There's always time to (re)try something new. Ever since I was a teenager, I always wanted to draw in the classic manga/anime style. Unfortunately for me, I really sucked at it. Every guide on drawing human style figures uses the classic method of draw a bunch of circles(in the correct place), then add detail and your done, amazing art.

I could never get the initial circles in the right place, my perspective was always way off and I got disheartened and gave up. I spent my years trying to get better at drawing, but I concentrated on sketching 3D scenes and objects plus a lot of random geometric patterns. Yesterday I purchased a new notebook to use as a dictionary of all the Japanese words I know, I wanted a creative way of quickly identifying it from my other 6 notebooks so out came some sticky labels and I decided to draw myself a cute anime girl to adorn the cover.

I have also been thinking of attempting to draw some manga and this means I would need to be able to re draw the same characters from different perspectives, Time to attempt the 'circles and add detail method'

It turns out all the years of sketching scenes has greatly improved my sense of perspective, and the draw a bunch of circles method actually makes sense now. By imagining a poseable figure I draw a rough circle where a major part of the body go, sketch in a line for the spine and arms etc, and I have a half decent wire frame drawing. The adding detail bit I find is the easiest, draw, erase, repeat. Still learning a lot when it comes to colouring, but I did finally acquire a pencil sharper which makes life so much easier.

While this is good enough to label my notebook, Its not really up to the standard where I would call myself a 'Manga artist' I had another go at sketching, refining the body shape, changing some of the detail and reasonably happy with the end result. I wont ruin this one by colouring it in.