Learning How to Draw with 3D References
Your perception is flawed, and so is mine. We can never really perceive anything in its fullest potential, only part of it conceptually. This applies to capturing the likeness of anything on any medium. This gets particularly sticky when we draw from photos or anything two dimensional, since whatever we see on that plane is only part of the whole. Our brain tries to fill out the rest.
When you’re using photo references to draw an original concept, using a two dimensional reference photo sometimes makes it difficult to understand the relation of light to the planes of the face, because sometimes you need to see how the light affects the side of the face before you decide to apply a brushstroke here, or to soften an edge there. This is why live drawing is such an essential tool in any art practice. It not only allows you to see how your subject interacts in it’s own 3D space, but also gives you more information than a flat piece of paper can. So what can you do if you’ve never been to a live drawing session or can’t find one especially now during lockdown?
I created a class that addresses a few things highlighted by this Corona quarantine: access to live references!
This started with my frustration of the lack of art communities in the places I end up living in. Sure, there are thriving clusters of artists that gather here and there, but I needed real live art classes, with structure and group motivation. I couldn’t get this everywhere. I needed to keep practicing my trade, and I needed to keep my skills sharp. That often meant that I had to revisit the fundamentals of figure drawing or step out to a café to people-watch and sketch.
This was limiting to me, however, because sometimes I’d get struck with an idea of a character or figure in a particular pose or have the desire to practice how light and shadow would play onto a character’s face and collarbones, and I would always inevitably end up in front of the mirror, with a self-timer, minus the lighting that I actually needed and the angle that I actually wanted to capture.
Like many digital artists, I have repeatedly turned to stock photo sites, reference pack websites, as well as wrangling my own partner to model for me. So as any artist would, I bought a wooden mannequin. I also ended up buying a wooden mannequin hand. Which still works great and all, but I needed more versatility. This is what pushed me to consider not trying to reinvent the wheel and instead look into what else I already had that could enrich my learning. This isn’t an ad, by the way, though I wish it was because artists have to eat, but a love letter to Clip Studio Paint’s asset resource. I found out about the 3D models, but couldn’t for the life of me get the posing just the way I wanted to. There was a wealth of information about it though — in Japanese, which I didn’t speak. So I learned, and took notes, and a while later decided to compile it into a whole class! I also saw myself sharing this with some newer artists on Instagram, so I decided to just create a checklist for who else this might help.
This class is for you if:
- you spend ages trying to find good reference photos you can study and draw
- you need more flexibility in the photos to supplement the reference photos you did find
- you feel limited using your camera’s self-timer to capture poses you want to draw
- your mirror has had enough of your “action poses”
- you do not have a studio or lighting equipment to capture light and shadows in your drawing
- you can’t find people willing to pose for you
- you want to learn the very basic proportions of how to draw the human body but don’t know where to start
- you need a mannequin/doll you can pose, reuse, and then change as you need
- you can’t go to live model art classes or you can’t afford them
This class is for beginners, aspiring cartoonists, and new webcomic creators who want to learn about incorporating 3D models into their workflow whether as reference images, using them as a base for concepts, or just for practice.
IMPORTANT:
This is NOT a 3D modelling class technically, this class uses assets that are all freely available on the Clip Studio website. This class will use the 3D layer options available in CSP. This will not teach you how to create anatomically correct models from scratch. At the end of the class you will become comfortable using 3D models as references for your character illustrations.
This is geared towards beginners who:
- are already familiar with the very basics of CSP (you can find my intro to CSP class here)
- want to discover CSP’s 3D model and reference capabilities
- want to improve their drawings with believable poses and proportions
- are stuck because of the availability of reference pictures to suit their own specific ideas
This will be a collaborative class that works well with students who want feedback, and who can also provide feedback to fellow classmates. This is on Skillshare and Gumroad (if you want to download it.)
Download this class on Gumroad
Meet your instructor:
Asia Noble is a self-taught illustrator and has been an active freelancer since 2014. Her goal is to share what she has learned and make learning less intimidating to the absolute beginner. She has illustrated for newspapers, books, comics, Yahoo, and Google. You can find some of her work on her website (AsiaNoble.co) You can reach out to her on Instagram and Twitter as @asianobleart.
