Box Men Explained

Lesson by

Assignments 48Lesson NotesDownloads 1

Box Men Explained

Lesson by

Steven Zapata

in Drawing Exercises for Beginners

Assignments 48Lesson NotesDownloads 1

Assignment

Now that I've shown you how I draw box men, it's time to try this exercise for yourself. Let your imagination and designer mind take over as you work through this exercise. Experiment with size, as well as the amount of box men you draw on a page!

@joaquin18

•

5mo

Hi, im new to drawing and art, any critique is good, i tried drawing this 3 expressions. Pure imagination.

@tocohasmail

•

5mo

First attempts - very fun and I want to do a lot more of these guys! Finding it fun to roughly shape them out and then redraw over them to better define certain shapes

Joshua Bennett

•

7mo

My boxmen.

@shikaiwen

•

7mo

Joy came out the best. Have to remind myself to use the whole sheet.

Devon D. Yeider

•

9mo

Awesome excuse to DRAW

John Tollefsen

•

2yr

I have tried to draw box men with feelings, but I need to practice much more.

John Tollefsen

•

2yr

My first box men.

Dalvin Tapia

•

11mo

guys are better then me lol

Audrey S

•

2yr

First couple of days of boxfolk -- I tend to have longer limbs a la robot from castle in the sky but hey this has been a lot of fun. Done in fineliner to avoid eraser temptations

@magda

•

2yr

This is so much fun. Adding animals makes it even better.

Taylor Brown

•

2yr

I love this teaching style, I really needed to hear from a person with a “do it anyway” mindset. As a beginner, I was so overwhelmed by anatomy, perspective, etc. that it made me AFRAID to draw. But if I don’t draw, I can’t improve! Steven inspired me to just try it in this video. I finished a page of boxmen and the exercise really helped me tie things together. Hopefully I can continue to ditch the perfectionism and learn as I go instead!

@valerioshi

•

2yr

I'm kinda embarrassed to share this stuff. First time drawing anything in 30 years. Got a lot to learn, but I'm happy to be here!

Isaiah

•

2yr

Great to have you onboard, valerioshi! It is, indeed, quite brave to put your work out there for others to see, but I am looking forward to seeing more from you. I think my favorite is the guy who is sort of waving to the people to beside him as he walks by.

@lustef

•

2yr

Il manque une étape... C'est écrit "débutant"...

Me Ch

•

2yr

Do you need to understand anatomy to do the box man exercise?

Isaiah

•

2yr

As you improve in your knowledge of anatomy/figure drawing, your boxmen will also improve. However, the exercise isn't necessarily supposed to look good. It is intended to be a way to get your pencil moving, without stressing out about the result. When I posted my assignments for this course, I tried to make what I showed publicly meet some minimum threshold for quality (which was, by the way, unnecessary), but to really do the exercises in the spirit that the instructor intends, you should have someplace, like a sketchbook or a stack of cheap copy paper, where you feel comfortable making a mess of things. You don't have to show what you draw there to anyone else. Nevertheless, drawing there will help you grow and build skill. I hope this helps. I look forward to seeing what you make, if/when you feel comfortable posting your work.

@art4therapy1000

•

2yr

Well can we also talk about how when I thought I could draw ok, that I can't seem to draw a boxman correctly?

@tiny

•

2yr

I am finding out the same thing about myself... ;-)

@art4therapy1000

•

2yr

Do you have a stick figure class? Lol 😂

@katygus

•

2yr

I found this both really helpful in terms of thinking about body composition and positioning, and really difficult in terms of actually drawing what was in my head! As others have said, this feels like it’s aimed at people who are a bit past beginner, and it would be great to have a lesson before this one that gives a little more guidance for how to make a box man in the first place. That said, here are my attempts:

@gothamdemon

•

2yr

Box men HW. Had alot of fun with this and helped ease anxiety on making figures any feedback is welcomed! Thank you!

James Goodman

•

2yr

Well it turns out I can’t draw a box man anyway so my earlier post doesn’t matter…….

James Goodman

•

2yr

I don’t get how the box men exercise is helpful…. If it’s not something that will lead to anatomically correct figures, why bother? To see how well you can make a figure out of boxes? A design exercise? I struggle with drawing the figure from imagination so it seems it would be more productive to practice something that would help me improve. Not see if I can design a figure out of boxes or triangles or broomsticks or whatever….

Isaiah

•

3yr

I can see this exercise being beneficial when I progress to the figure drawing course. To ease into drawing, I want my first marks of a session to be playful and free from expectation. This exercise meets this criterion, but there is also an opportunity here for more consequential practice. I began page 1 with random marks and shapes, since this is how I normally begin my warmup sessions; it represents how it might look if I actually incorporate the exercise into my routine. I did use a reference to redraw the rotating figures on page 2, as the original proportions were somewhat embarrassing.

Monica Brinkman

•

2yr

LOL box man baby yoda!

Pink Valeranth

•

2yr

These are beautifully done. I even cracked up at the old man. Great grasp of character, proportion and foreshortening.

Brenton Smith

•

2yr

Loving the boxman! the selfie one really relays character to me :)

Tara Tillmanns

•

3yr

I love your presentation and conversational teaching style. It’s great. It would be really nice to have a video going over what a box man is and a slower version of how to construct a basic one. This feels like this is aimed at art students who have been doing them for a while, but need to learn how to be more loose with them. However, the title of the course says beginner. It just feels like a step is missing and I’ve jumped into the middle of a class.

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Steven Zapata

Designer, Illustrator, Instructor