've been wondering the same thing myself, but I never asked ><



Ive been trying to decipher it myself, but most artists don't seem to want to take when you contact them directly. And searching around is just a mess of information that I cant seem to make sense of


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## WolfNightV4X1 (May 8, 2017)

I've been using pencil and paper for years. I actually moved on to mechanical pencil and paper.

It has nothing to do with the medium guys, it's the skills you have and how much you draw.

I've been keeping sketchbooks for years and drawing in them, seeing how my art has progressed over time.

Force yourself to try drawing new things. Force yourself to draw studies. Force yourself to practice important basic concepts of art.


If you absolutely wish to try other mediums, gimp/firealpaca/paint.net are great programs for digital art for free, you can scan a drawn picture and trace/color with a mouse. If you're willing to spend a minimum of $50 you can grab a cheap drawing tablet to do digital with a pen.

Edit: Here's one which is actually $30
Amazon.com: Huion H420 USB Graphics Drawing Tablet Board Kit: Computers & Accessories



Draw, draw, draw guys! Dont get discouraged by how good you are. Draw for fun.


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## LeonTheLucario (May 8, 2017)

Thanks for the advice, and useful links.

Ive just found finding help on the internet challenging because on a technical level I have absolutely no idea about physical/digital art. I don't know what to search to help me, I don't know what techniques to learn. Anything Ive learned to do so far is just from me practicing and finding a way to do something. (If this in quite nonsensical, its because like I said I have no knowledge, Ive just learned to do so far)


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## WolfNightV4X1 (May 9, 2017)

I started receiving formal training/teaching in art classes in middle/high school, if youre still a student I suggest taking those recreational electives if they offer ir. If not, I think they do offer clubs or classes you can take in the community (whether its at art stores like michaels or small businesses). These are cool because you receive a little in-person guidance and have new lessons each class.

Someone gave me this link long ago which is really really cool

www.ctrlpaint.com: Free Video Library

There's a section on drawing via traditional (physical, non-digital medium) which can really show you the basics for starting.

There's also a rundown on digital art on that as well, you probably wont be that good at first but that doesnt mean you cant take it and learn from a beginner standpoint.


There's also this one that I thought was cute (its less general but birbs!!!)


How to Draw Birds: Step by Step Instructions with Anatomical Details | Autodesk SketchBook


There's more tutorials out there,

rhe best practice is to draw from real life or images and there's really not much to say on that, but any general search on drawing tutorials for beginners might help.


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## LeonTheLucario (May 9, 2017)

Thanks for the links, Ill check them out properly when I've got some free time. Ive got exams next week so life has come to a halt at the moment.

And I've always been the type to self-teach, even being in university now I don't attend lectures and teach myself from outside sources most the time so classes probably wont be right for me, could always give them a go who knows.


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## KittenCozy (May 9, 2017)

WolfNightV4X1 definitely has the right idea. Their most important point is that (and I'm paraphrasing here) materials don't make the artist. You're doing just fine with pencil and paper. Once you get comfortable with that, then you can move into digital drawing. It takes a bit to get used to drawing on a tablet, but the mechanics are ultimately the same.

If you do want to go the digital route, definitely stick to the cheap/free stuff. Paint Tool Sai is the best program geared towards drawing (but it only works on PCs). Gimp is good for photo editing and covers anything PTS doesn't (it's basically the free version of Photoshop).

Hope this helps and good luck on your artist journey!


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## WolfNightV4X1 (May 9, 2017)

That's fine, Formal classes arent for everyone, but theyre not necessarily there to baby you, but mainly give you step-by-step lessons go learn by each day, youre not controlled by a teacher, it's mainly very useful because it gives you the space, time, tools, materials, etc. to just draw and do your thing. You're still teaching yourself within the methods each assignment wants and all that. 


If you do plan on being self taught you're going to have to understand over time where your resources are going to come from and what works for you. It's not easy to start from nowhere. That link I added is a great and thorough on its own so if you study deeply with that one it may be all you need until you find more content.

I know a guy who's an amazing artist his room looks like a mad conspiracy theorist. He has walls and walls of pegboard with tacked on digital art notes, traditional art styles, anatomical studies and references, and different things to improve and learn on. He literally dived deeply into study to get that good. So it all boils down to doing deep, deep research anywhere you can go, and just putting in the time and effort to practice no matter what.


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## LeonTheLucario (May 9, 2017)

I know what you mean, if it came off that way I wasn't looking for an instant work around, I just wanted some suggestions on where to go from where I am. Especially into the digital side, as I honestly had no idea where to begin, Ill stick to it and thanks for the help


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## LeonTheLucario (May 9, 2017)

I hear where youre coming from, might try classes or some form of course while I'm off over summer. Just bought myself a drawing tablet though, and Ill mess around with the programs you mentioned for a little while, see what I can do first, then decide on whether or not I want to look into classes


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## Butt_Ghost (May 9, 2017)

If you just put pencil to paper and start drawing, you've successfully started drawing. That's it. If you want to learn about techniques, using different mediums or whatever, the information is everywhere and not exactly hard to find online, but the main thing is that you need to start drawing and keep drawing, practicing and looking for ways to improve no matter how hard it seems. Putting the time and effort in is the most important part and even with guides and techniques, you need to get over the mechanical barrier* (being able to draw lots of lines, curves, circles etc. easily) before you'll really start seeing improvement. To do that you need to draw, a lot.
*It occurs to me that this is probably a gaming term but I don't have anything else to call it. Dexterity, maybe? You need to be comfortable drawing most shapes.

I, personally, started off drawing out of boredom and didn't really follow any specific guide to begin with. The first book about art I picked up was Anatomy for Fantasy Artists. It's extremely simplified, not all that helpful, but a lot of fun, and by being fun, it got me drawing frequently. There was also a guide specifically geared for starting Anthro art that was _excellent, _but the site for it is down and even though I found a mirror of it a while ago, I can't for the life of me find it now. It was the one hosted at http://hippie.nu/~unicorn/tut/xhtml/ if anyone knows where to find it.

Anyway, I haven't read much absolute beginner stuff so I can't attest to the quality of a few of the things I'm about to link, but they're all popular and widely recommended:

Keys to Drawing by Bert Dodson - Advice for absolute beginners. I haven't read this but it's widely recommended.

All of Andrew Loomis's art books for free online - Really good. FREE. Fun with a pencil is also widely recommended as a starting point for drawing.

Draw a box - Free lesson-based course for absolute beginners. Been popular online recently so probably worth checking out. I haven't used it.

Proko - Anatomy tutorials on Youtube. Pretty good.

The Anatomy issue of ImagineFX - I don't know if this is *supposed* to be free online, but the first result for "Imaginefx anatomy" on google is a .pdf of the whole damn thing so there you go. I have a paperback copy of this, it covers a lot of stuff but not in much detail. It's nice to have on-hand.

Edit:
I'd recommend sticking to pencil or really basic digital while starting off, learning to shade/render in greyscale before moving onto the tougher stuff. Since light makes up everything we see, learning to represent light and shadow is one of the most important parts. A regular 2B pencil (nothing expensive, just decent enough quality that it doesn't snap all the time) and cheap sketchpad is perfectly fine.

If you end up going digital, that ctrlpaint site linked earlier covers using a tablet pretty well, and you can apply all of the resources I've linked to digital art all the same. Though I'd say that the disconnect between the drawing surface and computer screen that you get with a conventional tablet is pretty weird, makes drawing feel awkward and might get in the way of really being able to focus on learning if you're just a beginner. Wouldn't personally recommend it, but it's still totally doable.


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## Zenoth (May 9, 2017)

Paint tool SAI is a pretty nice tool. And any tablet will work be it Huion or Wacom or another brand. You can find em for 20-80 dollars around Amazon.  Absolutely nothing wrong with paper and pencil either ^^.


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## Narri (May 9, 2017)

Personally I say just keep going at it, either way you are still making art, and that is what is important. Something I can recommend though is referencing, and drawing from life, be it a bowl of fruit or what have you. It helps you understand the way light effects an object and whatnot. (something I am struggling with currently) 
Looking up anatomy references of both humans and animals will help a ton
Getting drawing books can help as well (bought or found online)

 I can also offer a couple of helpful links
Online Classes by Skillshare | Start for Free Today - they have thousands upon thousands of video courses to choose from to help

www.youtube.com: Draw with Jazza - A personal favorite (however non furry) artist of mine. He creates a-lot of content from tutorials to challenges.





 - A bit of advice of what to draw when you dont know what to draw made by Jazza ^w^


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