A Life in Lines: Exploring My Drawing Styles and Sketches
Sketching, drawing, and doodling have basically been my shadow since I was a kid. I was that student doodling in the margins of every notebook during class. Miraculously, I never got in trouble for it! I even remember being allowed to draw all over a wall in our apartment during a remodel. It felt like total freedom.
These days, I try to keep that energy alive. I make it a priority to hit up life drawing sessions every week. There is something so raw and exciting about capturing rough gestures from a live model in just a few minutes. But I also love cozying up at home to work on more detailed pieces. Whether I am sketching portraits, inventing fantasy characters, or jumping into the latest online art challenges, my sketchbook is rarely closed.
This section of the blog is a giant umbrella for all those scribbles and masterpieces. It is where I share my drawing styles, from the messy 30-second gestures to the polished character designs. I hope you enjoy browsing through my visual diary as much as I enjoyed creating it!
Drawings
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Standing figure, charcoal drawing
I’m back to newsprint! So far it’s my favorite practice paper. This drawing took me about 20 minutes. I think the shading and hatching shows that it’s a longer pose. However, whenever I’m drawing, I always think that I’ll finish it later.. and usually never do ^^;
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Waiting, charcoal drawing
Once again, there’s a certain scene lined up here. I call it “waiting.’ For what? That’s a secret ^_~
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Two figures, charcoal drawing
This model did very dynamic poses, and I really enjoyed capturing them. I think, my drawings really lack that dynamic feel in a lot of cases. Something to work on!
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Two standing figures, charcoal drawing
The pose on the left looked pretty dynamic to begin with, but then I decided to add that braid! What a difference *_* Really love how the movement got captured in this one.
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Leaning figure, charcoal drawing
I always feel like the stool looks out of place in my drawings. Perhaps I need to work in the horizon line or define the flat area on the floor to ground both the figure and the stool? 🤔
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Sitting male figure, charcoal drawing
This is a 20-minute drawing, and I think I got the shoulders right in here.
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Standing male figure, charcoal drawing
I think I really need to work on shoulder girdle, it seems to always turn out way too small. This is a 10-minute drawing, but all of the basic structure mistakes are already set in place 😂
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Sitting half-figure, charcoal drawing
Sometimes, the whole pose isn’t working from that particular angle. Therefore, it’s okay to draw only a part of the figure. For example, sometimes I can’t see the model’s feet because the heater or something else is in the way, and it really throws off the whole figure. It’s still hard for me to put
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Male figure, charcoal drawing
I think I finally got into the habit of dating my drawings 😀 It might seem silly, but after a while I can’t tell when I drew each artwork. As the result, it’s tough to understand whether I’m making any progress.
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Male figure, gesture drawing
Back to the gesture drawings, I really like when drawing sessions start with a series of quick 1-minute standing poses. It’ a great warm-up exercise, helps one get into the drawing mood for the rest of the session.
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Sitting figure, charcoal drawing
Spent about 20 minutes on this drawing. I think if I added a few highlights, this figure would really pop. Seeing and analyzing my work like this is actually really helpful. When I’m drawing, I’m not noticing the mistakes because I stare at the drawing for so long and just get used to it. However,
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Reclining figure, charcoal drawing
Here, I concentrated way too much on the things surrounding the model, and had not enough time to work on the actual figure. However, I do like those pillows xD