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eliciaforever-deactivated201906

Why do artists refuse to use references why why why.

It’s not a contest to see who can get by without them. It’s not cheating to look at a thing in order to know what the thing looks like.

You don’t get stronger or better by pretending. Nobody is impressed by the awkward whatever-it-is you just drew. Use references.

wolveswithhats

I don’t think a lot of people know that it’s not cheating. I recall seeing so many piece of art called out because they referenced a pose, someone recognized it, and then proceeded to shame them for it. There’s this belief, both by creators and the audience, that artists should just be able to translate the ideas from their head to paper, and if they don’t, it’s plagiarism, or not true originality (spoiler alert: there’s no such thing).

I myself didn’t start using references until very recently, because even I was under the impression that it was frowned upon. And that belief has seriously crippled and stalled my ability to improve as an artist.

priderising

As a restarting artist, I can confirm. I just never knew. I thought you were just supposed to know how to draw the body correctly and if you didn’t you had no talent.

reapergrellsutcliff

(( I am going to say this again, loud and clear for everyone:

USING REFERENCES FOR ART IS NOT ‘CHEATING’!!!

If you can draw/paint without references, great! But if you need to use them, and feel that your art can be bettered by using references, please, use them! This is one of the biggest tips I can give to artists, is USE REFERENCES!

Anyone who would dare to attack someone for using references after ‘recognizing a pose’ is a dipshit, who doesn’t know a thing about art.

Do you know who else used references for their art?

Norman Rockwell

Alphonse Mucha

Gustav Klimt

Toulouse Lautrec

Vincent Van Gogh

Paul Gauguin

Edgar Degas

Gil Elvgren

Frida Kahlo

Pablo Picasso

Disney Studios

And thousands of others! So, artists! Go forth, and use references!!! ))

armellin

What do you think artists do when they ask someone to stand infron of them for 6 hours and then they draw this person. Do they cheat? Or when they place a still life and then paint it, cheating again? LOL

euclase

#literally one of the biggest fears I have #is for some douchefuck to dig out my reference #and point at it and say that I’m not a real artist #I don’t want you to dig out my references to prove that I didn’t make up a realistic picture out of fucking thin air #that’s not how art works #but especially on this site it happens CONSTANTLY #it’s so fucking scary #when people who’ve never touched a pen in their lives think they’re qualified to judge you #and ‘reveal’ how you’ve ‘scammed’ people

Soooo. I made this post originally on my personal blog (I’m eliciaforever), and it was nothing more than a little rant about a specific incident that I deleted after five minutes. But before I could delete it, it took the hell off on me, and now it has all these notes. And LOTS OF AMAZING INPUT.

And I just wanted to add in response to the above tags in particular, that shaming people for using references is something that happens to so many of us SO OFTEN. It doesn’t matter how skilled you are. People think art is supposed to be magical or whatever, and anything else is a crime. The reality of course is that art is a thousand times more deliberate than a lot of people think it is.

So yeah. Good info to pass along. Use references, kids. <3

lindblut

Reblogging because I think it’s important especially for young artists to gain the confidence to use references.

Seriously, references are esssential! Use them!

artgroves

USE REFERENCES. Improve your observation skills and hand/eye coordination. Improve your understanding of the body’s workings and the life and objects around you. Improve your skills. ART IMITATES LIFE. USE REFERENCES AND FUCK THE HATERS.

me: man, i need to make friends

someone: hey stranger you wanna make friends

me: is this a fucking spam blog

#i love it when i fuck up like that

Thank you for dealing with my selfishness until now.

And i’m sorry.

#touhou #touhou ctc #concealed the conclusion #reimu hakurei #art

artfromsaturn

Weird Character Generator

I recently discovered that you could make a small, basic generator in twine. As someone who’s always wanted to make their own generator, I took to abusing it right away. Two days of work later, the Weird Character Generator was born.

Since I got tired of character generators that gave me regular characters with regular flaws, this generator focuses on the wacky side of characters. There’s probably 100 or more different phrases for each of the four generator categories (an adjective, a noun, fun fact 1 & fun fact 2), so the results are endless. The generator contains swearing and references to drug use, so keep that in mind if you open it up in a public area. :v

Feel free to draw or share your results with me by @ing me at @orpheuscollective, or tagging it as #weird character generator so I can see it later :)