These are the best resources I've ever seen on how to study drawing. I've seen too many bad tutorials / books / courses and I hope I can help you avoid wasting time on those too. I suggest you watch everything, but how you study will depend on your goals, so only do the exercises you think are most important for you. Studying art mostly comes down to studying reference, so you can take any of these exercises and modify them for your own goals. If one guy teaches you how to draw from life, remember that you can just take the same method and use it to copy master artwork, and vice versa.
There's tons of contradictory and differing methods of study here, and I am purposefully leaving you to make your own decisions for yourself. Most of the methods here are effective, and your improvement depends most on your own effort and the hours you put in. The most important factor in finding a study method is your enjoyment of it. Do you like studying that way? It's not worth killing yourself over a torturous study method and burning out in 20 minutes, not to mention, giving up on art altogether. Find a routine you enjoy, and stick with it for years.
Remember that if you study, you WILL improve.
Site backup: https://artstudies.neocities.org/
David Finch Roadmap: (Beginners should do this)
https://davidfinchart.com/where-to-start-and-where-to-go-from-there-a-roadmap-to-professional-quality-art/
(basic guide for construction and anatomy)
Corresponding videos:
https://youtu.be/DMmsydblf7s
https://youtu.be/5sUbnpserx0 <- This video is great
https://youtu.be/6i6JDwEwXJI
David Finch Study Streams: (the most highly recommended resource here)
Frank Frazetta: https://youtu.be/ZqJ2h4Jw5nU
Claire Wendling: https://youtu.be/7ukExmlSRWU
Simon Bisley: https://youtu.be/Z2CZKX089w0
Travis Charest: https://youtu.be/ko7H8FGwks8
Carlos Pacheco: https://youtu.be/jFkqUtJ4mRM
Kevin Nowlan: https://youtu.be/ni30Hp72aeY
Joe Quesada: https://youtu.be/atXd2HbHYO8
Ryan Ottley: https://youtu.be/st31pTH3fFo
Frazetta Painting: https://youtu.be/aLAhVqh7qJQ
(Making master copies and drawing from memory)
Feng Zhu sketch studies:
Sketching 101: https://youtu.be/22XYoenU-0c
Just Draw!: https://youtu.be/WLqWX7onVmU
(importance of drawing from observation regularly)
Krenz Cushart: (turn on subtitles)
https://youtu.be/kbKqIJcIUCw
https://youtu.be/dgjx6y6B_G8
https://youtu.be/594WhCme2pQ
(importance of accuracy and master copies)
Jason Brubaker - memory drawing system
https://youtu.be/s_NuJIJ6wGY
https://youtu.be/G8e2DcN5kAo
https://youtu.be/S9Cx4pIjSvA
https://youtu.be/gkbQnBi_JqU
pdf: https://dreamco.com/pima/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/cognitive-drawing-202-sm.pdf
(He calls it cognitive drawing.)
(This is an extremely effective and organized way to apply memory drawing and iterative correction.)
(If you are scared of memory drawings, I highly recommend you do this. This iterative method lets you apply memory drawings in a very painless and stressfree way, because you have multiple chances to fix your mistakes.)
Jason's portfolio: https://www.artstation.com/jason_brubaker
(This guy is great, he did some phenomenal work for Kung Fu Panda)
Naoki Saito
How to copy art: https://youtu.be/B5QetP4aa8w
Fastest way to improve: https://youtu.be/8jsZGeaWkhE
This /asg/ guide is really good:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cK9q7oeFRE58MVaSgUql662iGqCXC8Ah/view
(importance of memory drawing)
KJG memory drawing:
https://youtu.be/yx6dbybn-rk
https://youtu.be/WKbQ4TPMkFc
https://youtu.be/-RFz2yFSBVc
(memory drawing and rotating objects from imagination)
Dave Rapoza on applying studies from memory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4tttsdhn8o&t=733s
(repetitively studying the same subject + memory drawing)
Sycra
How to practice drawing: https://youtu.be/oKFfSl-EBfI
(Extremely important video. Get a reference image, then tell yourself:
I will not move on from this reference until I've drawn it 10x.
Or something like that. If it's a painted study, paint it 2 or 3 times before moving on. Draw the reference until it's easy for you. Only then, move on.)
(I recommend combining it wtih the Cognitive Drawing method from Jason Brubaker.)
Based Jimmy Miracle:
https://youtu.be/fkRmBqC7qf0
https://youtu.be/ULzw4-CI3tE
Madame Cave's "Drawing from Memory"
https://mega.nz/file/5dNC1QhR#jxNqbfNxHdDtau2sRDAIX8cUBItXKMLd9CFKgwDXo0I
(Introduction was written by THE Eugene Delacroix)
(You can execute the same process digitally, by pasting ref image to canvas, instead of tracing on gauze.)
Arthur Guptill
https://archive.org/details/sketchingrenderi00guptuoft/page/n1/mode/2up
https://archive.org/details/a.l.guptill1935
(totally complete drawing programs, from beginner to professional)
Animator Beast's gesture drawing practice
https://youtu.be/yHJXLdCVD18
https://youtu.be/7y99O3wm4Cg?t=6003
(gesture drawing with accuracy)
(Clip Studio Paint EX can handle this easily, just import an mp4 into the animation timeline.)
Kirk Shinmoto:
Master Copy: https://youtu.be/YVAtRojlCS8
Master Copy 2: https://youtu.be/cF2UtfFT7y8
Anatomy Books: https://youtu.be/9pAMqgJXcbw
(approaching master copies with construction)
Ethan Becker Dragging Art over Reference:
https://youtu.be/RXb-Y_kz2aU
(learning to draw on model)
Will Terrell on how to build a Visual Library:
https://youtu.be/pOK2sDLtu2Q
Josh Black's daily training routine:
https://youtu.be/ugiP3-32_9Y
https://youtu.be/hA9UP9ZoekI
Christophe Younge Painting tutorials
https://www.youtube.com/@christopheyoungart/videos
Painting studies:
Color Studies: https://youtu.be/1d577v_XBKA
Quick color studies: https://youtu.be/CVGZf5EQQK4
Ahmed Aldoori: https://youtu.be/3YXTlF4hzaE
Noah Bradley: https://youtu.be/kQfF-P70V2Q
Simplify drawing and painting: https://www.youtube.com/@SIMPLIFYDrawingandPainting/videos
Minimaru:
Hand & Feet practice: https://youtu.be/pDCL7s8JjDY
90 sec figures: https://youtu.be/d86hKJNehI8
Basic Proportions: https://youtu.be/avcygKfCoXQ
Basic Anatomy: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMzSsN13py1hIz1Q-s49LWF-IkKna9Swv
Hide Channel:
Croquis: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTY4AtphBe8NS7WFIMIhHIBJVk3xQvi-q
Recommended books: https://youtu.be/TBqEj3tKD6o
How to practice:
https://youtu.be/tMoubXBGloU
https://youtu.be/eCtLmBShSho
1st year: https://youtu.be/QgnLM73R8oM
(turn on cc. not all are translated, but draw along anyways!)
Manga Materials:
https://www.youtube.com/@mangamaterialsyoutube9454/videos
Important Fzd videos for concept art:
Ep 106: https://youtu.be/jRq9-QEz650 (Getting a job)
Jeff Watts on Memory Drawing:
https://youtu.be/-NIvZZ7x3dc?t=2715
qrbits course:
https://youtu.be/aMlTKtmczzM?t=754
(recommend watching all of it, but timestamped at the essential advice.)
Paul Angeli, Storyboarding Basics:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVbVJEmr29uNm61LWE6UWp8zOtT9OPDRz
Misc
(Everything below this is just miscellaneous stuff that's interesting. Not all of it is necessarily about how to make studies.)
Zapata Perspective: https://youtu.be/_9tcy2436iM
Jeff Watts on the time it takes to learn drawing: https://youtu.be/KX0MrnzBJ8M
PSG Art tutorial: http://androidarts.com/art_tut.htm
Beast Animator's streams: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcZnl-xtyEqalCVkvhWr3FH8qp41QBJqF
Dan Thompson: https://www.youtube.com/@danthompsonfineart/videos
Don't practice: https://youtu.be/bFyxnYfZw2A
Rad Sechrist: https://radhowto.blogspot.com/
Neg Illustration Recommended books: https://youtu.be/Wy_4g-jTkgY
Steve Huston YT Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@STEVEHUSTONdrawsfromlife/videos
Alexander Mackendrick, on filmmaking: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuntSxVsd5TNh8KJJysrDZCV8cz-ptFXI
Simon aka Teal Line guy's redlines:
https://imgur.com/gallery/8eHzD
Inkwell, art business advice: https://www.youtube.com/@Inkwell/videos
(extremely whitepilling advice for artists)
Natalie Nourigat
Gesture drawing: https://youtu.be/Fa9CLiGhWr4
Comics Advice:
https://homeiswheretheinternetis.blogspot.com/2015/04/advice-for-aspiring-comics-artists-14-18.html
Feature animation storyboarding advice:
https://homeiswheretheinternetis.blogspot.com/2017/09/animation.html
Joe Kubert mail order dvd course:
Pencilling: https://youtu.be/Zt_j70hzSrE
Inking: https://youtu.be/sDc1b5qNSNI
YenYen Animation lectures:
https://youtu.be/JUO3wrCnOFk
https://youtu.be/O84C_11MUXM
Saejinoh: Pain Process
https://archive.org/details/youtube-wRNj1h5tVG4
(Marine bootcamp style training. Not recommended for the weak of heart.)
Figure Drawing apps:
Gesture Drawing!: https://www.artstation.com/marketplace/p/k1Vq/gesturedrawing
Quickposes: https://quickposes.com/en/desktop-app
Posemaniacs: https://www.posemaniacs.com/tools/thirtyseconds
Animation reference:
https://setteidreams.net/settei/
https://www.sakugabooru.com/post
Glenn Vilppu:
https://tv.creativetalentnetwork.com/axChannel.php?id=58
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV145411A7CV/
Craig Mullins Sijun Posts
https://archive.org/details/CraigMullinsSijunPosts
Recommended Books:
A redliner's advice
For the links in the above image, here's the thread: https://warosu.org/ic/thread/6809247#p6809772
/Mecha/ general op's advice
Tableguy's advice
Site: https://gvaat.com/blog/analyzing-capcoms-anatomy-guide-with-english-translation-part-1/
Velleity Art's advice
Slowpoke's advice
Note: Slowpoke has done over 2000 master copies!
Yoga Anon's advice
Pantsu Ripper's simple, but effective advice:
If you need to download the images here, get the extension "Save as PNG" because for some reason HackMD only lets you save XML files
How to learn to draw, for beginners
Disclaimer: You should probably mainly study from the above links. Learn from actual professionals, not some anon.
Step 1: Get some momentum on the basics
Get Andrew Loomis' "Figure Drawing for all it's worth" and John Buscema's "How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way". Read through these books, and accomplish the following, first:
- Proportions: Learn to draw the 8 head figure diagram from memory, from the side, from the front, the back, etc.
- Skeleton Mannequin: Get used to drawing Loomis' simplified skeleton "mannikin" from memory, in many poses. Make sure the proportions are correct.
- Anatomy: Learn where all the muscles sit on the skeleton, and where they connect. Don't bother with drawing them beautifully yet, just memorize the flat diagrams.
- Basic forms: From Buscema's book, learn to draw cylinders, boxes, spheres, etc. Basic stuff.
If you feel like you don't know how to effectively memorize concepts from drawing books, just do this:
Jason Brubaker - memory drawing system
https://youtu.be/s_NuJIJ6wGY
https://youtu.be/G8e2DcN5kAo
https://youtu.be/S9Cx4pIjSvA
https://youtu.be/gkbQnBi_JqU
https://dreamco.com/pima/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/cognitive-drawing-202-sm.pdf
Just go through Loomis and Buscema and do memory drawings + copies of all the important diagrams (you don't have to do all of them). Then, take 15-20 minutes to doodle some figures on your own. etc.
Don't get stuck on this stage. Just get your mind around the basic concepts, then move onto the next step. You don't need to master anatomy or proportions at this stage, I just want you to be able to reproduce the most basic stuff from memory. You should know proportions. You should be somewhat familiar with the basic skeleton mannequin, and you should be familiar with where the muscles go. All of this will be refined as you make master copies and draw from life.
Yes, you will forget stuff, that's a normal part of the process. Just go back and review what you forgot. Relearning forgotten concepts actually makes them stick better.
Learning proportions and anatomy does not make you good at drawing. This is baby step one. The real thing that makes you good at drawing is the next step: shape, observation, and a sense of form and design. That is where the bulk of your studies should be, so please do not get stuck on this step.
Depending on how experienced you are, you may not be able to accomplish the 4 things I listed above. No matter. Just move on anyways, and start doing master copies. The more mileage you have, the easier it will be for you to understand what Loomis is talking about. Come back to Loomis when it gets easier for you. (Actually, my expectations for you are very low. I see what's posted in the /beg/ thread every day, and it's not promising.)
Other recommended books, to get familiar with the fundamentals:
- Steve Huston's "Figure Drawing for Artists"
- Michael Hampton's "Figure Drawing: Design and Invention"
- Jason Brubaker's "Cognitive Drawing" books
- Glenn Vilppu's "Drawing Manual"
Though all of the above are worth reading, I think Loomis' Figure Drawing book is the best book on drawing ever written, and you should probably prioritize him and memorize everything he has to say, along with all his other books. (Creative Illustration is amazing)
Maximum time: 3 months
(or, you can also do the next step right away, concurrent with this step.)
Alternately: ("JUST DRAW" MODE) Instead of "reading" (ew) Loomis, just get Morpho and do Cognitive Drawing on every single image, from cover to cover. Start with the simplified forms book, then do the main book, and then the hands + feet book, and then whatever other Morpho book you want. This is how Negu Illust. taught himself to draw: just by copying Morpho. The simplified forms book shows you all the steps to construct the figure with boxes, cylinders, spheres, and theoretically you shouldn't need any written instruction to understand it. There's nothing complicated about boxes or cylinders or construction in general. Just copy what you see, then do it from memory!
The above will probably take 2-3 years to finish all the morpho books, so mix in Master copies + imagination drawing with it. Do everything side by side.
Step 2: Master copies
This is where the bulk of your learning takes place. At this stage, you're going to get your favorite artist's work and copy them every single day. Just paper and pencil is fine, and just copy the linework, not the shading yet.
The reason I wanted you to speedrun Loomis' and Buscema's books is because I want you to do master copies asap. Studies, particularly master copies, are HOW you truly internalize what you learned from Loomis and Buscema. You will only finally understand the principles of form and gesture HERE by doing master copies. If you spend too much time on Loomis, without applying waht you learned to master copies, you will plateau and not see much progress.
Watch the David Finch study streams at the top of this page, along with the Jason Brubaker videos. That is how I want you to do these master copies. Copy the reference, then put away the reference and your drawing, and redraw it from memory. This is how you translate your copies into imagination work.
Some points to keep in mind:
- BE ACCURATE when you do master copies. Copy it point by point, line by line, if you have to. If you feel unahppy with your study, do it again. The effort you put into copying something accurately directly translates to how much you improve. If you are working digitally, you could even take the pain of overlaying your drawing over the reference image, to see how accurate you were.
- Focus on figure drawing and anatomy for the bulk of this time. Learning to draw characters is most difficult. Begin an extensive manga / comic / artbook collection so you have a lot of art that you can study. You don't have to copy Bridgman if you don't want. You can learn figure drawing by copying your favorite artists.
- Start simple with these master copies. If you're an utter beginner, just draw eyes. Copy an eye, then do it again from memory. Then redraw the same eye you just studied from reference. Go back and forth like this, to correct your mistakes and test what you remembered. Slowly expand what you can do. If you can do an eye, can you do arm now? The leg?
- Focus on one subject matter at a time. Take one week to focus on learning how to draw a single subject. Do one week for heads, one week for hands, one week for torso. In this same vein, I think it can also be a good idea to only focus on one artist as you do these copies. Try to become a carbon copy of this artist, and then when you're tired of them, switch to another artist. This way, you begin to build up the multiple layers of your style.
- When you get comfortable with this, start studying details. Begin copying line weight, hatching techniques, background elements, etc. Learn to paint and render too, by copying artists, then redrawing it from memory. Shadow shapes can be memorized and applied across multiple drawings. Keep in mind, however, that studying basic shapes and forms is more important than studying details.
- How do you know when to move on from one subject? When the memory drawing is too easy. When this happens, it means you've pretty much assimilated that object into your visual library, and it's time to move on. Eventually, you will revisit that subject and realize that you actually still sucked. Improvement is an endless cycle of learning and relearning.
- Use Pencil and kneaded eraser, or draw digitally. This lets you lighten your sketch lines and draw on top. Good artists draw in multiple layers, starting from basic shapes, all the way to the details. I recommend actually taking a lot of your studies all the way to the inks.
To give you an idea of how much work it takes to learn to draw, Rad Sechrist said that you have to do master copies for 4 hours a day, for 4 years straight, in order to become a professional artist. Fortunately, master copies are a very pleasant and relaxing way to practice.
If you feel like you're forgetting your anatomy, do copies + memory studies on anatomy books. I like Bridgman, Taco, Morpho, etc. There are dozens of books out there.
Maximum Time: forever
Step 2.5: Life drawing / Landscape drawing
This is an optional step. Master copies are the only thing you need to get good, but there are benefits that come from drawing from life too.
The first benefit is to ground your art in some kind of reality. If artists just kept copying artists that came before them, overtime, art would degenerate into pure symbolism. People always seem to start exaggerating the features of the art they admire, and if each successive generation keeps exaggerating the art of the previous generation's, you end up with double, triple, quadruple exaggerations. Art no longer looks real, but you can escape this with life drawing. Think about traditional Chinese / Japanese art. It's all symbolism and convention.
The second benefit is that Life drawing teaches you the real form of what you're drawing. If you want to be a cartoonist, and all you're copying is lines, you may have trouble understanding exactly what those lines are representing. Drawing from photos / life helps cure that. You'll have an easier time rotating form and placing characters in difficult angles and poses. (To see the real form of something, drawing from life is better than photos.)
But, I still feel that life drawing is less important than master copies, because master copies are what actually teach you technique. It gives you the tools and knowledge to be able to depict life properly. This is easy to understand for artists who only draw in line, obviously, but it's also important for painters. Every drawing is a simplification of what you see in life, you cannot copy it perfectly. Master copies teach you how to simplify and design from life.
If you don't believe me, try drawing a tree from life. You will struggle with how to depict the leaves, how to draw the texture of the bark, how to draw the grass and roots and clouds, etc. There are infinite ways to apply pencil strokes to draw these textures. After struggling with this, go and find a great landscape artist's pencil drawing of a tree, and copy that. Copy every stroke and hatch pattern carefully. Then, go back to life. You'll then understand the importance of master copies.
Master Copies give you the foundation you need for drawing from life, and it's a good idea to do both for the rest of your life.
How do you find a good balance between master copies and life drawing? Actually, you can do whatever you want, as long as you get a bit of both.
Maximum Time: Forever
Step 3: Imagination work + Visual Libary
Start making finished art. Draw from imagination and apply what you learned from your studies. Find references for objects that you want to include in your finished work.
Start a portfolio of finished work. This is your gateway to becoming a professional artist. If you don't have a body of work, you have a lot to catch up on if you want to begin a career.
Keep studying! Begin each day with 1-2 hours of master copies / life drawing.
A really wonderful routine you might want to try is this: https://youtu.be/8jsZGeaWkhE
Basically you can divide up your day into this:
- 1 hour master copies / life drawing
- Naoki Saito routine for the rest of the day
You can begin "step 3" as soon as you wish, even right from Day 1. I just divided this roadmap into 3 steps for clarity.
Conclusion
The 3 steps above are an arbitrary division. Begin your master copies alongside your fundamentals study, and begin making finished art alongside your master copies. There's no real division, because making master copies IS fundamentals study, and making finished art IS a way of studying your favorite artists. They're all interconnected.
If I had to weigh studies against drawing from imagination, I'd say that studies are definitely more important. This is because we humans only grow through "input". We become capable of doing more than we previously could by taking in knowledge from the world and encoding them into our brains. If all you ever do is draw from imagination, you're leaving it up to random chance that you'll improve.
However, I cannot overstate the importance of making finished work too. Drawing from imagination is a form of memory drawing. Honestly, you could just skip the Brubaker / Finch way of doing memory drawings and just do copies + draw finished work and you'll still be improving rapidly. Drawing from imagination is only a waste of time if you never do any studies at all.
You don't HAVE to copy something exactly to improve, by the way. Kim Jung Gi's recommended method of study is to observe something in the real world, then to draw it from various angles from memory. That is a form of "input". Boichi said in a video that he didn't have the time to set aside to practice drawing while creating a serialized manga, and that the way he still improved was by having photo references up while drawing his own manga pages. He talked about buying the Vagabond manga ebook and having it up on a second monitor, and he'd look up and incorporate hatching techniques from Vagabond into Dr. Stone. That too is another form of "input".
The more of a beginner you are, the more time you should spend just copying and memorizing things, rather than making art. As you get more advanced, slowly tilt the ratio, towards where you're mostly making art, wtih just a bit of study to warm up or end your day. Professionals mostly just make actual art, for most of their day, and they may or may not take some time, every few days, for study. Of course, the best ones continue studying for the rest of their career.
Q&A
Shading? Painting?
I like Andrew Loomis' "Figure drawing for all it's worth" the best. It can be confusing, though, to know how what he teaches transfers over to painting from imagination, if you don't understand the relationship between shape and form. Loomis tells you to just "draw the contours of the halftones, core shadow, and reflected light" and form will take care of itself. When I read this as a beginner, I hated it, because I thought I would be stuck painting from reference for the rest of my life, but once you paint enough, you realize you can actually start reproducing those shapes you observed from memory. You'll begin to see the same shadow shapes show up over and over again on the same body parts, and you'll be able to understand how shadow shapes relate to form.
It's the same thing as learning anatomy. You first learn anatomy by drawing the shapes you see from books or life, then you can eventually reproduce them from memory. This process speeds up though, if you regularly practice memory drawings. Memory drawings can be done on shadow shapes too. Refer to the image above, with the advice from the redliner.
Gesture drawing?
This can actually be a trap for beginners, because your proportions end up going wild. There's not enough accurate observation. I personally think the shortest amount of time you should be spending on a figure should be around 5-7 minutes, because that gives you enough time to be relatively accurate.
Gesture drawing was originally heavily emphasized by professional animators working at Disney, who wanted to take their animations to the next level. They were all already extremely good at drawing, and they just need to make their poses more lively. For that reason, the Walt Stanchfield and Michael Mattesi books are NOT good for beginners. Feel free to study them as you get more advanced.
I would not worry too much about practicing "being gestural". If you do enough master copies, and you're copying some artists with lively art, you will eventually get a feel for how to do it too. The ability to exaggerate and infuse your drawings with life comes from superb control and knowledge, NOT by flinging your lines around in a desperate, caricatured, "gestural" way. Kim Jung Gi never talked about gesture drawing, and he turned out fine.
Academic drawing?
I think this is actually a great thing to get into, provided you do memory drawings or spend some time drawing from imagination. Doing an extremely long and detailed master copy, plaster cast drawing, still life, spending several hours on this, then doing it from memory, is actually something that was practiced back in the 1800's in Paris. Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran was a teacher at the Ecole, and he wrote one of the most hardcore drawing books out there, imo. It's called "The Training of the Memory in Art", and you can find it on archive (dot) org. He starts you out with severe exercises, like getting students to duplicate a vertical lines / geometric shapes that they see, as exactly as possible, by hand, but if you just read the book and take the thought process from it, you'll learn a lot. Most of the book is art education philosophy, not exercises.
A much better book than Boisbaudraun's is Madame Cave's "Drawing from Memory" / "Drawing without a master"
https://mega.nz/file/5dNC1QhR#jxNqbfNxHdDtau2sRDAIX8cUBItXKMLd9CFKgwDXo0I
It's always fascinating to look back at old artists and wonder how they were able to draw so well, but not only from reference, but from imagination. We're told by modern art teachers that academic drawing doesn't lead to drawing from imagination, but they way these guys did it, they COULD draw from imagination very well. The reason is that they not only did study anatomy, form, perspective, very deeply, but they also practiced memory drawing regularly.
Do I have to do memory drawings on EVERYTHING???
No, just do it on what you find important :). For example, I won't do memory drawings on how to draw a brick wall, because I'm pretty sure I can remember that easily. Many things you can just find reference for, as you're making finished work.
The most important things to remember are the shapes and forms of the human body. You never want to forget how to construct a face, for example.
When you do memory drawings, don't be overly ambitious. If you try to draw too much at once you won't remember it all. Just take a small part, say, an arm or a leg, then copy + redraw.
Do my memory drawings have to be exactly like the reference?
Actually, no. It's up to you whether you want them to be exactly like the reference. It's a great exercise to try to redraw what you did perfectly, and if you are doing the David Finch roadmap, you're meant to do that with Bridgman.
However, another way to do memory drawing is to simply draw from imagination. Say you just studied arms. Now, go draw more arms, from varying angles. This counts as memory drawings. Really, it's more like drawing from imagination. You're still pulling visual information from your mind and reinforcing shapes and forms.
This extends to anything. Say you just painted a portrait. Now, go paint another portrait from imagination. It doesn't have to be an exact duplicate. If you painted a woman's portrait from reference, now try painting a man's portrait. Many of the same shadows shapes and anatomy will carry over.
Doing memory drawings this way might be actually better than just redrawing what you did. It might be more fun to do it this way, and the gains are about the same. Plus, you will begin to learn what your weaknesses are and where you need to put more effort into studying.
Of course, feel free to just redraw what you just did. That works too, and you can more easily check your mistakes against the reference. This way, you can go back and forth between memory drawing and study, and you've got a sort of Cognitive Drawing thing going on. (Jason Brubaker links above)
Anyways, it's all up to you. The point is to study, then to reinforce what you studied with drawing from imagination. The key is to keep this relatively balanced, maybe 50-50, or 40-60. Again, up to you.
Perspective?
Yes, it's important to learn it, but contrary to what most people think, you don't really need to know it in depth for figure drawing. Most people are interested in drawing characters, so I'm having you do that right from the get go. Figure drawing is the hardest thing to learn in art, so you should start tackling that right from the beginning, and all the way until the end, forever.
Perspective, on the other hand, can be learned and mastered and finished. It's a finite skill. Learn it when you feel like you want to start drawing backgrounds and machineries and vehicles.
Yes, perspective is finite, but your visual library is infinite, and that's the fun part. The /mecha/ general op on /ic/ is a great example of someone who has mastered perspective, and is now just taking the time to learn how to draw actual objects from life. He'll spend some time studying guns, then some time studying tanks, etc. hopping from subject matter to subject matter. This is the real learning in perspective drawing. The rules should be covered quickly. Get to this part asap.
The best way to learn perspective is to refer to mecha gen's op's advice above. You can't miss it.
Boxes? Lines? Ellipses? Grinding?
I don't recommend a lot of "grinding". Stuff like drawing pages of boxes and lines and ellipses and stuff, that stuff is useful at first, but you'll quickly plateau. There will come a point where you will be able to draw a perfect box, and if you just keep grinding boxes, you'll stop improving. In other words, those skills can be "exhausted". What's worse is that if you just do master copies and draw from life, you'll continue to improve in those "grindable" skills anyways. You'll get more precise and you'll understand perspective better just by drawing a lot, so in my view grinding that stuff is useless.
If you do insist on grinding boring drawing exercises like these, do the ones in the Vilppu drawing manual, because you can train your 3d and 2d sense at once. It's essential to at least be able to freehand boxes and ellipses. (you can't draw cyborg girls without these skills) Keep these as warmups, and when you're good at them, move on. Value scales are also good for controlling your medium if you're drawing traditionally. You may also wish to work through Scott Robertson if you plan on drawing lots of environments, vehicles, for a concept art career.
How do I become a professional artist?
Git Gud.
These are the best resources I've ever seen on how to study drawing. I've seen too many bad tutorials / books / courses and I hope I can help you avoid wasting time on those too. I suggest you watch everything, but how you study will depend on your goals, so only do the exercises you think are most important for you. Studying art mostly comes down to studying reference, so you can take any of these exercises and modify them for your own goals. If one guy teaches you how to draw from life, remember that you can just take the same method and use it to copy master artwork, and vice versa.
There's tons of contradictory and differing methods of study here, and I am purposefully leaving you to make your own decisions for yourself. Most of the methods here are effective, and your improvement depends most on your own effort and the hours you put in. The most important factor in finding a study method is your enjoyment of it. Do you like studying that way? It's not worth killing yourself over a torturous study method and burning out in 20 minutes, not to mention, giving up on art altogether. Find a routine you enjoy, and stick with it for years.
Remember that if you study, you WILL improve.
Site backup: https://artstudies.neocities.org/
David Finch Roadmap: (Beginners should do this)
https://davidfinchart.com/where-to-start-and-where-to-go-from-there-a-roadmap-to-professional-quality-art/
(basic guide for construction and anatomy)
Corresponding videos:
https://youtu.be/DMmsydblf7s
https://youtu.be/5sUbnpserx0 <- This video is great
https://youtu.be/6i6JDwEwXJI
David Finch Study Streams: (the most highly recommended resource here)
Frank Frazetta: https://youtu.be/ZqJ2h4Jw5nU
Claire Wendling: https://youtu.be/7ukExmlSRWU
Simon Bisley: https://youtu.be/Z2CZKX089w0
Travis Charest: https://youtu.be/ko7H8FGwks8
Carlos Pacheco: https://youtu.be/jFkqUtJ4mRM
Kevin Nowlan: https://youtu.be/ni30Hp72aeY
Joe Quesada: https://youtu.be/atXd2HbHYO8
Ryan Ottley: https://youtu.be/st31pTH3fFo
Frazetta Painting: https://youtu.be/aLAhVqh7qJQ
(Making master copies and drawing from memory)
Feng Zhu sketch studies:
Sketching 101: https://youtu.be/22XYoenU-0c
Just Draw!: https://youtu.be/WLqWX7onVmU
(importance of drawing from observation regularly)
Krenz Cushart: (turn on subtitles)
https://youtu.be/kbKqIJcIUCw
https://youtu.be/dgjx6y6B_G8
https://youtu.be/594WhCme2pQ
(importance of accuracy and master copies)
Jason Brubaker - memory drawing system
https://youtu.be/s_NuJIJ6wGY
https://youtu.be/G8e2DcN5kAo
https://youtu.be/S9Cx4pIjSvA
https://youtu.be/gkbQnBi_JqU
pdf: https://dreamco.com/pima/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/cognitive-drawing-202-sm.pdf
(He calls it cognitive drawing.)
(This is an extremely effective and organized way to apply memory drawing and iterative correction.)
(If you are scared of memory drawings, I highly recommend you do this. This iterative method lets you apply memory drawings in a very painless and stressfree way, because you have multiple chances to fix your mistakes.)
Jason's portfolio: https://www.artstation.com/jason_brubaker
(This guy is great, he did some phenomenal work for Kung Fu Panda)
Naoki Saito
How to copy art: https://youtu.be/B5QetP4aa8w
Fastest way to improve: https://youtu.be/8jsZGeaWkhE
This /asg/ guide is really good:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cK9q7oeFRE58MVaSgUql662iGqCXC8Ah/view
(importance of memory drawing)
KJG memory drawing:
https://youtu.be/yx6dbybn-rk
https://youtu.be/WKbQ4TPMkFc
https://youtu.be/-RFz2yFSBVc
(memory drawing and rotating objects from imagination)
Dave Rapoza on applying studies from memory:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4tttsdhn8o&t=733s
(repetitively studying the same subject + memory drawing)
Sycra
How to practice drawing: https://youtu.be/oKFfSl-EBfI
(Extremely important video. Get a reference image, then tell yourself:
I will not move on from this reference until I've drawn it 10x.
Or something like that. If it's a painted study, paint it 2 or 3 times before moving on. Draw the reference until it's easy for you. Only then, move on.)
(I recommend combining it wtih the Cognitive Drawing method from Jason Brubaker.)
Based Jimmy Miracle:
https://youtu.be/fkRmBqC7qf0
https://youtu.be/ULzw4-CI3tE
Madame Cave's "Drawing from Memory"
https://mega.nz/file/5dNC1QhR#jxNqbfNxHdDtau2sRDAIX8cUBItXKMLd9CFKgwDXo0I
(Introduction was written by THE Eugene Delacroix)
(You can execute the same process digitally, by pasting ref image to canvas, instead of tracing on gauze.)
Arthur Guptill
https://archive.org/details/sketchingrenderi00guptuoft/page/n1/mode/2up
https://archive.org/details/a.l.guptill1935
(totally complete drawing programs, from beginner to professional)
Animator Beast's gesture drawing practice
https://youtu.be/yHJXLdCVD18
https://youtu.be/7y99O3wm4Cg?t=6003
(gesture drawing with accuracy)
(Clip Studio Paint EX can handle this easily, just import an mp4 into the animation timeline.)
Kirk Shinmoto:
Master Copy: https://youtu.be/YVAtRojlCS8
Master Copy 2: https://youtu.be/cF2UtfFT7y8
Anatomy Books: https://youtu.be/9pAMqgJXcbw
(approaching master copies with construction)
Ethan Becker Dragging Art over Reference:
https://youtu.be/RXb-Y_kz2aU
(learning to draw on model)
Will Terrell on how to build a Visual Library:
https://youtu.be/pOK2sDLtu2Q
Josh Black's daily training routine:
https://youtu.be/ugiP3-32_9Y
https://youtu.be/hA9UP9ZoekI
Christophe Younge Painting tutorials
https://www.youtube.com/@christopheyoungart/videos
Painting studies:
Color Studies: https://youtu.be/1d577v_XBKA
Quick color studies: https://youtu.be/CVGZf5EQQK4
Ahmed Aldoori: https://youtu.be/3YXTlF4hzaE
Noah Bradley: https://youtu.be/kQfF-P70V2Q
Simplify drawing and painting: https://www.youtube.com/@SIMPLIFYDrawingandPainting/videos
Minimaru:
Hand & Feet practice: https://youtu.be/pDCL7s8JjDY
90 sec figures: https://youtu.be/d86hKJNehI8
Basic Proportions: https://youtu.be/avcygKfCoXQ
Basic Anatomy: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMzSsN13py1hIz1Q-s49LWF-IkKna9Swv
Hide Channel:
Croquis: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTY4AtphBe8NS7WFIMIhHIBJVk3xQvi-q
Recommended books: https://youtu.be/TBqEj3tKD6o
How to practice:
https://youtu.be/tMoubXBGloU
https://youtu.be/eCtLmBShSho
1st year: https://youtu.be/QgnLM73R8oM
(turn on cc. not all are translated, but draw along anyways!)
Manga Materials:
https://www.youtube.com/@mangamaterialsyoutube9454/videos
Important Fzd videos for concept art:
Ep 106: https://youtu.be/jRq9-QEz650 (Getting a job)
Jeff Watts on Memory Drawing:
https://youtu.be/-NIvZZ7x3dc?t=2715
qrbits course:
https://youtu.be/aMlTKtmczzM?t=754
(recommend watching all of it, but timestamped at the essential advice.)
Paul Angeli, Storyboarding Basics:
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLVbVJEmr29uNm61LWE6UWp8zOtT9OPDRz
Misc
(Everything below this is just miscellaneous stuff that's interesting. Not all of it is necessarily about how to make studies.)
Zapata Perspective: https://youtu.be/_9tcy2436iM
Jeff Watts on the time it takes to learn drawing: https://youtu.be/KX0MrnzBJ8M
PSG Art tutorial: http://androidarts.com/art_tut.htm
Beast Animator's streams: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLcZnl-xtyEqalCVkvhWr3FH8qp41QBJqF
Dan Thompson: https://www.youtube.com/@danthompsonfineart/videos
Don't practice: https://youtu.be/bFyxnYfZw2A
Rad Sechrist: https://radhowto.blogspot.com/
Neg Illustration Recommended books: https://youtu.be/Wy_4g-jTkgY
Steve Huston YT Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@STEVEHUSTONdrawsfromlife/videos
Alexander Mackendrick, on filmmaking: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLuntSxVsd5TNh8KJJysrDZCV8cz-ptFXI
Simon aka Teal Line guy's redlines:
https://imgur.com/gallery/8eHzD
Inkwell, art business advice: https://www.youtube.com/@Inkwell/videos
(extremely whitepilling advice for artists)
Natalie Nourigat
Gesture drawing: https://youtu.be/Fa9CLiGhWr4
Comics Advice:
https://homeiswheretheinternetis.blogspot.com/2015/04/advice-for-aspiring-comics-artists-14-18.html
Feature animation storyboarding advice:
https://homeiswheretheinternetis.blogspot.com/2017/09/animation.html
Joe Kubert mail order dvd course:
Pencilling: https://youtu.be/Zt_j70hzSrE
Inking: https://youtu.be/sDc1b5qNSNI
YenYen Animation lectures:
https://youtu.be/JUO3wrCnOFk
https://youtu.be/O84C_11MUXM
Saejinoh: Pain Process
https://archive.org/details/youtube-wRNj1h5tVG4
(Marine bootcamp style training. Not recommended for the weak of heart.)
Figure Drawing apps:
Gesture Drawing!: https://www.artstation.com/marketplace/p/k1Vq/gesturedrawing
Quickposes: https://quickposes.com/en/desktop-app
Posemaniacs: https://www.posemaniacs.com/tools/thirtyseconds
Animation reference:
https://setteidreams.net/settei/
https://www.sakugabooru.com/post
Glenn Vilppu:
https://tv.creativetalentnetwork.com/axChannel.php?id=58
https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV145411A7CV/
Craig Mullins Sijun Posts
https://archive.org/details/CraigMullinsSijunPosts
Recommended Books:
A redliner's advice
For the links in the above image, here's the thread: https://warosu.org/ic/thread/6809247#p6809772
/Mecha/ general op's advice
Tableguy's advice
Site: https://gvaat.com/blog/analyzing-capcoms-anatomy-guide-with-english-translation-part-1/
Velleity Art's advice
Slowpoke's advice
Note: Slowpoke has done over 2000 master copies!
Yoga Anon's advice
Pantsu Ripper's simple, but effective advice:
If you need to download the images here, get the extension "Save as PNG" because for some reason HackMD only lets you save XML files
How to learn to draw, for beginners
Disclaimer: You should probably mainly study from the above links. Learn from actual professionals, not some anon.
Step 1: Get some momentum on the basics
Get Andrew Loomis' "Figure Drawing for all it's worth" and John Buscema's "How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way". Read through these books, and accomplish the following, first:
If you feel like you don't know how to effectively memorize concepts from drawing books, just do this:
Jason Brubaker - memory drawing system
https://youtu.be/s_NuJIJ6wGY
https://youtu.be/G8e2DcN5kAo
https://youtu.be/S9Cx4pIjSvA
https://youtu.be/gkbQnBi_JqU
https://dreamco.com/pima/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/cognitive-drawing-202-sm.pdf
Just go through Loomis and Buscema and do memory drawings + copies of all the important diagrams (you don't have to do all of them). Then, take 15-20 minutes to doodle some figures on your own. etc.
Don't get stuck on this stage. Just get your mind around the basic concepts, then move onto the next step. You don't need to master anatomy or proportions at this stage, I just want you to be able to reproduce the most basic stuff from memory. You should know proportions. You should be somewhat familiar with the basic skeleton mannequin, and you should be familiar with where the muscles go. All of this will be refined as you make master copies and draw from life.
Yes, you will forget stuff, that's a normal part of the process. Just go back and review what you forgot. Relearning forgotten concepts actually makes them stick better.
Learning proportions and anatomy does not make you good at drawing. This is baby step one. The real thing that makes you good at drawing is the next step: shape, observation, and a sense of form and design. That is where the bulk of your studies should be, so please do not get stuck on this step.
Depending on how experienced you are, you may not be able to accomplish the 4 things I listed above. No matter. Just move on anyways, and start doing master copies. The more mileage you have, the easier it will be for you to understand what Loomis is talking about. Come back to Loomis when it gets easier for you. (Actually, my expectations for you are very low. I see what's posted in the /beg/ thread every day, and it's not promising.)
Other recommended books, to get familiar with the fundamentals:
Though all of the above are worth reading, I think Loomis' Figure Drawing book is the best book on drawing ever written, and you should probably prioritize him and memorize everything he has to say, along with all his other books. (Creative Illustration is amazing)
Maximum time: 3 months
(or, you can also do the next step right away, concurrent with this step.)
Alternately: ("JUST DRAW" MODE) Instead of "reading" (ew) Loomis, just get Morpho and do Cognitive Drawing on every single image, from cover to cover. Start with the simplified forms book, then do the main book, and then the hands + feet book, and then whatever other Morpho book you want. This is how Negu Illust. taught himself to draw: just by copying Morpho. The simplified forms book shows you all the steps to construct the figure with boxes, cylinders, spheres, and theoretically you shouldn't need any written instruction to understand it. There's nothing complicated about boxes or cylinders or construction in general. Just copy what you see, then do it from memory!
The above will probably take 2-3 years to finish all the morpho books, so mix in Master copies + imagination drawing with it. Do everything side by side.
Step 2: Master copies
This is where the bulk of your learning takes place. At this stage, you're going to get your favorite artist's work and copy them every single day. Just paper and pencil is fine, and just copy the linework, not the shading yet.
The reason I wanted you to speedrun Loomis' and Buscema's books is because I want you to do master copies asap. Studies, particularly master copies, are HOW you truly internalize what you learned from Loomis and Buscema. You will only finally understand the principles of form and gesture HERE by doing master copies. If you spend too much time on Loomis, without applying waht you learned to master copies, you will plateau and not see much progress.
Watch the David Finch study streams at the top of this page, along with the Jason Brubaker videos. That is how I want you to do these master copies. Copy the reference, then put away the reference and your drawing, and redraw it from memory. This is how you translate your copies into imagination work.
Some points to keep in mind:
To give you an idea of how much work it takes to learn to draw, Rad Sechrist said that you have to do master copies for 4 hours a day, for 4 years straight, in order to become a professional artist. Fortunately, master copies are a very pleasant and relaxing way to practice.
If you feel like you're forgetting your anatomy, do copies + memory studies on anatomy books. I like Bridgman, Taco, Morpho, etc. There are dozens of books out there.
Maximum Time: forever
Step 2.5: Life drawing / Landscape drawing
This is an optional step. Master copies are the only thing you need to get good, but there are benefits that come from drawing from life too.
The first benefit is to ground your art in some kind of reality. If artists just kept copying artists that came before them, overtime, art would degenerate into pure symbolism. People always seem to start exaggerating the features of the art they admire, and if each successive generation keeps exaggerating the art of the previous generation's, you end up with double, triple, quadruple exaggerations. Art no longer looks real, but you can escape this with life drawing. Think about traditional Chinese / Japanese art. It's all symbolism and convention.
The second benefit is that Life drawing teaches you the real form of what you're drawing. If you want to be a cartoonist, and all you're copying is lines, you may have trouble understanding exactly what those lines are representing. Drawing from photos / life helps cure that. You'll have an easier time rotating form and placing characters in difficult angles and poses. (To see the real form of something, drawing from life is better than photos.)
But, I still feel that life drawing is less important than master copies, because master copies are what actually teach you technique. It gives you the tools and knowledge to be able to depict life properly. This is easy to understand for artists who only draw in line, obviously, but it's also important for painters. Every drawing is a simplification of what you see in life, you cannot copy it perfectly. Master copies teach you how to simplify and design from life.
If you don't believe me, try drawing a tree from life. You will struggle with how to depict the leaves, how to draw the texture of the bark, how to draw the grass and roots and clouds, etc. There are infinite ways to apply pencil strokes to draw these textures. After struggling with this, go and find a great landscape artist's pencil drawing of a tree, and copy that. Copy every stroke and hatch pattern carefully. Then, go back to life. You'll then understand the importance of master copies.
Master Copies give you the foundation you need for drawing from life, and it's a good idea to do both for the rest of your life.
How do you find a good balance between master copies and life drawing? Actually, you can do whatever you want, as long as you get a bit of both.
Maximum Time: Forever
Step 3: Imagination work + Visual Libary
Start making finished art. Draw from imagination and apply what you learned from your studies. Find references for objects that you want to include in your finished work.
Start a portfolio of finished work. This is your gateway to becoming a professional artist. If you don't have a body of work, you have a lot to catch up on if you want to begin a career.
Keep studying! Begin each day with 1-2 hours of master copies / life drawing.
A really wonderful routine you might want to try is this: https://youtu.be/8jsZGeaWkhE
Basically you can divide up your day into this:
You can begin "step 3" as soon as you wish, even right from Day 1. I just divided this roadmap into 3 steps for clarity.
Conclusion
The 3 steps above are an arbitrary division. Begin your master copies alongside your fundamentals study, and begin making finished art alongside your master copies. There's no real division, because making master copies IS fundamentals study, and making finished art IS a way of studying your favorite artists. They're all interconnected.
If I had to weigh studies against drawing from imagination, I'd say that studies are definitely more important. This is because we humans only grow through "input". We become capable of doing more than we previously could by taking in knowledge from the world and encoding them into our brains. If all you ever do is draw from imagination, you're leaving it up to random chance that you'll improve.
However, I cannot overstate the importance of making finished work too. Drawing from imagination is a form of memory drawing. Honestly, you could just skip the Brubaker / Finch way of doing memory drawings and just do copies + draw finished work and you'll still be improving rapidly. Drawing from imagination is only a waste of time if you never do any studies at all.
You don't HAVE to copy something exactly to improve, by the way. Kim Jung Gi's recommended method of study is to observe something in the real world, then to draw it from various angles from memory. That is a form of "input". Boichi said in a video that he didn't have the time to set aside to practice drawing while creating a serialized manga, and that the way he still improved was by having photo references up while drawing his own manga pages. He talked about buying the Vagabond manga ebook and having it up on a second monitor, and he'd look up and incorporate hatching techniques from Vagabond into Dr. Stone. That too is another form of "input".
The more of a beginner you are, the more time you should spend just copying and memorizing things, rather than making art. As you get more advanced, slowly tilt the ratio, towards where you're mostly making art, wtih just a bit of study to warm up or end your day. Professionals mostly just make actual art, for most of their day, and they may or may not take some time, every few days, for study. Of course, the best ones continue studying for the rest of their career.
Q&A
Shading? Painting?
I like Andrew Loomis' "Figure drawing for all it's worth" the best. It can be confusing, though, to know how what he teaches transfers over to painting from imagination, if you don't understand the relationship between shape and form. Loomis tells you to just "draw the contours of the halftones, core shadow, and reflected light" and form will take care of itself. When I read this as a beginner, I hated it, because I thought I would be stuck painting from reference for the rest of my life, but once you paint enough, you realize you can actually start reproducing those shapes you observed from memory. You'll begin to see the same shadow shapes show up over and over again on the same body parts, and you'll be able to understand how shadow shapes relate to form.
It's the same thing as learning anatomy. You first learn anatomy by drawing the shapes you see from books or life, then you can eventually reproduce them from memory. This process speeds up though, if you regularly practice memory drawings. Memory drawings can be done on shadow shapes too. Refer to the image above, with the advice from the redliner.
Gesture drawing?
This can actually be a trap for beginners, because your proportions end up going wild. There's not enough accurate observation. I personally think the shortest amount of time you should be spending on a figure should be around 5-7 minutes, because that gives you enough time to be relatively accurate.
Gesture drawing was originally heavily emphasized by professional animators working at Disney, who wanted to take their animations to the next level. They were all already extremely good at drawing, and they just need to make their poses more lively. For that reason, the Walt Stanchfield and Michael Mattesi books are NOT good for beginners. Feel free to study them as you get more advanced.
I would not worry too much about practicing "being gestural". If you do enough master copies, and you're copying some artists with lively art, you will eventually get a feel for how to do it too. The ability to exaggerate and infuse your drawings with life comes from superb control and knowledge, NOT by flinging your lines around in a desperate, caricatured, "gestural" way. Kim Jung Gi never talked about gesture drawing, and he turned out fine.
Academic drawing?
I think this is actually a great thing to get into, provided you do memory drawings or spend some time drawing from imagination. Doing an extremely long and detailed master copy, plaster cast drawing, still life, spending several hours on this, then doing it from memory, is actually something that was practiced back in the 1800's in Paris. Horace Lecoq de Boisbaudran was a teacher at the Ecole, and he wrote one of the most hardcore drawing books out there, imo. It's called "The Training of the Memory in Art", and you can find it on archive (dot) org. He starts you out with severe exercises, like getting students to duplicate a vertical lines / geometric shapes that they see, as exactly as possible, by hand, but if you just read the book and take the thought process from it, you'll learn a lot. Most of the book is art education philosophy, not exercises.
A much better book than Boisbaudraun's is Madame Cave's "Drawing from Memory" / "Drawing without a master"
https://mega.nz/file/5dNC1QhR#jxNqbfNxHdDtau2sRDAIX8cUBItXKMLd9CFKgwDXo0I
It's always fascinating to look back at old artists and wonder how they were able to draw so well, but not only from reference, but from imagination. We're told by modern art teachers that academic drawing doesn't lead to drawing from imagination, but they way these guys did it, they COULD draw from imagination very well. The reason is that they not only did study anatomy, form, perspective, very deeply, but they also practiced memory drawing regularly.
Do I have to do memory drawings on EVERYTHING???
No, just do it on what you find important :). For example, I won't do memory drawings on how to draw a brick wall, because I'm pretty sure I can remember that easily. Many things you can just find reference for, as you're making finished work.
The most important things to remember are the shapes and forms of the human body. You never want to forget how to construct a face, for example.
When you do memory drawings, don't be overly ambitious. If you try to draw too much at once you won't remember it all. Just take a small part, say, an arm or a leg, then copy + redraw.
Do my memory drawings have to be exactly like the reference?
Actually, no. It's up to you whether you want them to be exactly like the reference. It's a great exercise to try to redraw what you did perfectly, and if you are doing the David Finch roadmap, you're meant to do that with Bridgman.
However, another way to do memory drawing is to simply draw from imagination. Say you just studied arms. Now, go draw more arms, from varying angles. This counts as memory drawings. Really, it's more like drawing from imagination. You're still pulling visual information from your mind and reinforcing shapes and forms.
This extends to anything. Say you just painted a portrait. Now, go paint another portrait from imagination. It doesn't have to be an exact duplicate. If you painted a woman's portrait from reference, now try painting a man's portrait. Many of the same shadows shapes and anatomy will carry over.
Doing memory drawings this way might be actually better than just redrawing what you did. It might be more fun to do it this way, and the gains are about the same. Plus, you will begin to learn what your weaknesses are and where you need to put more effort into studying.
Of course, feel free to just redraw what you just did. That works too, and you can more easily check your mistakes against the reference. This way, you can go back and forth between memory drawing and study, and you've got a sort of Cognitive Drawing thing going on. (Jason Brubaker links above)
Anyways, it's all up to you. The point is to study, then to reinforce what you studied with drawing from imagination. The key is to keep this relatively balanced, maybe 50-50, or 40-60. Again, up to you.
Perspective?
Yes, it's important to learn it, but contrary to what most people think, you don't really need to know it in depth for figure drawing. Most people are interested in drawing characters, so I'm having you do that right from the get go. Figure drawing is the hardest thing to learn in art, so you should start tackling that right from the beginning, and all the way until the end, forever.
Perspective, on the other hand, can be learned and mastered and finished. It's a finite skill. Learn it when you feel like you want to start drawing backgrounds and machineries and vehicles.
Yes, perspective is finite, but your visual library is infinite, and that's the fun part. The /mecha/ general op on /ic/ is a great example of someone who has mastered perspective, and is now just taking the time to learn how to draw actual objects from life. He'll spend some time studying guns, then some time studying tanks, etc. hopping from subject matter to subject matter. This is the real learning in perspective drawing. The rules should be covered quickly. Get to this part asap.
The best way to learn perspective is to refer to mecha gen's op's advice above. You can't miss it.
Boxes? Lines? Ellipses? Grinding?
I don't recommend a lot of "grinding". Stuff like drawing pages of boxes and lines and ellipses and stuff, that stuff is useful at first, but you'll quickly plateau. There will come a point where you will be able to draw a perfect box, and if you just keep grinding boxes, you'll stop improving. In other words, those skills can be "exhausted". What's worse is that if you just do master copies and draw from life, you'll continue to improve in those "grindable" skills anyways. You'll get more precise and you'll understand perspective better just by drawing a lot, so in my view grinding that stuff is useless.
If you do insist on grinding boring drawing exercises like these, do the ones in the Vilppu drawing manual, because you can train your 3d and 2d sense at once. It's essential to at least be able to freehand boxes and ellipses. (you can't draw cyborg girls without these skills) Keep these as warmups, and when you're good at them, move on. Value scales are also good for controlling your medium if you're drawing traditionally. You may also wish to work through Scott Robertson if you plan on drawing lots of environments, vehicles, for a concept art career.
How do I become a professional artist?
Git Gud.