Are You Cheating in Art?

| Part 2
A quick refresher on the last article (Link) in this series. We talked about battling the Imposter Syndrome
and how the ‘Creative Gap’ can be addressed in beginners. We also understood how to distinguish
between an Inspiration, Interpretation and Imitation. The idea was to help navigate beginner artists in
identifying the best way to begin their projects and be honest about it.

In this article I shall talk about artistic techniques to achieve desirable results and the general perception
around certain techniques in art. Honesty in art is about the intent and not the means of creating. Art is a
form of expression for an artist. A very broad subject but I will try my best to keep it short and precise.

Many purists or traditionalists feel almost cheated when new age artists try methods out of the ordinary
or something that helps them achieve a faster results. Many techniques unfortunately get termed as cheat
codes or short-cuts and even get frowned upon. There are two ways to look at this; Expression and Skill.
The only way to navigate your approach through this and not feel guilty about any methods that you
would want to adopt is “Identify your Objective as an Artist”.

Beginners could benefit a lot from a little introspection before they begin their journey as artists.
These very simple questions can help you prioritize your approach towards your art and be realistic about
it. Building skills requires time, effort, and years of practice and patience. Refining a particular technique
might interest you if you’re a perfectionist, but can be quite frustrating in the beginning. Which brings me
to the crux of this article and the biggest struggle for beginner artists – Drawing Techniques.

If I started listing down the range of drawing techniques, this article could very well become a whitepaper
on that. But, we are going to address just the basic and the most crucial part of replicating or imitating an
existing image or subject – the initial sketch. For people who do not believe in sketching and are far more
comfortable painting directly without a sketch, this should not be an area of concern for obvious reasons.
This is specifically for people who prefer observing and learning from replicating images, drawing still life
or replicating visuals from around them.

Perfect drawing and sketching are skills that aren’t imperative to be an artist. Yes, that’s right. If I stick to
my definition of an artist, the skills and techniques matter as much as you make them to be. If you struggle
with a certain method to achieve the desired results, you can always find an alternative which can aid you
to overcome that struggle. Skills and techniques in art are just that – aids. While drawing accurate images
freehand is considered to be the most sacred and definitely one of the most admirable skills one can have,
it’s not a necessity… unless you want it to be. While some might be gifted in this skill, many take years of
practice to perfect it. Impressive skills and techniques can make artists truly exceptional and quite revered
for their art. However, it took them years of practice, insight and patience to get there and there are no
shortcuts to that.

Since this series is mostly meant for beginners, I will talk about three main techniques that can be used
for drawing and sketching your subject with ease. The focus of each of these techniques will differ as per
the objective of the artist.

1. Grid Method
One of the most popular methods of drawing, this technique allows you to break down your reference
image into smaller shapes. It helps one work on their observational skills and approach the subject in
smaller shapes and not as a whole subject. It is also quite an inexpensive way of replicating your subject
to great levels of accuracy. One can scale up and scale down the image as per convenience and it’s a great
way to work on your drawing skills.

There are plenty of videos online which can guide you in this method. The method could be slightly tedious
with the math involved. However, I found this really simple tutorial on the grid method which can help
you with the math behind it.

The downside of the grid method is that it does leave way for inaccuracies in really complicated images,
especially if you got the math or the placement wrong. There is also a chance that a mistake in one section
can get magnified across the grid as you progress without realizing the mistake. This usually happens
because we see each section in isolation.

2. Proportional Dividers
I’m quite surprised that these ingenious tools don’t get the exposure they deserve. A proportional divider
is yet another instrument that can help train the eye and hand in understanding proportions when
replicating a subject. Believe it or not, Leonardo Da Vinci was believed to be a great proponent for these
astonishingly simple yet effective devices. A Proportional Divider can also help you scale up or scale down
any image or subject of reference.

The advantage of using a divider is that you need not depend on a print out in order to replicate it. Watch
how Mr. Mark Carder, an artist, demonstrates the use of a proportional divider in this video (Proportional
divider — The basics). It’s astonishing how they have stopped teaching how to use this tool even in
established art schools, given how useful and effective using this can be. One can even make this tool at
home using cardboard or spare wood lying around and completely change their approach to drawing with
accuracy. Listen to Stefan Baumann explain how this tool can help you train yourself to draw with
maximum accuracy using a reference image in this video (Proportional Divider The Best Keep Secret to
Improve Your Drawing).

Using a proportional divider may be slightly more time consuming depending on how detailed and
intricate your reference image is, but it is definitely a fool-proof method to get accurate drawings and will
also train you to draw free hand eventually.

3. Tracing / Light Box / Projectors

Coming to our third technique and the most debated one at that – Tracing. Before I write on this topic, I
want to just put it out there that even the most established artists out there practice this technique and
we’ve had enough shaming around it.

Talking about the pros of tracing, it not only saves one hours of sketching time, but also helps get very
accurate sketches. Watercolorists prefer tracing their sketched on the paper because too much erasing
can really damage the very expensive watercolor paper and make it unfit for painting. Tracing helps reduce
errors and transfers the image most effectively to watercolor paper. In fact, many artists trace their own
sketches onto watercolor paper to avoid damaging the paper.

Talking about errors, we need to acknowledge that painting and sketching are two very different skills
with very different approaches. A beginner who wishes to perfect his/her painting techniques and
broaden his/her understanding of the nature of the paint medium they are using, sketching just becomes
another hurdle. It can be quite demotivating for a beginner to find the final result suffer due to inaccurate
sketches despite using perfect painting techniques. It’s quite alright to trace an image and practice
painting over the traced images. It all boils down to what your objective is from a certain project - Painting
or sketching? Tracing will not be able to train you on sketching and accurate drawings. But if that’s not
your objective, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with it.

One can use various methods of tracing. Using light boxes, projectors, or even a simple window on a bright
sunny day. You needn’t spend a fortune to be able to trace. A light box can easily be created at home
using a glass sheet and a wooden box with a bright bulb inside. Projectors are also quite a common way
to trace in case you want to scale up an image, however, there can be scope for distortion. The major
drawback of this technique is that the reference image should be the exact same size of your final drawing.
Some trace the image on tracing paper and then transfer the graphite onto the watercolor sheet by
drawing again behind the image. There are plenty of phone apps which can help you trace directly onto
the paper. This article (Six Simple Art Tracing Methods) can help you identify all possible ways of tracing
an image. I would suggest try as many techniques as possible and pick a favorite. Sometimes you might
want to use different techniques for different styles of drawings.
All of the above techniques might struggle in helping you draw images out of your imagination. Since
accuracy requires skill and practice, don’t let it hold you back from expressing. Great art is rarely about
accuracy and more about what you express and how it connects with the audience. My suggestion would
be try all techniques possible and choose what works for you.

Any form of expression or communication is always driven by an objective of the communicator. If you
figure out your objective as an artist, the creation process becomes a lot more enjoyable and guilt-free.
An artist needs to impress himself/herself before he/she can impress the world. Hope this helps you make
peace with your creation process and feel good about everything you create here on.