As a learning process, is it okay to copy?

If you aren't just training yourself to be a human copy machine, yea copying someones art to try to understand how they got certain effects, or copying a reference are both totally reasonable

>>2362884

This + mileage, for an absolute beginner doing 100% copies of other drawings is a good way to get yourself to learn and you can train making confident lines. Make sure to mix it in with your other exercises though once you are semi competent

Yes.

Most people tend to call their copying "studies" but there are tons of people who just duplicate a reference or art they like.
You can learn a lot from doing it, but as someone who's pretty good at copying from reference right now and still garbage at drawing from imagination, I can assure you that getting good at one doesn't mean you'll be good at the other. Practice both. Lots of studies, if you're critical, will help inform your imagination drawings and build you visual library though.

File: bonjwa.jpg (61KB, 437x437px) Image search: [Google]

61KB, 437x437px

how can you draw what's in your mind

if you can't even draw what's in front of you

think about it anon

>>2362932
pure and simple

>>2362874

Not only is it ok, it is required.

Not OP but I got a similar question

does literally tracing something do any good?

>>2363106

no

>>2363106

Yes, absolutely. As long as you try to understand the forms you are tracing. You can most definitely expand your visual library by tracing alone. Proko has tracing in his courses as a standard excercise.

NO RULES JUST TOOLS

>>2362874
A lot of people on this site recommend "drawing on the right side of the brain", yet admonish people for drawing from reference, when in the very first chapter (pg 17 in 4th edition) it says:

This tyranny of the symbol system explains in large part why people untrained in drawing continue to produce "childish" drawings right into adulthood and even old age. What you will learn is how to set your symbol system aside and accurately draw what you see. This training in perceptual skills - how to see and draw what is actually "out there" - is the rock bottom "ABC" of drawing. It is necessarily (or at least ideally) learned before progressing to imaginative drawing, painting, or sculpture.

Kinda says it all really.

>>2363163
wow this might be the most helpful comment ive ever read on this site. thank you anon

>>2362932
Jayden please