Using References

 Using References

November 3rd, 2022

Choosing what to draw when you have that feeling of inspiration is fairly straightforward. For me, all it usually takes is the gathering of a couple of reference images that match the mental image I have in my head of what I want to draw in order to fully flesh out my ideas. I believe there is no such thing as a bad reference image.

There are some people who believe that being an artist means being able to draw without having any references. I think that that misconception could not be any further from the truth. Take character sheets, for example.

Credit: Wenderson Chaper on Pinterest

These sheets are made in mind of being references for animators who need to draw them over and over again. Even in the professional workforce of animators and artists, they are not expected to remember the minute details of each character or memorize their relative heights even if they do draw them thousands of times each day. 

I constantly draw from reference. I believe that drawing from reference exhaustively is one of the main reasons I have been able to improve as an artist. Even though having an image in front of me might seem counterintuitive to working on building stronger mental images, it has actually improved that ability because I can observe and remember information to a greater extent.

Though I stated that there is no such thing as a bad reference image, it is true that some reference images offer less to the aspiring artist than others. For instance, take anime and cartoons as reference images. In these images, the lines which the artist needs to draw are already defined. There is no question as to what will make your drawing appear as a proper drawing to others. 

On the other hand, drawing from life or even 3D animation takes significantly more effort. There are no hard lines. The only lines there truly are are the shifting of gradients from different colors, the hard edges created by color contrast. Being able to interpret the implicit lines that are created within real life improves your artistic ability by a wide margin.

It was difficult for me to draw this veil, which had no hard edges or lines.

(375 words)