Trudging forward

So I decided to check out Andrew Loomis's "Figure Drawing for all Its Worth" and it is a riveting guide and read.  This man is a wizard.  He completely deconstructs the human figure down to its mannequin and rebuilds it, from tissues to bones to skin.  Definitely an intense book, and much like perusing an Elder Scroll, one must take cautious steps not to go through it too fast lest their brains explode from the overabundance of information.

Saturday and Sunday I tried to make the arms a bit longer and add more animation to the figures.  I'm also experimenting with Loomis's style of making a mannequin.

My new goal is to not only be consistent but increase the amount I draw each session.  So I'm going to go back and fill more pages after this update.  Just wanted to show y'all what I'm doing.  I'll also keep attempting to make the mannequins more animated and experiment with contraposto and all that jazz.

Pay no mind to the crazy dwarfs.  I felt like doodling to give my brain a slight rest in between all the repetitions of mannequins.

Also, apologies for the cropped images.  My sketch pad is 11x14 which is quite larger than the scanner I use.  I want to fill out the pad completely before moving on though so I can unlock the achievement, Full Tome.

EVERY JOURNEY BEGINS WITH A FIRST STEP

Okay so today I mostly got acclimated to the new Intuous5 tablet.  I have to say the pressure sensitivity is a bit too stiff.  You almost have to break the screen to get full opacity and line thickness.  Another thing I'm getting used to is the "absolute" screen the tablet provides.  I can't flick the pen around like a mouse whenever I pick it up.  It's not a mousepad, it is literally my monitor on the tablet, so if I poke around on the far left side of the tablet, it will do the same on my monitor.  This took me a while to get used to.  Because of this, it's basically emulating my movement.  This isn't like drawing on a piece of paper at all.  But I can see the benefits of using this.  It's just going to take a while to practice.

I'm going through the basics first before I really do anything too big.  I want to really get the skeleton/mannequin/muscles/proportions ingrained into my skull first, so a lot of my drawings are going to just be repetitions.  I experimented with different sized figures, but it was mostly female today.

Here's a question for you veterans.  Is there a proper way to grip a pencil?   I usually rest the pen on my thumb and put pressure on it with my index and middle finger, sometimes using the ring finger as support too.

I heard that the tripod grip, pictured above, is the correct method, and the way I've done it is incorrect.  I've been experimenting with both my old school claw grip and the tripod, and my wrist muscles are just not used to holding a pen in the tripod grip.  When using the tablet pen though, I find the tripod grip gives me much more control.  What kind of grip do you use?

IT BEGINS

The Rules
I must update this blog at least once every 48 hours.  I hereby give all of my friends permission to punish me if I do not follow through with this, including but not limited to:
* Slapping my shit
* Slashing my car tires
* Spamming me with texts, calls and e-mails
* Kicking me in the nuts

You have permission to do this repeatedly until I get my proverbial act together and post again.  Emergencies notwithstanding of course.