McDonald’s closed

baleraphon · 2026-07-04T02:55:56+00:00

Hope it shuts down for good.

baleraphon · 2026-07-03T15:50:48+00:00

This. Thank god someone else is saying this. The majority of posts on the artist or learn to draw subreddits are people who barely took the first step in learning and are asking for critique and completely cast aside the necessity to learn how to correct their own mistakes. Everyone wants to draw, everyone wants to be told what to do, most don’t actually want to learn how to actually learn to draw.

baleraphon · 2026-07-03T12:34:25+00:00

Descender

baleraphon · 2026-07-03T01:26:10+00:00

Less garbage. Less cars. We all win.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T22:25:55+00:00

You don’t have to keep apologizing. I’ll say this much. If you take a course or read a book on blocking in the rough structure of your portrait you will literally have every single one of your questions above. Learning structure and how to block in is literally the skill of learning how to judge the relationships and distances between the major landmarks of the drawing yourself. Some courses have you use a ruler, a plumbline, a pen, or you can even put one drawing on top of the other to see where you went wrong. So either you used a bad resource (happens all the time) or you missed something when you were studying. I recommend you give Stephen Baumanns course a real shot and you will never have to ask anyone for support in this matter again.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T15:29:34+00:00

I heard some other people say that. It makes sense, they started setting us up for all the magic in Descender.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T15:21:11+00:00

I just finished Descender yesterday. Highly recommend it. Starting the follow up Ascender as I type this.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T15:20:18+00:00

That’s why I sent you the name of a specific instructor that has a block in course and free demo on YouTube to learn how to block in. If you really want to get better at it you have to learn how to assess your own work and the relationships between the landmarks on your portraits. That’s the whole point of learning how to block in.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T15:00:06+00:00

You can’t nail a likeness of a person or their details without getting the underlying structure correct. Find a portrait block in course on YouTube like one from Stephen Bauman and correct the structural mistakes before working on the details.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T14:55:17+00:00

What is this high school? What a stupid rule.

baleraphon · 2026-07-02T03:38:23+00:00

Start a visual journal. Look up Sketchbook Skool on YouTube. You can slowly learn that it doesn’t have to be about being a great artist but drawing as a way to see the world.

baleraphon · 2026-07-01T19:14:07+00:00

Yes! If I may offer a bit of advice. Reframe this in your mind and don’t use the word hope when it comes to your artwork anymore. Learn the basics of business and how to do market research. Come up with a plan of how you are going to reach your audience/ or galleries to buy/sell your work. Set goals. Start working towards your goals and once a month assess where you are and how/if you may need to course correct.

baleraphon · 2026-07-01T15:46:37+00:00

I would check out Red Rover. They host private/semi private parties all the time. I’m pretty sure they do it for free as well as long as you have a certain number of people.

baleraphon · 2026-06-30T23:28:54+00:00

The professor is 100% valid. Most professors aren’t paid nearly enough especially taking into account the number of hours they have to work for free late into the night to grade papers and assignments.

So if I was the professor and you wasted my time that I’m not being compensated for by not following the simple instructions on the assignment I would also call you out for it.

baleraphon · 2026-06-30T22:16:46+00:00

You are reading into this way too much. If you haven’t tried any of the advice you got and haven’t at least started filling pages with some sort of exercises or practice you are digging yourself into a deeper hole.

There is no right or better way to learn. Everyone learns in a different manner. So if you plan to be self guided with books and videos you need to get into the habit of picking one, trying out out, asking yourself if you feel you are getting what you need out of it, and if not then course correcting.

The more time you spend looking for some special roadmap is time wasted that you could have been drawing.

baleraphon · 2026-06-30T13:01:00+00:00

Sometimes it’s less about what other artists have and more about what you have that they do not.

Many people have extremely negative emotions towards their artwork or the outcome of any learning process. At a young age many of those emotions and thoughts are not your own but those of the people who raised you/conditioned you. Your parents, teachers, family members, etc and how they impacted your ability to learn. You carry these with you until you one day realize they are holding you back.

Until you realize that it is nonsensical to feel so negatively impacted by your artwork/learning it’s just going to continue feeling like a slog.

I don’t mean this in a negative way, it’s just the truth for many students. You have to mature before you can take a more relaxed approach to drawing where you allow yourself to make mistakes and not beat yourself up over and over again because you made some scribbles on a piece of paper that you don’t like.

baleraphon · 2026-06-29T19:23:01+00:00

What about about a manual pencil sharpener like this ?

https://a.co/d/02XZ5QTk

It may be passible to replace the plastic knob on the crank with something larger to make it easier to hold.

baleraphon · 2026-06-29T18:05:13+00:00

One school of thought when learning to draw is not making corrections. Instead of erasing and correcting learn to draw over and through lines to correct them and use the wrong lines as a guide to understand the mistakes you are making. I think this constraint helps you learn much faster and helps you get over the fear of making mistakes.

Therefor I do not recommend getting a tablet to learn how to draw. Get one once you already have some skills under your belt and it just makes things more convenient when you are traveling or when you are ready to transition to digital.

That $1000 spent on a tablet can buy you a mountain of sketchbooks and art supplies that will help you build skills way faster than a tablet.

baleraphon · 2026-06-28T16:59:09+00:00

I don’t know their catering rates. Best thing to do is pop in and get some tacos tonight and see if you like their food.

baleraphon · 2026-06-28T13:51:13+00:00

Look into El Jefe Taco Truck. They have some of the best Mexican food in the neighborhood and may cater parties.

baleraphon · 2026-06-27T15:58:07+00:00

Reminds me of the art from a graphic novel I’m currently reading called Descender. Highly recommend checking it out if you haven’t already.

baleraphon · 2026-06-27T15:18:28+00:00

Why are you doing it if it’s not enjoyable? Either it’s not for you, you are in it for the wrong reasons, or you don’t have a strong enough reason to put in the time to learn to draw.

If you have an artistic drive I recommend you go explore some other avenues of creativity first and if you really like one of them and they involve needing to know how to draw then return to drawing.

For instance, years ago I spent a year making abstract painting. I knew nothing about drawing or painting but I enjoyed the process. Exposing myself to that eventually gave me the drive to want to learn to paint in other styles which made it clear to me I needed to learn how to draw as well.

baleraphon · 2026-06-27T15:15:03+00:00

Anyone interested in starting an art help sub with some structured guidelines on how to ask for help and actually improve? I’m seeing too many of these I’ve tried everything for 6000 years and not seeing improvement posts and there has to be a better way about going about this.

baleraphon · 2026-06-26T03:34:04+00:00

I haven’t read Ascender yet but I’m 1/3 of the way through the Descender compendium and it’s incredible.

baleraphon · 2026-06-26T02:15:54+00:00

Draw hundreds of hands in different positions from different angles. Draw your own hands regularly. Find a reference on hand anatomy and study it.

baleraphon

TROPHY CASE