Warming up

When working on my book I always like to start by warming up. I bet you didn't know that drawing was a contact sport! You definitely don't want to pull a muscle leaning over that drawing table.

Over the years I've learned that I draw consistently better when I'm warmed up. To do this I came up with a system that works pretty well for me.

A few months ago I sat down and came up with a list of monsters that I've never drawn before. I love drawing monsters because they are fun, and the anatomy doesn't have to be perfect. In fact, the more distorted the anatomy the better. I took one of my sketchbooks and wrote the names at the bottom of each page. Each night I would sit down with a timer set for thirty minutes and draw whatever was next on the list. If I didn't get done in the allotted time, I would finish the next night. The key is to remember these are sketches and not portfolio pieces.


Here's a warm up sketch from a few months ago.

It was supposed to be a plant creature who ended up being a mushroom guy, meh. I broke one of my own rules there, so I have to go back and draw the plant monster soon. Don't piss off the client!


This warm up process works great for a few reasons.

#1. You don't waste any time thinking about what you want to draw.

Thirty minutes goes by very quickly. And if you're like me, you don't have a lot of extra time to draw at night. I have a full time job during the day, so every minute in the evening counts.

#2. You force yourself to draw what's been assigned.

I'm my own project manager. (aha! future post idea, time management) Anyway, I treat myself like an employee. This means I don't get to draw what I want, I draw what the client wants, which is me. Confused yet? When I was young I would sit down at that blank page and just draw what came to mind, often switching in the middle of picture if it didn't come out right. The purpose is to MAKE it come out right.

#3. Thirty minutes warms you up, but doesn't burn you out.

Thirty minutes for me is the perfect amount of time. Any longer than that and I start eating into my comic page time. Once again, If I was a full time artist I would probably spend more time on sketches, but for now this works.

Let me know if you guys have any warm up strategies.