Drawing What You Can

Post by Elisabeth TenBrink Kelley, co-founder

     Hello there. If you guys have been reading my art posts, you'll notice that all I post are Photoshop tutorials, while the drawing tutorials are done by Catsi and guest bloggers. Why is this? Because I'm horrible at drawing. Seriously, I can draw two things with any decency: dragon and eyes. The dragons take over an hour, and can't have feet, and the eyes can't be in pairs. So, why the heck am I talking about drawing? What could I possibly have to teach you?
     Well, recently, I've started drawing eyes in my notebooks again, and making them more complicated. I've really been working on shading, making the highlights look right and whatnot. (When you only have a pencil, there isn't much you can do besides highlights.) But here's the thing: they look pretty cool. I'm getting better at them. I couldn't draw a face to save my life, but I can draw a single, unpaired eye pretty well. Well that's nice, you're thinking. But how does that apply to me?
     For one, it shows that even if you're crappy at something, you can still enjoy it. For two, if you simply draw what you can actually make work, you do gain proficiency. Someday I may be able to put my eyes on a person's face. Someday I may even be able to put two eyes on a person's face.
     So, even if you're a pathetic drawer (isn't there a better term for that?) like me, if you can find one thing you can draw decently, then you're on the right track. Eyes may lead to faces, faces to people, people to scenes. Don't give up because you feel that you can't draw. It's all a process. Just like writing, or poetry. The only difference is that it's easier to tell if you're doing well or not. Keep your old drawings, so you can see how far you've come.

     What do you say we all keep track, huh? I'll draw something today, keep it, and next year, same time, we'll all share them. Hopefully I won't be comparing two eyes.


Elisabeth TenBrink Kelley is an aspiring author and poet, as well as a failing artist. (But luckily, she doesn't plan to make a career out of that.) To learn more about her, see our About Us page. You can follow her on Twitter here: @ElisabethGTK.

Also, we have two contests currently open. One is for poetry, prose, and art, which you can find here. The deadline is this month, so hurry! We're particularly looking for prose and art submissions.
The other one is a holiday themed contest for poetry, which you can find here.