Day #87 of Figure Construction - Really quick & dirty leg anatomy study - like barely half an hour. The main reason for this is my wrist. I work in IT and use the computer mouse quite a bit and for the longest time, things have been fine.

I don't know if it's me getting older or the intense gesture grind I did over the past few weeks or a combination of both. BUT. I've noticed a slight pain or throb I should say in my dominant wrist, even when it's at rest.

Now earlier this year I tried my hand at Squash for the very first time and I did something wrong, because I struggled to hold anything firmly in my right hand afterwards for like a week.

So I might have to go on a break were I rest my wrist as much as possible. I can't tab out of work. It's not that bad. It's just that I noticed it. But it is super important to nip this kind of thing in the bud. Hence the tiny studies.

I have a 2 week vacation coming up next month, so I might take that as a no draw, no mouse clicking rest period. That might help.

In the mean time, I guess I gotta be a bit more diligent with the wrist stretching. It seems to help, even if for just a brief period.

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Day #86 of Figure Construction - More leg anatomy! The groove is coming back, which is fantastic news. Wrist still hurts a bit, but I stop rather than push through.

I should also start implementing some wrist exercises to stop/prevent further damage. One is to put both palms together in a prayer while letting your elbows touch. Then gently push your wrists down towards your belly button, letting your elbows slide out to the sides. Once your wrists have reached their destination, hold it there for 5-10 seconds.

I should do that now.

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Day #85 of Figure Construction - More anatomy for the leg, this time the underside plus some buttocks action. Simplistic and short study, but every line counts and I really need to grease the wheels of habit. I don't know if that ever was a phrase, but it sure is now.

I'll take tomorrow off because that's life, but come back hopefully stronger over the weekend :-D

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Day #84 of Figure Construction - More leg anatomy. A bit more "proper" this time around and back to the good ol' draw, compare with reference, correct, rinse and repeat process that carried me through last years Portrait System.

This session felt a bit like coming home after a long trip. A bit off, but at the same time familiar. So, good to be home, I guess? I still need to figure (heh...) out how to get a complete process down - gesture - structure - anatomy.

I might want to focus on the anatomy for the first week, then tackle the process as a whole for the second week. I honestly don't know half the stuff I'm doing. Throwing stuff at the wall to see what sticks. The key thing is to stitch the things that do stick together into one long, cohesive process that will take me from blank canvas to finished illustration.

The Portrait System had all that already mapped out for me, so I just had to retrace their steps and make personal adjustments as needed. Michael Hampton's approach oddly enough makes a lot of sense when I see it, but I struggle to implement it in practice.

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Day #83 of Figure Construction - Okay, back in the good ol' saddle after leaving behind Veil's 6 month gesture process, challenge, whatever. Back to anatomy. I've kinda fallen a bit off to be honest. For all its faults and incompatibility with what works best for me, Veil's gesture thing did cement me into a routine. Rebuilding a new routine or rather changing gears like that isn't super easy. At least not for me.

Still, just got to bite that bullet and get on with it. Not the best study, but surprisingly proportional all things considered. I figure it's best to ease into things, make it as friction-less as possible so I can build up momentum and routine.

I did some gestures before hand, but I threw them in the trash, aka I deleted the layer. Not from reference, just from the impregnation - more to warm up and not leave gesture behind completely. Which I've done in the past because I loathe gesture studies.

Slow and steady it goes. Slow and steady it goes.

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Day #82 of Figure Construction - I've noticed that during gesture sessions, I tend to tense up. My hand forms a so-called "death-grip" on the stylus. Basically, I'm holding it way to hard as if my life depended on it. This manifests itself as wrist pain and towards the tail end of the gesture hour, shoulder pain.

So, in an effort to deal with this, instead of operating at my regular 400% zoom and skate around the canvas, I stayed fully zoomed out so I could see the entire canvas. Then, I kept making a new layer for each gesture. I had to define a hot-key to quickly toggle layer visibility on/off. Once I was done with the batch, I went through each layer, shrunk it, and positioned it to the final result.

And it kinda worked...? My wrist still hurts. Not as much as previously and I made a conscious effort to not spiral into a death-grip, to relax and let my stylus skate along.

The gestures look less than stellar and I fear that it isn't so much my zoom level that is the cause of my pain. It's the time limit and how long/frequent I practice. Even with 2 rest days a week, I still don't recover. The pain returns during the following gesture session.

I might have to dramatically change my approach to figure/gesture drawing. Health and well being above all else.

It's "just" a hobby, so it's not like my livelihood is at risk. That said, I don't want to give up on this hobby of mine because I hurt myself in some desperate bid to "git gud fast". Half as bright, twice as long and all that jazz.

I'm not giving up - just course correcting.

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Day #80 & 81 of Figure Construction - Two batches of gesture studies and a longer anatomy study based on a "winner" from one of the gesture batches.

Things get progressively more rigged as I add more and more stuff on top of the gesture. As disheartening as that is, it is part of the course from what I understand. It'll be ironed out as I get more mileage putting all the different pieces together to form a complete illustration.

Next week I'll start adding legs to the mix and after 2 weeks of that, my first pass over body anatomy will be complete. From there on out, it's all about mileage - keep putting it all together and refine existing skills.

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Day #79 of Figure Construction - Okay, the gesture grind is making me go nuts and I'm just a quarter through the "program". It is just so mind-numbing at this point that it feels more like sliding backwards than anything else. And no immediate reward for my efforts either. Yay...

But, I might have found a small little remedy - longer figure studies. It's still not the greatest figure drawing in the history of ever. HOWEVER. I do get the feeling that this is the way forward. At least for the time being.

I also suspect that all these gestures and the truck loads of "failures" I've churned out over the past couple of months have "freed" me from references. As in, I'm no longer clawing at my own face because what I've drawn deviate from the reference. Which is progress, I dare say.

Not quite what I was expecting, but I'll take it nonetheless.

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Day #78 of Figure Construction - 45 days of gesture drawing aaaaaaaaaaaand... yeah. I could be overly critical with myself or I could be doing something wrong. Or maybe I should stop obsessing so much over this crude, initial stage of a longer, multi hour drawing process and just chug along.

I don't know anymore. The feeling of being stuck, threading water and getting exhausted in the process is wearing me down. Veil does put an emphasis on doing what works best for you rather than adhering blindly to someone else's process/workflow/whatever.

That said, the sunken cost fallacy is real. Not going to lie.

On a more positive side of things, I did some expressive eyes doodles at work. And the results were pretty neat. Especially considering that it was without reference and without much prior experience in expressive eyes. The bulk, if not all of the portraits I did last year were of relative neutral expressions. So that's nice.

Honestly, I think the gestures "suck" because they currently exist in a vacuum; just the gesture - no anatomy, very little structure, just the bare bones of an idea. If even that.

There are times though where I wish the path ahead was a bit clearer. A bit easier to walk. Others might fumble and stumble like I do, but for whatever reason, it doesn't LOOK like it. It's not reflected in their process nor the finished product.

Would this trek been easier if I was largely ignorant of my own shortcomings and inadequacies?

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Day #77 of Figure Construction - A thing I've noticed in a lot of my gestures is that the legs more often than not end up looking like... well crap.

So, in an effort to remedy this I spent today's gesture session on just pelvis & legs. I don't expect this it immediately resolve my issue, but some dedicated effort towards tackling a flaw/weakness is worthwhile.

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