Art Tutorials, Books, and References

[artinfo4all]

Figure Drawing, Animating, Cartooning, Graphic Design, Illustration, and yes... manga books. Mostly the ones that teach you more about the e

Art and Learning should not be restricted by your financial abilities.

[jojo-the-dogg0]

Equiping an armor tutorial

i'll prob make more bc i love talking ab armors

[jeansvoid]

Art school made me realise that no matter how bad the imposter syndrome got, no matter how different every artist was, we all had different qualities the other admired.

[niyarest]

can someone explain what he's talking about i got distracted by his giant jiggling honkers badonkers

[x]

[niyarest]

[sakuu]

(Xユーザーの게게겍さん: 「https://t.co/JluJaEcszv」 / Xから)

[magicratfingers]

did u know u could just draw bad and nothing happens did u know that

[magicratfingers]

girlies are u doing ok

[magicratfingers]

oh no girlies

[midwinterhunt]

hot artists don't gatekeep

I've been resource gathering for YEARS so now I am going to share my dragons hoard

Floorplanner. Design and furnish a house for you to use for having a consistent background in your comic or anything! Free, you need an account, easy to use, and you can save multiple houses.

Comparing Heights. Input the heights of characters to see what the different is between them. Great for keeping consistency. Free.

Magma. Draw online with friends in real time. Great for practice or hanging out. Free, paid plan available, account preferred.

Smithsonian Open Access. Loads of free images. Free.

SketchDaily. Lots of pose references, massive library, is set on a timer so you can practice quick figure drawing. Free.

SculptGL. A sculpting tool which I am yet to master, but you should be able to make whatever 3d object you like with it. free.

Pexels. Free stock images. And the search engine is actually pretty good at pulling up what you want.

Figurosity. Great pose references, diverse body types, lots of "how to draw" videos directly on the site, the models are 3d and you can rotate the angle, but you can't make custom poses or edit body proportions. Free, account option, paid plans available.

Line of Action. More drawing references, this one also has a focus on expressions, hands/feet, animals, landscapes. Free.

Animal Photo. You pose a 3d skull model and select an animal species, and they give you a bunch of photo references for that animal at that angle. Super handy. Free.

Height Weight Chart. You ever see an OC listed as having a certain weight but then they look Wildly different than the number suggests? Well here's a site to avoid that! It shows real people at different weights and heights to give you a better idea of what these abstract numbers all look like. Free to use.

[narrettwist]

Homie gonna share this

[eameschairs]

me and @microbiologistmusings made a guide! we were talking about how frustrating it can be when so much (well meaning!) art of wheelchair users seems to get the chairs...not quite right. so maybe this will help :) i had a lot of fun drawing it and thank u to levi for your unending wisdom <3

[miyuliart]

I collected my art tips on hands over the years. It ended up being 54 pages of notes I took and some guides I tried to create for myself. Maybe some of these can be useful to others as well. You can buy the pdf here or join my Patreon to get it for free.

[soundlesswind]

Bit of fun on twitter, where I talked about balance and visual information. Because it’s also good basic drawing concepts to keep in mind, I decided to post here, also.

[anyrava]

I made a detailed rock painting guide (Includes some rendering basics too!)

You can find more tutorials on my Ko-Fi Shop if you've found this helpful! 🫶🍃

Visit Anyrava's Shop!

I've opened a shop. Come take a look!

[amezure]

Support me on PATREON or Ko-fi 💕

[penbrydd]

Name Reources

So, you’re writing a thing, and you need to name a character. And, as we all know, naming a character is a giant pain in the ass. I offer this list of shit I use pretty regularly, for this purpose.

Behind the Name (The etymologies are weird as fuck, in a few places, but it’s great if you’ve got a name and need to find other names that are from or derived from the same culture/language)

Behind the Surname (BTN for family names)

Academy of Saint Gabriel Medieval Names Archive (This is the go-to for medieval names in Europe and the Near East. Hardcore scholarship and a distinct lack of fucking around.)

Kate Monk’s Onomastikon (The original internet name resource.)

The Soldier in Later Medieval England (Actual names from English military rolls around the Battle of Agincourt)

England’s Immigrants (Non-native residents of England, 1330-1550)

Celtic Personal Names of Roman Britain

Mapping the Medieval Countryside - People (People appearing in English inquisitions post mortem, 1418-1447)

Wiktionary’s Index of Biblical Names

Ancient Names Galleria (The weird shit is here. If you need Akkadian or Phoenecian names, those are totally covered.)

Trismegistos People (Names extracted from the Trismegistos Texts – mostly names from Graeco-Roman Egypt.)

Personally, I use the shit out of Trismegistos People, England’s Immigrants, and the Ancient Names Galleria. If you’ve got good sources I didn’t hit, feel free to add them in a reblog. I’m always looking for more good name resources. (And almost all of what I have is Europe and the Near East, with a little North Africa.)

[penbrydd]

Dropping this update in the most recent reblog in my notes, in the hopes it falls into as many laps as possible. Here’s some more good sources for names, this time with a more African focus.

Wikipedia Category: Surnames of African Origin (which is helpfully divided into sections by language)

Wikipedia Category: Amharic Language Names (I believe this list is primarily, if not entirely, given names.)

 YorubaName (“an online intervention to preserve and document all Yorùbá names in a multimedia format.”)

Writing Adolescent Fiction: Character names: Kenyan, Tanzanian and Ugandan (a list of given names and surnames with notes on how full names are constructed in each culture listed)

Again, if you know any good sources, particularly for regions I haven’t covered, let me know!

[penbrydd]

Rebageling with some more good shit:

So You Want to Name a Sino (a fairly detailed guide on how to name a Chinese character without sounding like too much of a moron)

Most Popular Baby Names for Girls Since 1960 (most popular American girls’ names, by state, from 1960-2012, as a gif)

Popular Baby Names (the US Social Security database of naming trends in the US, with search options for date, gender, location, and trend)

A Guide to Names and Naming Practises (a UK government guide to common names and structure of names from around the world, split first by continent and then by culture. PDF.)

Curiosities of Puritan Nomenclature (an entire book on trends in English naming and name structure and the Puritan influence, from 1880. PDF.)

Things I am particularly looking for reliable sources for, if you’ve got them: North and South American aboriginal names, Southeast and East Asian names, names from the former USSR, Australian aboriginal names. (All of these by culture or language family, if possible, not just by current national borders.)

[kotori-mochi]

Can't afford art school?

After seeing post like this 👇

And this gem 👇

As well as countless of others from the AI generator community. Just talking about how "inaccessible art" is, I decided why not show how wrong these guys are while also helping anyone who actually wants to learn.

Here is the first one ART TEACHERS! There are plenty online and in places like youtube.

📺Here is my list:

Proko (Free)

Marc Brunet (Free but he does have other classes for a cheap price. Use to work for Blizzard)

Aaron Rutten (free)

BoroCG (free)

Jesse J. Jones (free, talks about animating)

Jesus Conde (free)

Mohammed Agbadi (free, he gives some advice in some videos and talks about art)

Ross Draws (free, he does have other classes for a good price)

SamDoesArts (free, gives good advice and critiques)

Drawfee Show (free, they do give some good advice and great inspiration)

The Art of Aaron Blaise ( useful tips for digital art and animation. Was an animator for Disney)

Bobby Chiu ( useful tips and interviews with artist who are in the industry or making a living as artist)

Second part BOOKS, I have collected some books that have helped me and might help others.

📚Here is my list:

The "how to draw manga" series produced by Graphic-sha. These are for manga artist but they give great advice and information.

"Creating characters with personality" by Tom Bancroft. A great book that can help not just people who draw cartoons but also realistic ones. As it helps you with facial ques and how to make a character interesting.

"Albinus on anatomy" by Robert Beverly Hale and Terence Coyle. Great book to help someone learn basic anatomy.

"Artistic Anatomy" by Dr. Paul Richer and Robert Beverly Hale. A good book if you want to go further in-depth with anatomy.

"Directing the story" by Francis Glebas. A good book if you want to Story board or make comics.

"Animal Anatomy for Artists" by Eliot Goldfinger. A good book for if you want to draw animals or creatures.

"Constructive Anatomy: with almost 500 illustrations" by George B. Bridgman. A great book to help you block out shadows in your figures and see them in a more 3 diamantine way.

"Dynamic Anatomy: Revised and expand" by Burne Hogarth. A book that shows how to block out shapes and easily understand what you are looking out. When it comes to human subjects.

"An Atlas of animal anatomy for artist" by W. Ellenberger and H. Dittrich and H. Baum. This is another good one for people who want to draw animals or creatures.

Etherington Brothers, they make books and have a free blog with art tips.

As for Supplies, I recommend starting out cheap, buying Pencils and art paper at dollar tree or 5 below. For digital art, I recommend not starting with a screen art drawing tablet as they are more expensive.

For the Best art Tablet I recommend either Xp-pen, Bamboo or Huion. Some can range from about 40$ to the thousands.

💻As for art programs here is a list of Free to pay.

Clip Studio paint ( you can choose to pay once or sub and get updates)

Procreate ( pay once for $9.99)

Blender (for 3D modules/sculpting, ect Free)

PaintTool SAI (pay but has a 31 day free trail)

Krita (Free)

mypaint (free)

FireAlpaca (free)

Libresprite (free, for pixel art)

Those are the ones I can recall.

So do with this information as you will but as you can tell there are ways to learn how to become an artist, without breaking the bank. The only thing that might be stopping YOU from using any of these things, is YOU.

I have made time to learn to draw and many artist have too. Either in-between working two jobs or taking care of your family and a job or regular school and chores. YOU just have to take the time or use some time management, it really doesn't take long to practice for like an hour or less. YOU also don't have to do it every day, just once or three times a week is fine.

Hope this was helpful and have a great day.

[kotori-mochi]

Incase people missed this.

[vyeoh]

New Frame Plus for character animation! Incredible analysis by the guy that used to do Extra Credits

[homochadensistm]

Ppl who say that art is "inaccessible" aren't saying it because learning it is expensive or costs money, they're saying it because they're too lazy to learn and don't want to put in the time and effort.

[rosslynpaladin]

^THis. I am a disabled person who went to a small private atelier with a classical foundation and a killer understanding of working in the art field from game design to galleries. I left with 5 years of higher ed and went on to illustrate childrens' books.

[butchlinkle]

historically, pixel art was rendered on limited hardware, there were strict limits on how many colours could be displayed on screen at once and in a single sprite.

These limits no longer exist, so you are no longer beholden to any of them. Despite what you might hear in certain pixel art spaces, there aren’t really any rules anymore, because there’s no technical limitations forcing you to work a specific way. You can make your pixel art have as many colours as you want, be whatever size you like, and have as many frames as you want it to.

However! the smaller you make a sprite, the harder things will become to read unless you shrink down the number of colours in equal measure.

In a photo you might have. i dunno. 1,000,000 pixels in it or something like that. Thats like a really small photo but that’s still so many pixels that you don’t really notice any of them individually. They all blend together into one big mass to tell you what you’re looking at in groups of hundreds!

On the other hand, in a 16x16 sprite you’ll only have 256 of them. Every single individual pixel can have something to say!

But if every pixel is trying to say something at once, it muddies the sprite and makes it hard to read. However, if a group of pixels are all the same colour, they’re all saying the same thing, and it becomes a lot easier to understand what you’re looking at.

like, for example, take a look at this 16x16 crop of a random photo.

does that look like a whole lot of nothing? yeah . theres 256 pixels, and theres 256 colours. the pixels aren’t really working together to tell you anything, so instead it just becomes one big vague mass. if i reduce the colour count to just 6 colours and increase the contrast, though,

it starts to look less like visual noise, and more like water at sunset!

The contrast is important - part of why you want to keep your colour count low is to make groups of pixels distinct from each other.

But, how exactly do you keep your colour count low, anyway?

a colour ramp refers to the gradient of colours in your palette that are used to shade one particular colour, such as tempests hair or her skin

instinctively you’re probably going to want to make individual gradients of colour for each of these things.

however, if you connect these ramps together, you can greatly reduce the number of colours you’re using in your piece. This also helps create a cohesive palette!

when it comes to connecting ramps, value matters much more than individual hues. you want to have a good range of values to have a readable sprite!

I think actually a really good example of value mattering more than hue in sprites, is this guide to anti aliasing by pixeljoint user ptoing

also just generally good advice, but take a look at this bit in particular

despite the wildly varying hues, they work together just fine. by focusing on the value when you combine your ramps, you can create some really interesting colour palettes!

anyway. now for some vaguer notes on how i do lighting

anyway thems just some thoughts for you all

[eldritchdilf-deactivated2025061]

Contrary to popular belief the biggest beginner's roadblock to art isn't even technical skill it's frustration tolerance, especially in the age of social media. It hurts and the frustration is endless but you must build the frustration tolerance equivalent to a roach's capacity to survive a nuclear explosion. That's how you build on the technical skill. Throw that "won't even start because I'm afraid it won't be perfect" shit out the window. Just do it. Just start. Good luck.

[eldritchdilf-deactivated2025061]

I'm getting jumped in the notes here with "easier said than done" and that's true, so I am by NO MEANS a professional with professional-level art off the top of my head here's some tangible things to help with your frustration tolerance.

It never goes away. Like. Literally ever. "It's so hard and I keep stumbling over it" yeah. Never goes away. For anyone. Keep that in mind.

While you do have to train your eye to get better at drawing, which means you have to look at good art, you also have to stop only looking at artwork made by professionals or people who've been doing it longer than you. Jealous of another 21-year-old whose art is better than you? Block or mute. Lol. It doesn't matter who cares. Jealousy is ugly and you should work on that but feelings like that don't just go away and so if it's not hurting anyone just get that out of your sight. Unblock/mute when you're in a better headspace.

If you can't keep your drawings to yourself then have a dedicated set of artist friends to complain with or hold each other accountable. Preferably people of your same skill level. And no I don't mean a huge discord server full of randos, like, your actual friends, chances are you're only going to get your feelings hurt if in you're some huge buttfuck discord server where people are busy doing god knows what and they either ignore your posts or just leave reacts.

What actually helps ease this is by practicing in bulk. Everyone tells you art is like a muscle and you have to train it constantly, with rest, but constantly. And what this means realistically is you're more likely to learn by drawing something repetitively. Say you're struggling to draw a profile. Don't waste hours getting one drawing of a profile right. If it sucks just start over again. Repeat. Literally the fastest and most efficient way with almost every drawing roadblock is just start over again. The time will pass anyways etc etc.

Confidence is won through effort! Confidence is not so much a feeling as it is the cumulative result of the work you put in. (I read this on reddit one time and never forgot it.)

6. This is a really tough one but you'll have to substitute motivation for discipline.

7. I mean. You don't have to be good at art man. It's fine. You do have to weigh in how much you actually want to get to a certain skill level and weigh it against the amount of effort you're willing to put in. If you're fine where you are that's fine!!! It's fine!!!

[l-a-l-o-u]

My advice to every artist (and honestly, everyone, but it’s especially relevant if you want to make art yourself) is to learn to appreciate everything other people make. Especially things you don’t like! Look at weird, ugly, bad art, with clashing colors and weird proportions and botched perspective and tropey subjects. Look at things made by amateurs an hobbyists and children, with shaky lines and incomprehensible detail. Look at everything you might find cringe or unpleasant - look at furries and gore and fetish porn and all the niche fandom crossovers. Look at art from cultures you don’t know well, look at things made hundreds of years ago, look at paintings from art movements you don’t know or don’t like at the museum. Look at photography and sculptures and fashion shows and murals on buildings and the design of everyday objects like chairs or lampposts or cars. Look at animation and comics and advertising, even the design on your cereal box.

And each time you look, try to find one thing you can appreciate about it. It’s fine if you don’t enjoy the art, but try to find something in it that has value, something you can respect about it, something that moves the world. It can be mastery of a technique, it can be the emotion conveyed, the thought it provoked, it can be color choice, composition, originality, or it can simply be the act of creation itself. Even in art that makes you uncomfortable, art that you find disgusting or bland or vile or ugly or just lame. You need to learn to see it. It’s ALWAYS there. Really look for it. Because you can learn from every single one of these things. Ask yourself why the artist made this, why they made it in this way. Wonder what someone other than you might see that you don’t see, if it has a meaning you just can’t grasp.

You will learn about the value of art, what it means to create, what it means to be human. If you can appreciate those things, it’ll reflect in how you make your own art. Not only will it deepen your relationship to art as a whole, but it’ll allow you to jump past the initial instinct to look away and give you the opportunity to notice techniques and patterns that you maybe wouldn’t have thought to use otherwise! You can learn from the masters, but you can also learn from everyone else. Learn to see the soul in art! I promise it’s worth it.

[l-a-l-o-u]

Great tags on this one so far, you guys GET IT!!