The 20/80 Rule For Drawing Practice
It can quickly become overwhelming, and you have to focus on each and every one of these fundamentals and get all of them exactly right before you are allowed to move to the next level. At least, that is what I suspect the thinking is.
I call the “practice fundamentals first” the bottom-up approach; you focus on learning how to solve all the smaller things first, knowing you will probably need them eventually.
I usually do things the exact opposite way: I dive head-first into things I have never done before, and, of course, I fall flat on my face. What happens is that you discover what the most important things are that you have to focus on. You may discover fundamentals you didn’t even know you needed. For example, while you focus on becoming better at making art, you might miss the business-related fundamental skills.
My way is the “top-down” approach. I do the thing immediately and then discover where I get stuck and find solutions for that.
There are several reasons why I think the top-down approach is better:
1. The 20/80 Rule
You’ve probably heard of the 20/80 rule: you can get eighty percent of the way doing twenty percent of the work. And the last twenty percent takes eighty percent of your time. You can find it in many other places. For example, if software is too slow, it tends to spend 80% of its time in 20% of the code. Et cetera.
For drawing, you can get eighty percent of the way you want to go by doing twenty percent of the exercises. You just need to find out which 20 percent. And you do that by going top-down.
Going top-down lets you discover which 20% to focus on to get where you want to be faster.
2. You Come Up With Better Solutions
The solutions you construct in the bottom-up approach are not always the best. To find the best solution, you have to start with the problem you are trying to solve, starting at the top.
By going bottom-up, you come up with a solution before studying the problem, if that makes sense.
3. You Reach Your Goal Faster, Or At All
Going top-down is not an easy path, at least initially, because you won’t do good work right away. But you do get better over time, and that is motivating. And you reach your goal of doing the thing you want to do at all. If you go bottom-up, you will very likely get stuck there, never feeling ready to move on to doing that thing you want to do.
Conclusion
Practicing the fundamentals does have an important role! You really do need to do that. I read somewhere that “Art without craft is just self-expression,” which is not bad per se, but when you control the fundamentals, you get to express yourself more accurately. That is the craft part, and it is hugely important. Practicing fundamentals is extremely important.
But start at the top, start top-down, and find out what it is you need to practice, which fundamentals you need to practice, and upto what point. Get eighty percent of the way by doing twenty percent of the work.
I noticed on Discord that people don’t always heed this advice. But I feel that I should at least offer it because it is what works best for me.
Yours sincerely,
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