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why does my line art always look worse
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in the sketch what can I do to make it
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look better I struggled with line art
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for the longest time and learned all
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sorts of tips tricks and techniques to
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improve my line art skills and I'll tell
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you what I figured out so maybe you
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don't have to struggle as long as I did
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here's a scenario that might just sound
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a little bit familiar you sketch
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something and you actually end up with a
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pretty nice one this one deserves to be
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taken further so you lower the opacity
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of your sketch make a new layer on top
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and draw your lineer s and now that
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you're done with your liner you delete
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your sketch layer and oh oh no not again
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why does it look so bad so there are a
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lot of reasons this can happen here's a
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quick thing you can check first is your
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sketch layer too visible the problem
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with your sketch layer being too visible
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is that you might confuse it with the
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liner I used to do this all the time
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luckily there's a very easy fix for this
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just make your sketch layer more
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transparent so that you can barely see
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it I like to make it a different color
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entirely so I can make sure I don't
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confuse my sketch and line art but what
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if you already do this in fact you might
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be thinking that this is way too obvious
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the problem is definitely something else
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so my sketches used to look something
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like this there's actually a problem
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with the sketch and I think the problem
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is that our human brains just work too
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well humans are fantastic at perceiving
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patterns and organizing visual
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information even when that information
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is incomplete take a look at these
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images even when there are only
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disperate elements the human eye tends
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to perceive it as a whole United form
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Instead This is known as the Gestalt
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gestal how do you pronounce this gestal
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pronunciation this is known as the
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gestal principles of visual perception
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but how does that relat to the sketch
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see when we're looking at a messy sketch
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we generally don't perceive each
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individual stroke Instead The Strokes
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come together to imply a larger form
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even if some of the lines are missing
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unfortunately once I start doing line
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art I was forced to actually start
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nailing down these implied forms which
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meant I had to understand them fully to
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draw them and at this point any gaps
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there were in my knowledge started to
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make themselves very
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apparent this was because I tended to
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use much thinner lines for my liner so I
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had to be way more precise so how do you
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prevent this well one way of doing it is
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that I started making my sketch much
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neater and also I made sure to keep the
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lines a similar width to the line art
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this way you can do more of the problem
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solving during the sketch phase when
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it's time to do liner I can mostly just
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Trace over the neat sketch but even when
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I made sure to have neat sketches I
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started encountering a different problem
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so for example let's say I have this
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sketch it's not too messy and it has
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some movement and energy to it so then I
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do some line art and it looks like this
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what why is it so stiff so here's what's
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happening when I'm doing line art I have
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a tendency to try to fix the mistakes I
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see in my sketch for example maybe it
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seems like that the arm is bending
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unrealistically here maybe we should fix
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it and make it straighter but remember
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we're artists and we don't have to make
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everything 100% realistic in fact
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sometimes you want to exaggerate or
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simplify things to make them look better
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than reality you might be surprised but
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if you already made a successful sketch
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try trusting it even if the lines feel
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wrong and another thing let's consider
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gesture drawing for a second if you're
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not familiar gesture drawings are
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sketches usually timed where you try to
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capture the energy and form of a pose
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they're Dynamic and energetic but rarely
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have detailed Anatomy that actually
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helps them feel more lively when you're
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drawing lines there are some lines that
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help the energy and others that hinder
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it if you're not careful and draw too
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many hindering lines you can end up
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making the pose feel stiff or static and
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that's actually a reason when drawing
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action poses Anatomy is often smooth and
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simplified way to help sell the action
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honestly I still find this really hard I
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think it's pretty Advanced but there's
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nothing to do but to keep practicing it
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but there's something you still might be
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wondering about maybe something obvious
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that I seem to have skipped where are
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these lines supposed to go in the first
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place this is actually a slightly
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different problem I get asked questions
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all the time about lineart when I stream
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the way I draw I'm usually drawing lines
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to make arts so that makes it line art
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right right but I think what they're
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actually asking about is draftsmanship
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also known as well drawing and the
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process of learning that is long and
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convoluted to say the least but not
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impossible as long as you keep working
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at it what people usually mean when they
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say line art is the process of tracing
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over your sketch to make clean lines so
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let's go back to that for now and see
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what kind of things we can do to make
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your line art look even better so one
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tip you might have heard is to vary your
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line width instead of having your line
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all the same boring width you can make
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it more exciting by making your lines
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thicker or thinner in certain places
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except for the most part I don't use it
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in fact I love the look of art that uses
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uniform linewidth all the way through
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you can see a lot of this in some
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animators work and I think they're some
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of the most cracked artists out there I
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love how their work manages to be so
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expressive despite how minimal the line
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work is that said linewidth can be used
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to help make your art more interesting
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but there is one important thing to
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remember lines don't exist in real life
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lines are a tool to help artists depict
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form so there's no strict rule telling
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you where lines should be thicker that
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entirely depends on the artist so here
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are some places I like to thicken my
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lines first the areas where two surfaces
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touch and create a very dark shadow I
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might also make lines thicker for forms
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that are closer to the viewer or
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sometimes I like to thicken the lines on
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the outside of an object to make it
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stand out and finally when working with
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thicker liner sometimes I like to have
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thickness where the lines curve the most
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think about where you would naturally
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press harder when drawing curves you can
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try it for yourself anyway while adding
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line width is optional it can help make
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your line work look more lively and
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dynamic however adding line width can be
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a bit tedious I have to draw over my
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lines over and over again to get the
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perfect thickness and it takes ages to
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get them perfectly smooth and the
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perfect shape but then I learned maybe I
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don't have to do that I know there's art
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out there that seems to to have super
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clean perfect line art so when I tried
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to replicate this I zoomed in all the
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way to make sure every single Pixel is
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perfect but I realized that when I
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looked more closely at these pictures
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with perfect line art it was actually a
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lot messier than I expected to be honest
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I really like seeing liner that isn't
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Flawless a bit of wobble and
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imperfection gives lines a lot of
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personality that's the reason I never
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actually use rulers or Circle Tools in
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any case if you find yourself spend too
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long on line arts remember not to zoom
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in too far most people won't even notice
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if individual pixels are a little messy
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but what if despite that you still don't
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want to do line art then don't when
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doing digital art especially the
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distinction between sketch and line art
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is arbitrary anyway I think my sketching
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is usually pretty clean so I often don't
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bother doing a separate line art layer
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remember what I said before lines don't
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actually exist if you don't like line
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art then don't do it in fact in fact
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plenty of artists prefer to Simply clean
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up their sketch with an eraser rather
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than going over it again with clean
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lines and lots of people prefer to go
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straight in with shapes to carve out
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their forms that's perfectly valid I
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wish I could do that actually even if
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you like the look of liner you can
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always go back in and add it afterwards
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what's important is that the process
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feels comfy for you there's no real
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wrong way of doing it thanks for
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watching anyway if you ever wanted a
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chibi pirate majima sticker a cute
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little bunik sticker or a $6 million
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banana of your own you can pick up some
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stickers at my store and help support
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the channel as well but in any case I'll
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catch you next time
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bye-bye oh there was a car
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outside is it gone now
