Fundamentals of Drawing Anything - Shading, pencils, more (Udemy.com)

This course was as good, no better, than I expected. With this course, I was able to improve my basic fundamental skills a great deal. Mr. Fontaine is a great instructor and offers great explanations for everything. The instructor starts traditional but switches to digital at some point to offer clearer explanations. The principles are still the same though and the course can be completed digitally or traditionally. Before I took this course, I struggled with lights and shadows. For awhile, I just could not grasp the concept of light and shadow. Thanks to this course, I finally begun to understand how it works and I feel much more confident when dealing with lights and shadows. As with anything, you have to put in the work to get better but it's worth it in the end. I still feel I can improve but because I put in the work and worked on the basic fundamentals, I'm better now than I was when I first started this course. Overall, this is a solid course. It really does help with the basic fundamentals like basic shapes, light and shadows, and perspective. Understanding this will help you literally draw anything. I highly recommend this course!

A few nice guidelines are given, but my overall impression is that this course is rather boring and chaotic. Lots of times Neil starts with an idea, then changes his mind and continues with something else. It seems all very improvised. Some of it is of little practical value, e.g. the drawing of twisted cubes. One would think of drawing things in the house, human figures, animals, et cetera, but twisted cubes?? Not so impressed with the final two drawings either.

I actually have a degree in Graphic Design and Creative Media, but I picked up this course to see if it was worthy to recommend to friends and colleagues. I was happily surprised to find myself picking up new things, even on the "basics." Neil Fontaine explains things that even my so-called art teachers failed to provide, leading me to fell a little gipped out of my college education. But very happy that Neil is teaching it anyway, and you don't need to pay college level money to learn great things. I'll be recommended this to all aspiring artists in the future.

I gave this course 5 stars because you deserve it. In reality it would probably be a 4 to 4.5 because I felt we talked about some things multiple times but no new tips were really given on that particular subject (I hope that makes sense). Overall Neil is extremely knowledgeable and does a thorough job explaining very important concepts. One thing I would like to see differently is you doing the recordings live vs record then voice over them. Maybe this is a technical limitation with the setup (which of course I understand) but sometimes it was hard to follow along because you would say, "ok connect this here" but in the video you connected something different. With all that said, thank you so much for putting this knowledge out there for people to consume.

I have learned a lot so far. The thing is that sometimes it's hard to be engaged because the videos are too long, and the teacher repeats himself quite a lot. I believe the whole course could have been shorter, and I would have learned the same and enjoyed it more. Also, in some sections, the order or lessons feels just weird. For such a basic curse, I believe it's better to be simple and slowly increase the difficulty. In some sections started with something complex and then something simple. Finally, recording and audio could be improved in many videos. It's a good course, but it can be improved in many ways.

The instructor gives a lot of great detail, but does have a tendency to ramble and get off topic. I have also found it harder since he started to use the digital drawing system as my pencil drawings never quite match as well as they did when he was drawing in pencil. I have made some adjustments to my expectations of my own drawings and that has helped. This is by no means a negative review, just a minor observation. I am still much better than when I started, which was worse than rudimentary. My eye drawings were pretty amazing after just one session with the instructor.

I think it was a great course. Definitely helped me understand form, shading, and so many other concepts that I had very loose knowledge of. I was in several art courses in high school and college, and it's been quite some time since then, and this class helped me understand all kinds of things that the teachers just kinda skimmed or went through very quickly. I love the fact that I can pause and slow down things that I don't quite understand. The instructor is very thorough as well, so that's very helpful. Thanks so much for the class!

This has been my fourth art class, one in school and the others online. Neil taught me how to hold the pencil and how to draw straight lines, circles of different sizes, curves, hair and most important to draw from your shoulder, elbow, wrist and fingers. Other instructors would have us draw something, give a one minute example and we were on our own. Neil shows you all his strokes from beginning to end. Thank you, Neil. Next I'm starting his anatomy and pin-up courses.

Thank you, Neil! In short this course is a guiding hand for the one who is ready to learn the craft) This are first steps of course, buut it will make your hands tremble in expectation. Cause, there is nothing super complex or beyond the grasp in technical aspect for every one of us. Just don't stop drawing and efforts do the magic. Complexity appears in places where there is no clarity, and Neil makes everything clear. Sometimes repeating same things several times, yeah. But base things are extremely important to make progress later. And here, step by step, basic skills are explained, shown and you'll got the understanding how to exercise them. Thanks again, gonna dive in your next course, Neil!

I have taken courses before but this is one of the best, I believe I should have begun with this and then the others, basic shapes are absolutely the way to learn......I was drawing from what I thought the shape was. I was wrong. I love this course and seriously recommend this course to any artist learning or not go back to basics never forget where it started. I little confusing at times when trying to draw lines from point to point but over all I loved this course