Hi, Erin Nice work. I like that on the top you already self evaluate your work and wrote it on the top. Writing and recording this type of information makes more likely that you'll work on it on the future. If I may add to these, try also writing the next step on how you're going to do it and when. In this case you could write "practice 1 sheet of ellipses and long lines tomorrow" "Buy Scott Robertson's book and read the chapter on ellipses next monday". But, let's talk about your assignment. Whenever you're drawing the spine remember that each vertebrae is tightly linked to the next one and each one will move slightly but the movement of each part adds up composing the movement of the whole spine. So you want to remember that the curves are smooth. Take care to not make points or sharp changes on your spines. Also don't overthink it. In the bottom one you thought too much on the movement of each section and it resulted in a broken spine. From this angle what you can see is almost a c-curve. The second one I feel that you change the angle of the opening below the externum. It's possible in real life, but the model has a more open angle. In general I think you're getting the size relationship between the rib cage and the pelvis wrong. And the movement of the spine are too stiff. To improve on these problems I'd like to suggest that you repeat this same exercise but with different approaches: _ Substitute the head, rib cage and pelvis for boxes. Pay close attention to where they are pointing and their size relationship. _Draw just the spine. Forget the 3 big masses and focus just on the movement of the spine. Use cross contours to define the sections. _Do an exaggerated version of your first exercise, Try until you go to far, then, bring it back to the realm of humanly possible. This is not the most inspiring of exercises but it's important to know the limits of the spine so we don't draw worm people. So, persevere! Keep drawing Best regards.

the Images look great, I can tell you’ve got really solid drawing skills when it comes to foundation like the limbs as cylinders and the changing planes of the face. When looking at whether something should have lots of black or only a little black it really depends on the type of lighting being used in the scene. You are on the right track and it’s a really good way to be thinking about value in an image. Often pro artists (like Anthony Jones) will start with painting in the values of the painting in a more graphic manner. This means painting everything as solid blocks of greys whites and blacks with no variation in each block of value. Then after they know what the local value is, they look at it from a distance or make it smaller to see if they can still tell what it is. After that they apply highlights and softer gradual gradations to show light hit the different planes of the surfaces of the subject drawn. So in general true black is only used when there is a complete absence of light like in a shadow. And shadows in the light tend to be a darker value then the lightest light on the light side, but the shadow on the light side tends to be lighter then the lightest value of the shadow side. For example if we have a black shirt, the part of the shirt in shadow would be the blackest black. But the part of the black shirt in light would be more of a really dark grey. Anthony Jones only has one video here on proko but he has more on his site robotpencil and here is a link for his lesson on value which was very helpful for me. https://robotpencil.gumroad.com/l/RjyGk all in all though I can tell you’ve been practicing a lot and the drawings look really good and I can tell over time your values have continued to improve. And your thinking on the right track so keep exploring more about value. Sorry for the long post and I hope this helps.

Hi James, one way for studying that has helped me is to break down a drawing even further. I ask myself first what do I like about the work I’ve done and what do I want to improve. I then do a study of the part I didn’t do as well as I would have liked. This study usually includes looking for or making additional reference. Then I look at many different types of tutorials on the subject from many different artists, and then I draw that particular thing again from the same angle and then multiple different angles. Then at the end I ask myself do I understand why the first one didn’t turn out right and do I know how to fix it? If I do know then I move on to the next thing. If not I take a break and then try it again the next day. Also some times if I have a hard time seeing issues in my work I’ll take a picture of it and mirror it so it’s flipped horizontally the other way. This makes the image look new to the brain and it makes mistakes easier to spot if I’ve been working on something so long that I can’t tell any more what’s right and wrong. I am sorry this is long and I hope it helps.