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How to draw

How to draw from memory and imagination.

Learning how to draw from memory.

If you want to learn how to draw from memory, you will first need to be very familiar with the subject you are drawing, for example if you draw the letter (A) then it will be a memory drawing the way you have always drawn the letter (A). So every time you draw one it will look very smiler to the last one you drew. This is because you have done this an unknown number of times throughout your life and it is fixed inside your head. It will not change unless you purposely make an intended change. As you are very familiar with the letter (A). The letter (A) is a very simple shape and does not present very much to remember. If lets say you draw a car, then that is very different shape, that is far more complex than the letter, making it far more difficult to remember. It is more like the whole alphabet, upper and lower case plus numbers together.

Now I know that it is highly likely you can draw the alphabet and numbers from memory quite easy. So this also proves that you know how to draw from memory because you can do it with the alphabet. The question is how many times have you done this, the answer to that question is unknown. It must be thousands if not millions of times depending how old you are but how many cars have you drawn?

VW Underwater Concept Car, how to draw from memory and imagination.

10,20 or even a 100, it bares no comparison to the amount of times you have drawn all the letters and numbers of the alphabet, and so it is highly unlikely you will be able to remember what the car looks like, without having it in front of you to look at. There is a lot to remember if you want to know how to draw from memory. A point to note (when I am talking about how to draw from memory I do not mean any old car, I mean a specific car like a Mustang or a Corvette). Most people can draw a box shape and put a couple of wheels on it that would make it a representation of a car but in most cases not a very good one, so that is not what I mean.

To be able to know how to draw from memory you need to train yourself to do so by braking it down into component parts. Wheels, windows, lights, tires, side view mirrors, door handles, the list goes on and on, that’s why it is difficult. Each one of these is a shape in it’s own right, so is a lot to remember, but it is possible. By breaking it down, you learn how a car is actually made up or constructed, you learn the anatomy of a car and all cars look very similar overall.

All cars have the items mentioned above and all of these items can be found in very smiler places on all cars. If you know that a car has wheels and these wheels are usually a defined distance apart from each other. This distance can be measured by the number of wheels it takes to get to the next wheel. Then you can easily make a template in your mind for placing these wheels the right distance apart. You can easily check this distance by measuring the number of wheels from your first wheel to your second wheel and you will get it right every time.

If you know that the wind shield usually starts about half the width of a wheel behind the front wheel then you know where it goes on most cars but also remember that every one is slightly different as well. If you learn where everything goes in this way by teaching yourself this from doing it on purpose, then you learn how to construct cars without having one to look at because you know where everything goes. Also if you use an item like a wheel as a measuring tool then everything about your car will be in proportion to everything else just like they are on real cars.

In the image of the car above you can see 3 red double sided arrows these are all the same size which show you how much smaller the rear of the car is because of its distance from the front. It also shows how far the windscreen is from the front wheel which is about half the width of the wheel. You can also take note that the door line actually almost measures up with the windscreen.

If this image was directly side on you would be able to measure the distance between the wheels and everything else about this car by using the wheels as the basic measurement which would give you a greater understanding of the anatomy of this vehicle.

If you do this then just doing it will make you more familiar with the subject of cars but also anything that you might like drawing for example, faces or people because they are not very much different from each other either. If you understand the anatomy of the subjects you draw as well as having a familiarity with them combined, you will be more able and know how to draw from memory. If you do this a lot then you will also be prompted by the parts you are drawing as to what the next part to draw might be. This also helps as you are following a process of actions that becomes a natural pattern of behavior.

A good way to practice memory drawing is to draw cars or other subjects like faces as described above and to then when you have finished the drawing, using these techniques to draw the same drawing all over again, while it is still fresh in your mind, without looking at it. Doing this will reinforce your learning, making it stronger as a memory and build up your ability to remember by exercising your visual memory, making it stronger and more capable.

Below you will find a video of a drawing I did using this method but changing the viewing position, so I was drawing it from a different angle, also making it even more difficult. When wanting to be able to draw well, you really need to push yourself hard to make, what seems like very little ground at the time but that is what will make you progressively just that little bit better.

Let me explain this in another way, cartoon films once consisted of thousands of hand drawn, hand painted images, where every single one had to be the same as the last one but in a different position or pose from a different angle. For one person to do this on there own it would take years so the cartoon makers would hire many people and break everything down into smaller components, bite sized chunks so any body could soon learn to do that one small part. Then they would have a team of say 20 people doing only small parts making it easy and also enabling them to complete them very quickly. If you had spent the last 10 years doing this for a studio that made cartoons do you think that you would probably be able to almost do this with you eyes closed?

The way to learn how to draw from memory is learned by drilling yourself to do so through continuous repetition, drawing the same thing over and over until you learn where everything goes, and purposely drawing your attention to understanding where it goes also.
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how to draw a easy

What are drawing techniques?

Drawing techniques, are the manor in which procedures and methods are applied, for accomplishing a desired result, everything we do, when making a drawing, is usually created by using, different drawing techniques. The different marks we make, when drawing pictures, is also part of our technique and the different combination’s, of marks we use, so already you can see that technique, is actually not one but different combination’s, of contributing factors.

There are many different techniques, for using, the many different tools, available to us, as artists, with some being conventional and others, being less conventional.

The manor in which we, use the tools available to us, eventually gives our drawings a look and feel that is unique, to us as artists because of the combined but differing techniques, we use to execute these drawing skills.

For example, there are many different ways, to hold a pencil and the way in which you hold, a pencil, has a direct influence upon your technique, when using it. I see many tutorials, that are aimed at teaching people how to draw, that insist on telling the learner, how to hold a pencil when practicing, these different techniques, giving them the idea, that the pencil, has to be held in this way or that.

The problem with doing this is, if everyone, did everything in exactly the same way, then it is very likely, they will all produce drawings, that would not necessarily be exactly the same but very similar and without variety.

The best way to hold a pencil, is the way that feels best to you.

Are drawing techniques important?

It seems, that those who experiment with using these tools, in different or less conventional ways, end up producing work that is fresh and unique, giving it an edge on other, similar work.

This is not to say, that using tools in the conventional way, does not produce good work or that everyone, has to use these tools in less conventional ways, to be different but that the best way, to do anything, is the way you feel most comfortable doing it.

By all means, experiment with every drawing technique, you can possibly think of or learn, so as to at least have, the ability at your finger tips because of the importance, of the next point.

The point is this; if you practice your drawing skills often, then you will also develop your own drawing techniques and styles, that will eventually make, your overall style unique to you.

Picture of a hand of hand showing bone structure in some detail.
Picture of a hand showing bone structure in some detail, Phalanges, Metacarpals and Carpals, that make up the different bones in the hand, and the wrist.

Yorkshire Terrier Hatching Drawing

how to draw a easy

How to practice using a pencil, without boring yourself to death.

Most people don’t know how to draw, they don’t really know what they are looking for, let alone be able to draw it and why should they?

Why would you know anything about practice using a pencil if you had not been using one regularly?

Most people think that they have to draw an outline but can’t actually see one because they don’t know what they are doing.

Most people get better and learn quicker if they trace pictures but most people also think tracing pictures is cheating and so never use tracing as a learning method, what a shame. When you trace a picture you can only realistically trace out lines, you are not able to do the shading as well when tracing and so drawings that are traced are unfinished looking, very uninteresting because they are uniform, without tonal variation or quality of line.

When tracing pictures, you get your outline very accurate, so the rest of the drawing is more likely to be more accurate and it enables you to see the outline, more easily so it will look good and you will feel good about it.

Constructional drawing is the foundation of all drawing, get it right and you will have saved yourself half of the struggle but doing the other half of a drawing, the shading is a much more enjoyable and a great way of learn about construction drawing, so you learn the difficult stuff by doing the easy stuff first.

Design sheet of ideas for potential further development.

The easy way or the hard way, it’s completely up to you?

If you want further information about why and how tracing works scientifically, then take a look at this interesting article (How to draw easy an extraordinary tail of two brains) or do some research about the functions of the left and right brain. You will learn about the benefits of drawing and how the dominant left brain activities, actually make it difficult to learn drawing but also stunting your thinking power, along with your creative abilities.

Don’t make it hard, make it easy.

Enjoy learning to use a pencil at the same time as learning about how to do construction drawing the easy way first, not the difficult way round, like everybody else teaches, easy way first is the way to go but it astounds me, why the hard way is always practiced. There is a great book by Betty Edwards called drawing on the left hand side of the brain, that many people have used to help them learn to draw and draw well, so well, that many have been astounded by their own abilities, after using the methods given in the book, one of the main methods is tracing because it reaches the parts, other methods cannot reach.

 

Dragons head drawn with graphite pencil 3b & 5b
Dragons head drawn with graphite pencil 3b & 5b as an idea for another picture.

They don’t teach geometry in primary school because the children wouldn’t understand it but they give them pencils to play with, the geometry comes much later when they know what a pencil is, they also teach tracing which has got to be one of the easiest ways to practice using a pencil by drawing because when you trace pictures, you can draw any outline for any picture you want easy.

 

how to draw a easy

The graphite pencil.

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No education is neutral, that is fact, so the only way you can really find out is for yourself, drawing is a good way to do that and I would like to suggest, that we start with the faithful graphite pencil.

The pencil has been around for many years because it’s good to use, easy to hold for most people, even the oldest available drawing tool, other than the finger (charcoal) comes as a pencil nowadays.

It is interesting to understand, that what we think of as a pencil, is most often a graphite pencil and has many similar qualities as charcoal, it can be used in much the same way but the graphite pencil will produce, more tonal variation.

The good old graphite pencil, comes in many different measures of hardness or softness, which enables the user, to create many different qualities of line, as well as a very wide variety of tones, from almost black, to almost white and everything in-between. The softer pencils come in the B range, they are identified as, B to B9, with B9 being very soft and because of this, it dose not stay sharp for very long, consistent fine lines are more difficult, without a fine, sharp tip. If you watch a well practiced expert drawing, with a softer pencil, you will notice how often they turn it, between their fingers to change the drawing tip and keep it as sharp as they can, as long as they can. The other side of this is the harder pencils. These range from H to H9, with the H9 being very hard, they will stay sharp for a long time but will also gouge deep groves into your paper, if you press too hard, when drawing but can be useful, when shading very light areas of tone or creating effects.

The graphite pencil is very versatile, it has many different capabilities, that produce many different results, all of them worth knowing about and worthy of taking a look, or even a second look, even if you have been drawing for years.

Everything we look at and see is a shape, that is often made up of other shapes, most of these shapes, change shape, when moved to different view points, this is the bulk substance, creating the three dimensional form of the shape. These can be created with two types of line, a linear or straight line and a curve. If you can draw these two types of line, you can draw, if you can draw stick figures you can draw. If you don’t draw more than stick figures, then you either don’t want to draw or don’t really know how.

The simple lines below, show some shapes and lines that can be drawn with a graphite pencil, it’s as it says, if you can write words, then you can draw straight lines and curves. If you can read then it’s even better and you’re lucky, because many people world wide, can’t.

A straight line and a curve, created a stick man.

Straight lines and curves, graphite pencil lines made with a 3b & HB pencil.

Graphite pencils 5b & 4b wooden type.

The simple lines above show, how simple it really is to draw lines and curves. None of them are outstanding, these lines have been made with HB and 4B, graphite pencils. But none of the full range of pencils, should ever be overlooked and as you can see, they are versatile, the lighter lines are with a HB, which is probably the most common of all and is a Hard Black, HB. Where as the darker lines, the word (yes), are made with a B4 pencil, which is in the B range of Blacks.

Mechanical Pencil with 3b graphite sticks.

Lets look at an exaggerated, three dimensional line drawing of a cup. These are common shapes using line and hatching to emphasize, the three dimensional form or shape of the cup using a 4B.

A single point persepctive drawing of a cup that is distorted.

You can also see the construction lines, drawn with a pencil, that where used to help create some of the out line or shape, using a single point perspective, this can also be used in a vertical direction to create a wheel shape.

how to draw a easy

How to draw cars easy, step by step.

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The site how to draw cars easy, step by step on Hubpages, has been rewarded by receiving many positive comments and worth a visit, for some great information about drawing cars easy.

Hubpages.com/how to draw cars easy step by step/.
For the best info (Hubpages.com/how to draw cars easy step by step/) every time.

The page shown above, is about using simple methods of drawing, it is particularly aimed at drawing cars but most of the information can be transferred to any other subject matter. I am sorry but you will need to take a look at page art, a visual question on the way to it. This page is about negative space, it is an interesting concept, about seeing your drawings by looking at the area, surrounding the subject, take a look it, it will be worth it, perhaps you will find out how to draw cars another different way.

2009 Mustang Shelby GT500 Marker Pen Drawing.

How to draw cars easy, yes it is very easy, you just do it like everybody else does it, the problem is, you don’t know how everybody else does it, do you?

If you don’t know, then I will tell you how 2 draw cars and I will tell you how to draw cars step by step as well, I will tell you how to get them right first time, every time, just like all the great car designers do it.

Except they had to learn the hard way and I will show you the easy way, with no holds barred, bang on every time, without failure, because everybody is still learning the hard way.

There is a much easier way to learn how to draw, that for some great unknown reason, nobody is telling you about, so I will.

How To Draw Cars Grid Constrution

How do they design great looking cars?

How do they draw great looking cars?

The simple answer is they don’t, 99% of all car drawings are drawn on production lines by more than one person and the final designs are not even drawn by people but are actually drawn by machines nowadays, yes they are.

Do you really think that computer software companies design drawing programs for the fun of it?

No fear, these companies design drawing programs as a means of making money by providing others with equipment, that will make their jobs easier, drawing software is designed to make things easier.

How to draw cars easy GT 500 concept idea
Don’t forget, (Hubpages.com/how to draw cars easy step by step/) Far and away one of the best hubs I have seen on drawing.

Do you think that companies spend thousands of dollars on computer equipment, so there designers can sit around all day, drawing with a pencil, no fear, they don’t. Yes people do sit around drawing all day with pencils sometimes but mostly that is only to generate ideas and a great deal of the time is spent drawing, redrawing over, and over again, the same things, that are just slightly different.

Nowadays this is mostly done by machine, when Walt Disney made cartoons like Jungle Book they employed hundreds of people, to produce those animated movies, now they use machines.

If I was to draw a fairly decent car from scratch, free hand, it would take me at least a couple of hours but it would take anybody, the same amount of time not just me because drawing lines takes time, no matter how good you are and to draw a fairly decent car, would take at least a couple of hours. Then to make a slight change to it, you would have to spend, another couple of hours, drawing another one, that was slightly different, so at that speed it would take you 8 hours to make, about 4 changes.

Do you really think that anybody lets you do that, when designing cars, especially when there are thousands, of slight alterations made in the design process, to make sure everything is as near perfect as possible?

The Beatles and the 5th Beatle, negative, positive space.
The Beatles and the 5th Beatle, negative, positive space. Don’t forget (Hubpages.com/how to draw cars easy step by step/).

Think about it, if someone designed a car, then they decided to put it into production, it would cost millions of dollars to get to that point, so if they then produced, ten or twenty and found out they where no good, do you think it would be OK? Trust me it would not be OK, car companies don’t say, we will just spend another few million dollars putting it right, not on your life.

When a car goes into production, it is completely right because if it is not, then it will cost the company millions of dollars to put right and perhaps even people’s lives, will be at risk, so that’s why they get it right, but the truth is, how to draw cars step by step, is very easy when you do it like they do.

The truth is you can do it, just like the car companies do it, at home with a computer because that’s all they use to do the jobs, of hundreds of people and you can get the software for free, legally free.

You too can scribble a few cars down on a piece of paper, then design them and produce a finished professional piece of work, every time, the same way they do it, easily.

Austin Healey 3000 MKIII Marker Pen Drawing.
Austin Healey 1960’s sports car, 3000 MKIII Marker Pen Drawing, (Hubpages.com/how to draw cars easy step by step/).

How to draw easy cars, will provide you with all the information to get you started, on how to do this, legally free.

How to draw a car easy, is only the start, it will soon grow into, how to draw cars easy step by step, one will soon become many.