Some advice

[Helixdq]

Hey guys since some of you are so good with your art, and you all seem to be very tolerant of people regardless of their level i thought i'd ask some advice with some of my problems.

I've started to learn how to draw (i doodeld before but knew very little about what i was doing) a few months ago, around the time i joined here, using tutorials from the net, namely:
"Fun with a pencil"
McDuffies's (thanks a lot, i picked a few good hints from there)
How to draw manga (mostly just drawing simple manga faces)

I can't say i've "done" them (as in drawing everyhing - too lazy), i plan to do that someday, but i did read them - they helped, and i think i'm improving.

But i've run into a weird problem:
I've used only my tablet to do them, and basicly everything that i posted on here, or that will go in my comic (once i'll get back to doing it).
So i've tried to do some drawing on paper, and i was disappointed that i don't seem to be able to translate what i've learned into that, i'm back to square one. I thought hand-eye coordonation should be better, if anything on paper.
Anyone else had this happen to them ?
Is it my technique ? My sketches are pretty ugly/messy when i start with them, and i keep refining them until i can live with them.. a rather tedious process which involves lots of erasing. I'm quicker now, but i still do a lot of little corrections here and there.
Is it the tools ? What is the most basic set of tools that i'd need for pencil drawings with lots of erasing going on (types not brands/shops if possible please, i'm not in the US).
How about for simple inking ?

I'm using Art Dabbler to do my sketches, which is supposed to be a "natural media" program (i chose it to be as close to "real" drawing) - so i don't use layers undos and stuff like that a lot until the coloring stage.

Second problem - digital "inking":
I'm using PSP.
I've found that just darkening the sketches and coloring on a mask layer above makes the edges look rather messy/pixelated unless i seriously shrink the image - which i don't want to do because they don't have that high a resolution to begin with - probably around 800 pixels wide or less.
I've tried using the pencil tool but i can't seem to get the hang of it ... doing it point by point seems a chore not unlike editing my image pixel by pixel (i really hate how trying to curve each individual segment is so unintuitive).
Does anyone have any advice on this (other then get a vector drawing program) ?

Also just as an expresion of frustration: every single body drawing tutorial seems to use it's own, and rather incompatible with others way of building.
I mean they seem totally incompatible ?! Argh. Right now i'm just drawing stick figures with aproximate proportions and hope for the best...

[Dburkhead]

The three most important things you need for improving your drawing are:

1) Practice
2) Practice
3) Practice

I think drawing, like many things, involves "talent" more of the Thomas Edison variety ("Genius is 10% inspiration, 90% perspiration").

I'm afraid I can't help you with digital inking. I do my inking the old fashioned way--with pens.

[Helixdq]

Thank you, and i do practice (digitally drawing with my tablet).
The problem is i'm afraid if what i can do digitally gets better in the following months, i'll have even less incentive to do awful-looking things on paper.

[Thirdworldvillian]

its good to practice with a wide array of mediums. If your good at digital drawing then doing it on paper will eaisilly come to you.

[The Chill Clan]

Hmmm . . . you have a great deal of questions with an even greater variety of answers. Now I could cop out on giving you anything meaningful or useful by telling you to take a figure drawing class. But that'll gets you nowhere and it wastes both our time since you've probably already thought of it yourself. So you want answers here goes. First get drawing tools you like, which means going to your local art store or whatever and spending money to find out what you like. WE can all make recommendations but you'll have to do the legwork yourself. I personally like 0.5 technical pencil with a kneaded eraser. Other people like a good old #2. Second spend a little extra on good paper to draw on cause they can take more abuse when you erase. Brake down your drawings, get a sketchbook that you'll do nothing but rough sketches and doodles in and take it everywhere, and then come back to that when you want to do a finished piece on good paper. Then once you have all that look in a mirror, full length if you have it, and pay extreme attention to how, what, and why things move. You are you're most readily available human model so use that. As for your tablet problem, you're probably drawing the same way you always do on the tablet but when you go to pencil and paper you don't get that clean absolute erase that a computer will do automatically give you. So don't worry about it just keep forging ahead, eventually you'll get cleaner lines by shear determination than anything else.
Moving on to your second problem. The pencil tool in PSP was designed to give hard pixilated lines, switch to the brush for softer lines. And just go really slow around the curves, so slowly in fact that you're thinking about ever millimeter of movement, or get a couple of those plastic circle and oval templates and maybe a french curve and just use those as guides.

Note: people in general are about 6-7 heads tall, we use the head as a measurement because it's readily available and takes no time to figure out. All you have to do now is decide how tall you want your characters to be and you're done. If you want them short make them 5 if you want them tall make them 8 it's really that simple. Some drawing guides are just insane when it comes to this. I once read through a 'How to Draw the Simpsons" guide to drawing and practically through it out the window when they started using bowling balls as a term of measurement system.

I hope this helped or at the least confused you.

[Fiore42]

But i've run into a weird problem:
I've used only my tablet to do them, and basicly everything that i posted on here, or that will go in my comic (once i'll get back to doing it).
So i've tried to do some drawing on paper, and i was disappointed that i don't seem to be able to translate what i've learned into that, i'm back to square one. I thought hand-eye coordonation should be better, if anything on paper.
Anyone else had this happen to them ?

In my personal experience, tablet-work isn't great for improving the basics of draftmanship--I think it's because it's too easy. It's easy to tell what vertical is, easier to compare the sizes of things on the nice, flat, screen, etc.

Digital work is great, though, for playing with color theory. If you want to see how two colors play off each other, there's nothing easier!

[Warofwinds]

Print out a picture from what you did on the tablet, set it next to you, and draw that on normal paper for practice. Don't copy it from underneath, just use it as a reference. That's how I learned to draw until I could see what I wanted in my head.

[Helixdq]

Thanks a lot guys for all the advice, it really helps...