How To Draw With Your Arm?

[Guest iceshiel]

I have this nasty habit of drawing with my wrist, with poor results. Lately i've been trying to draw with my arm and shoulder but i am finding it a little difficult. Perhaps i am not used to it.

 

Anyone with some good advice?

[Guest joetheshow202]

I have this nasty habit of drawing with my wrist, with poor results. Lately i've been trying to draw with my arm and shoulder but i am finding it a little difficult. Perhaps i am not used to it.

 

Anyone with some good advice?

 

I tend to generally relax my whole arm and raise it slightly off the surface i'm working on to get a bit of leverage. Be nice and bold with line drawing. Try not to 'pull' lines too much as your drawings begin to look a bit laboured and 'hairy'. Go for nice big movements with your arm. If you are opting to draw a line which is relatively straight, focus on the point, which you intend to stretch it to and go for it! If you try and do it in seperate stages, again your technique is going to look a little contrived. The main thing to remember is to stick with large hand movements and try to be adventurous. If you make mistakes you should leave them in because not only does it add to the charm of your sketch but you can often turn them into some pretty good design!

 

Good luck!

 

Joe

[Guest MikeWied]

There's a small tutorial somewhere around here, or on DesignerTechniques.com that goes into drawing with your wrist and arm. Ahhh yes here's a link http://www.designertechniques.com/tutorial...tip01-page1.htm. Like I said it's a very small article. But the best way I can describe it for you is to move like your "karate chopping", of course while holding a pencil and drawing lol. The jist of the article though is to save drawing with your wrist for small curves and your arm for longer strokes. e.i.= wrist for a headlight line, arm for a bodyline on a car if that makes any sense.

 

And if I'm drawing anything round or elliptical, I like to use my arm, just more controlled to me.

Just practice man, you'll get better.

[powers 0]

Standing up helps me.

[skinny 0]

For a quick way to improve your results:

Draw a series of lines in all directions to see which stroke is easiest for you to make. That will be your main stroke. Once you find that, drag the pencil or pen in the direction you're going, make the back of the pen aim in the direction that you're drawing.

Tense your wrist to keep yourself from making those wobbly lines and to force the stroke to come from your elbow or shoulder. For smaller curves, using the wrist may be necessary but for the big sweeping lines, use the elbow or shoulder. Think of your hand and fingers as a big solid chunk to do those long lines.

Other than that, lots of practice! Draw to random dots on the page to practice aiming.

[Guest sachin]

Exercise!

 

Before a sketch session draw lots of parallel lines using your shoulder and keeping your wrist slightly stiff. Then practice freehanding circles and ellipses. When you practice freehanding circles and ellipses try to "throw" them down. Get your desired circle or ellipse in less than three attempts. When you are practicing, keep page composition in mind as well.

 

As skinny mentioned, hitting two dots with one line is a very good exercise to build up coordination.

 

 

Rinse and repeat.

[Guest Buff]

I find pens and pencils much more effective :-P

 

Seriously though, thanks for the post... I'm rubbish at sketching and could use all the help I can get

[skinny 0]

I forgot to mention, draw the lines fairly quick. When you do them slow trying to be really careful, the lines get shaky. Do them swift and smooth like you were brushing away powder off of your paper.

[Guest barowdy]

Because the images are small, people tend to learn how to sketch from the wrist. Drawing a long line tends to consist of lots of small movements from your wrist, as you move your arm along. If you look carefully at these lines they consist of lots of small arches.

 

Sketching from your shoulder means that you can draw lines in one continuous movement. Instead of drawing by moving your wrist, keep your wrist still and move your entire arm in one long movement from your shoulder. It's not an easy skill to master but once you have, you definitely will see the benefit.

 

A good way to learn is to practice drawing on large A2 sheets of paper and have the paper vertical. This means that you can't rest your wrist on the page encouraging you to use your shoulder when drawing.

[Guest JMAG]

The above is good advice.

Also if you just lock your wrist, you've just forced yourself not to use it.