Uploaded January 2020 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Start your training here: 2d101.com/manga
Hi, Mark this here for 2DAnimation101.com In this video we're gonna talk about the elements of a good drawing. Okay, so there are several elements and actually we're going to cover nine, the nine of them, in the next couple of videos. But in this video we're going to talk about the first one. Okay, so the nine elements right now, just so you know, is the clean lines. That's one. Two is line thickness, then it's spacing. Then number four is placement. Number five, shape proportion. Then number six shapes sizes. Then number seven, line angles. Eight is shading tones. And number nine is curves. They don't have to be in any specific order. We just put them in this order and you can just learn and master them. And probably you are a good at some, right? So in any case, in this first video, we're going to talk about the first one line, the clean lines OK? So let's check an example. The best way to understand it is way to examples. So this is a drawing done by Precia, and she's working on a manga that can probably in the future become an anime. And as you can see this is are great example of having clean lines. You can see, let me zoom in a little bit. You can see that the lines are very carefully done for the hair. Every little single detail is done carefully. That is
a clean line. The contrary of this is sketchy lines. These are sketchy lines. This is a work. One of the exercises done by one of our students. Now this is looking good, but this is not clean lines. Okay? So there's nothing wrong with this. If you're practicing, it's okay to be doing sketchy lines, but you just need to know that at some point you have to master clean lines. In this case, this is a great way to practice sketch lines. And why does this look good? Because everything else in this exercise is looking good. The proportions, the angles, the sizes, everything is great. And this spacing we're later gonna be covering all of them in detail. But in any case, it's looking good. Now this is an example of something that doesn't look good. Look, this is done by uh, one of our students, Basel, and you can see that the lines are not clean. Now in these example this student was purposely doing sketchy lines and it looks good. But in here, this was not intended to be sketchy. This was intended to be clean lines. But as you can see, there are a lot of little details in there. Now those drawings were done with a tablet, a drawing tablet like this one, one that I actually used for years and years. And it's like the graphic, uh, the Intuos from Wacom. And it's this kind of of drawing tablet
in which you cannot see what you're drawing, but you can, you have to look at the screen. So you're, you're drawing in here and everything happening, is happening right on the screen in front of you. That makes your hand to be very imprecise and it's very, very difficult to draw clean lines. So if you have one of these, I recommend you switch to pen and paper. Later we're going to talk about a little bit more about that, but it's not very good to have this because it's very hard, like seriously. Basel was trying his best and he was having trouble. You can see this, right? This is when he switched to pen and paper. Look how easy and smooth the lines are now why? Because he just switched from digital. Well, actually digital using this kind of tablet and then switching to pen and paper. You can see this, right? Huge improvement. Now when you're doing clean lines, you don't actually have to be, to have an incredible pulse because I have a shaky pulse. When I try to do that in a single stroke, my hand goes, Ooh, probably that happens to you too. If that's the case it's good to do like sketchy lines, but the being really slow later, I'm gonna. If you want, let me know and I can create a little tutorial on how to do this, but right now you just need to know that you can go really
slow and just make sure the line is going clean. For that you just have to be careful and slow. Now, what happens if you don't have a good pulse and you try to do clean lines in a single stroke, but you don't have that ability or that talent or skill? Well, this is what happens. Look, this was delivered by one of our students. These were done in a single stroke, but as you can see, it's not looking good, right? You can see the shaky lines. That's how I do it too. So actually I can show you right here. If I had this, if I had to do that, I would just go, that's one stroke and then another stroke, another stroke. Look, I'm doing strokes little by little. Can you see and trying to be, going really slow and really careful instead of doing this, in which I'm not very precise in a single stroke. Right, right. And actually this software has a little bit of smoothness because it's not actually depicting all my, my shaky hand movements.
Start your training here: 2d101.com/manga
Hi, Mark this here for 2DAnimation101.com In this video we're gonna talk about the elements of a good drawing. Okay, so there are several elements and actually we're going to cover nine, the nine of them, in the next couple of videos. But in this video we're going to talk about the first one. Okay, so the nine elements right now, just so you know, is the clean lines. That's one. Two is line thickness, then it's spacing. Then number four is placement. Number five, shape proportion. Then number six shapes sizes. Then number seven, line angles. Eight is shading tones. And number nine is curves. They don't have to be in any specific order. We just put them in this order and you can just learn and master them. And probably you are a good at some, right? So in any case, in this first video, we're going to talk about the first one line, the clean lines OK? So let's check an example. The best way to understand it is way to examples. So this is a drawing done by Precia, and she's working on a manga that can probably in the future become an anime. And as you can see this is are great example of having clean lines. You can see, let me zoom in a little bit. You can see that the lines are very carefully done for the hair. Every little single detail is done carefully. That is
a clean line. The contrary of this is sketchy lines. These are sketchy lines. This is a work. One of the exercises done by one of our students. Now this is looking good, but this is not clean lines. Okay? So there's nothing wrong with this. If you're practicing, it's okay to be doing sketchy lines, but you just need to know that at some point you have to master clean lines. In this case, this is a great way to practice sketch lines. And why does this look good? Because everything else in this exercise is looking good. The proportions, the angles, the sizes, everything is great. And this spacing we're later gonna be covering all of them in detail. But in any case, it's looking good. Now this is an example of something that doesn't look good. Look, this is done by uh, one of our students, Basel, and you can see that the lines are not clean. Now in these example this student was purposely doing sketchy lines and it looks good. But in here, this was not intended to be sketchy. This was intended to be clean lines. But as you can see, there are a lot of little details in there. Now those drawings were done with a tablet, a drawing tablet like this one, one that I actually used for years and years. And it's like the graphic, uh, the Intuos from Wacom. And it's this kind of of drawing tablet
in which you cannot see what you're drawing, but you can, you have to look at the screen. So you're, you're drawing in here and everything happening, is happening right on the screen in front of you. That makes your hand to be very imprecise and it's very, very difficult to draw clean lines. So if you have one of these, I recommend you switch to pen and paper. Later we're going to talk about a little bit more about that, but it's not very good to have this because it's very hard, like seriously. Basel was trying his best and he was having trouble. You can see this, right? This is when he switched to pen and paper. Look how easy and smooth the lines are now why? Because he just switched from digital. Well, actually digital using this kind of tablet and then switching to pen and paper. You can see this, right? Huge improvement. Now when you're doing clean lines, you don't actually have to be, to have an incredible pulse because I have a shaky pulse. When I try to do that in a single stroke, my hand goes, Ooh, probably that happens to you too. If that's the case it's good to do like sketchy lines, but the being really slow later, I'm gonna. If you want, let me know and I can create a little tutorial on how to do this, but right now you just need to know that you can go really
slow and just make sure the line is going clean. For that you just have to be careful and slow. Now, what happens if you don't have a good pulse and you try to do clean lines in a single stroke, but you don't have that ability or that talent or skill? Well, this is what happens. Look, this was delivered by one of our students. These were done in a single stroke, but as you can see, it's not looking good, right? You can see the shaky lines. That's how I do it too. So actually I can show you right here. If I had this, if I had to do that, I would just go, that's one stroke and then another stroke, another stroke. Look, I'm doing strokes little by little. Can you see and trying to be, going really slow and really careful instead of doing this, in which I'm not very precise in a single stroke. Right, right. And actually this software has a little bit of smoothness because it's not actually depicting all my, my shaky hand movements.
