Breaking it down: first, master basic shapes. Circles for joints, cylinders for limbs—sounds simple, but it builds a 3D mindset. I learned this from a manga artist’s tutorial where they sketched Goku from 'Dragon Ball' as just a series of stacked ovals. After that, study skeletal landmarks (collarbones, ribcage) to anchor your sketch. Pinterest boards with ballet dancers or athletes are gold for dynamic angles.
When I hit a plateau, I switched to charcoal for a week. The messy medium forced me to focus on mass instead of lines. Proko’s YouTube demos on shading the torso made lightbulbs go off—especially how rib shadows curve. Now I warm up by sketching my own hand in different positions daily. It’s crazy how much knuckle practice improves overall proportion sense.
Improving human figure drawing starts with understanding proportions. I used to struggle with limbs looking too stiff or heads being oversized until I studied basic anatomy ratios—like how the average body is 7-8 heads tall. Sketching stick figures first to map out movement helps, then gradually adding muscle structure over it. I keep a sketchbook just for quick 5-minute gesture drawings of people in cafes or parks, focusing on flow rather than details.
Another game-changer was learning 'contour lines'—tracing the body’s curves lightly before committing to shadows. For practice, I redraw frames from 'JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure' since the exaggerated poses teach balance. Oh, and tracing photos of dancers mid-motion taught me how weight distribution affects posture. Now I doodle exaggerated poses inspired by 'Street Fighter' characters to push my flexibility.
Start with blind contour drawing—no peeking at the paper! It trains your eye-hand coordination. I picked this up from an old art teacher who had us draw models holding 30-second poses. Terrible at first, but now my lines flow better. Next, analyze Michelangelo’s sketches; his hatching shows muscle groups like a roadmap.
For fun, I challenge friends to 'fast sketch' sessions using screenshots from 'Attack on Titan' action scenes. The time pressure kills perfectionism. Also, tracing over健身 photos with a red pen to mark major tendon lines helped me see the body as interconnected systems, not just outlines. Keep a 'mistake scrapbook'—comparing early attempts to recent work is oddly motivating.
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The Human
Sadieperez9
9.2
36.8K
Horror stories originate from somewhere. Whether from eyewitness accounts or from survivors' tales, they come from somewhere. And while all of us grow up with the folklore, how many of us genuinely believe that werewolves and vampires prowl through the night, taking what they want.
I will admit I didn't believe the tales. I thought werewolves and vampires were nothing more than make-believe. Scary stories meant to keep kids in line. That is until a monster ripped me from my warm and sold me to the highest bidder.
Where nightmares and horror stories become true is where my story begins. Can I ever be free again, or will the beasts rule my body and soul forever.
TRIGGER WARNING!!!!!
The life cycle of a butterfly lasts for an average of thirty days. In human time that was nothing. Within that thirty days the butterfly would go through the craziest of cycles, starting as an egg enclosed within a shell that is both impenetrable and fragile. Then that shell would break to let out a creature that was hideous and scary and weird.
Soon the creature would enclose itself completely for the second time, never to be seen like that again. It was a period of transformation. In thirty days, a butterfly's life will be complete, coming out of the cocoon as a changed and majestic creature. But humans aren't butterflies and thirty days weren't enough.
Book cover credits to the amazing A-Graphics (@hiagraphics). Check her works on https://www.facebook.com/hiagraphics/
The day I got fired, I received a trial pass from an AI cosmetic clinic.
It required neither surgery nor recovery time, yet it could deliver a flawless celebrity face overnight.
But there was a catch.
The face only lasted seven days after the complimentary trial.
To keep it, I signed a contract to become the actress' body double, trading my time, identity, and freedom for another week of beauty.
As the years passed, I kept paying the price to maintain a face that wasn't mine until one day, I realized I no longer wanted to live in someone else's shadow.
I was a sketch artist acting for the police.
On a secret mission, I was discovered by a murderer. My eyes were gouged out, and my body was dismembered, unceremoniously dumped in a garbage bin.
On the brink of death, I called my boyfriend, a criminal investigator. However, he hung up on me because he was busy accompanying his first love to a prenatal checkup.
A few days later, he received a painting that was a vital clue to finding the murderer, but he thought I was playing tricks on him.
In his anger, he tore that portrait to shreds.
After he found out the truth, he spent the whole night searching through the garbage to piece it back together.
When you're on the brink of death, does humanity still exist?
Clementia must learn to trust people again after surviving a blocked elevator into a zombie apocalypse or risk losing everything in this horrific world. Every day for Clementia over the last two years has been a haze. She keeps her head down, hangs out with the folks she despises the most, and only leaves the house to work at her required internship. But everything changes the day the workplace elevator breaks down, trapping her as the screaming begins. When the doors eventually open, revealing a dystopian world ravaged by bleeding fangs and sickness, Clementia is thrust into a horrifying race for her life, stuck between strangers she's not sure she can trust and man-eating creatures hungry for her flesh.
With that, she realized that the whole city was filled by those monsters. And she is now forced to flee for her life, and she must learn not only how to live in this new and frightening environment, but also how to fight her own inner demons before they lose her something more valuable than her life. But then she met Justine, the one who would help her live in this chaotic life, and together they will fight in a world where a virus has spread, turning the majority of the people into flesh-eating monsters, as they both connote safety and unity.
On the day of Zephyr’s art exhibition, I saw people stand around a portrait of myself.
My cheeks were flushed, and I was bare.
My posture was the one we used in bed last week for fun. Zephyr even got the mole on my chest right.
As people stared at me mockingly, I demanded, “Why did you do this to me?”
He was unbothered. “It’s not as if I asked you to sleep with someone else.”
But he did let people see how I looked when I was having an intimate moment with my own boyfriend!
“It’s just a painting. Why are you being so petty?”
I was stunned by the mockery in Zephyr’s gaze. Then, I called my assistant. “I’m attending the international art festival as the organizer.”
Drawing monsters is one of my favorite creative outlets—there's no limit to how wild your imagination can go! Start by sketching a rough shape; maybe it's a twisted tree trunk or a blob with too many eyes. Don't worry about details yet. Once the basic form feels right, add exaggerated features: claws that curve like scythes, jagged teeth, or patchy fur. Textures make monsters pop—try stippling for scaly skin or rough crosshatching for a grizzled look.
Lighting is key for drama. Imagine a dim lantern casting shadows that stretch its limbs unnaturally. Study real animals for inspiration—hyena laughs, spider legs, or bat wings can blend into something uniquely terrifying. My go-to trick? Give it one 'off' feature, like a perfectly human hand amidst chaos. It unsettles viewers because it feels wrong, and that’s where the fun begins.