Im currently drawing heads and faces (i just began doing it for the first time) and im not sure about
how to use my hand and hold the pen/pencils correctly. Im left-handed.
I have learned to draw (from the book "Drawing on the right side of the Brain" by Betty Edwards),
blind conture drawing, and i normally can draw good at slow or fast speed, by observing the movements and
not getting a wobbly grip. I resist to not to gobble a Château de Art, to get a steady hand :)
What bothers my is that most of the time i feel not like drawing lines exactly how they should be. This results
in lines that are different, especially in crosshatching. Its not pleasing when in a drawing some crosshatched
areas look much different than others in terms of spacing beetween the lines and thicknesses
I think my problem is that i hold the pen wrong, or choose a wrong grip for the current situation. I observe the lines i have
drawn before, and try to apply the same pressure and speed until the look about the same. This happens in erasing WAY TOO OFTEN.
So, i got told and i see some artists hold their pens very loose and much at the end of the pen, to swing around softly and sketching the first
loose lines to make a start. Gripping it tighter when the shapes become more clearly, and so on. But still i do a lot of different
drawing styles, scribbling for example where each scribble looks different from the one before, or the ones i did on the last day.
So its very hard to draw the lines or style from the day before, especially when the pencil wears down and i have to sharpen it.
Is there a hint of sharpening pencils to achieve the same thicknesses of lines always?
Because when i draw a line where the tip has become not sharp enough anymore, its already too late.
I currently use 2 pencils, one for thicker lines and one being very pointy for thin lines.
Thats something i came up with, maybe just a stupid workaround.
Then i draw some dynamic lines (which im best in i think), above the inferior drawn sketch to ink the lines.
I have no chance to visit an artschool or course here or get a teacher (except those cheap artcourses who are not knowing anything about this
as i experienced before). In books i rarely find anything about it.
If someone who reads this thinks its a good idea of recording a video or
posting example images of this problem is a good idea, i would do it,
i have the time. And because i have the time i thought about making an thread or kind of blog where i post my experiences and observations,
maybe to verify if something i experience is wrong or to help others. I already write down when i feel its something new i learned and how i did it. Not always
i can remember by just looking at previously drawn pictures how i achieved them. Maybe someone here would like to see what a bald bearded
beginner encounters, hehe.
Some additional info:
All my years in school 15+ years ago i ALWAYS neglected to write something by hand because my hand hurted from writing, i couldnt write good,
because by writing a bit, my hand began to hurt and the thumb got a cramp easily (like always). I grabbed the pen like a sword and broke some pencils
or ballpens just because of the pain and that i could not keep up the writing speed when it was needed (ie. at a dictation).
Yes, this was a cause of stress and frustration that time, as i can reflect today, but lead to a very bad handwriting (and a complete failure of grades) for
the following years and still until today.
