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stop-tracing — You're Doing It Wrong.
Published: 2008-08-30 03:15:22 +0000 UTC; Views: 87774; Favourites: 1093; Downloads: 32081
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Description
Inspired by the posters everyone has seen by now. Took the photos myself of course.
Are you against tracing? Join the club!
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Comments: 344
I agree! This picture explains it all!
1) Tracer finds picture on Google
2) Tracer prints out the picture
3) Tracer traces picture and claim they "work so long on it"
Colors!3D is a place where there is a truckload of tracers. On the 3DS version, there's a tracing feature where you can trace off your drawing from paper . You can either manually take the picture or you can get the picture off your SD card. That's a problem cause many people are abusing the feature by saving pictures that they don't own and tracing off of it. These people give the same excuse "I'm not copying, I'm learning!". Yeah, learning to trace, not to draw! A lot, and I mean A LOT of people get away with that stuff and that's BS! Isn't that art thief?
If people want to be self-taught, then practice by using reference or drawing YOURSELF! I taught myself how to draw for years and I think it was worth it. I see a great improve so far. So, there's no excuse of not improving. It takes years to improve, not over night.
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It saddens me when people do this. I refrence alot when it comes to fanart-coughSebas-chan'shaircough-but this is just wrooooong on so manmy levels. This is someone elses hard work they are just copying without even breaking a sweat!
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For me: Tracing can be okay for people who don't know that many poses or what not, but if you do trace, then be sure to link back to the person who made the original artwork and give credit where credit is due.
So, tracing CAN be okay in my opinion but you just have to do the right things; give credit to the person who made the artwork with the pose you used and just link back to their artwork.
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If you need to learn poses, you just need to practice by looking at a lot of reference pictures, not tracing.
If you do trace in order to get proportions right for example, you just don't publish that picture, end of story. You learn from it and draw your own image without tracing.
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If that is what you think then so be it.
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There are adult education programs that offer life drawing. Even a local artists guild has that also.
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what's the point of tracing when there's a thing called practicing? hello?... laziness much!?
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I suck at human anatomy so I usually use a basic human 3d model and then make it look the way I want and use it only for the angle and pose. Is that also not acceptable?
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It's perfectly acceptable. The only ting not is taking credit for the image itself or using it for profit without the owner's consent.
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oh please. Everything is acceptable. If someone else than the artist has the right to decide what is art and what not, then its not art, its censorship, and oppression.
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I hate that really! on my previous school my friends want to draw something from my drawing instead that take that drawing on the window and draw it over
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Ugh. This simply annoys me! I hate it every time when my friends trace! Faved.
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I half do it-ish, I'm not sure how to describe it, I don't print the exact picture and trace over it. Instead I just look at the picture for a very long time to know the points and lines, then in school when I'm bored I draw it but do the shadows my own way and add more things that I think fit the picture better (plus the lines aren't always 100% accurate.) all this = No wasted printed paper! Muahahaha! (somehow I still think of this way as mind tracing, because of filling in the points, but not 100% directly.)
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It's called photographic memory. If I want to draw a character, I memorize it. I have a hard time referencing. It doesn't work. I have to do it my way or no way.
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copying without tracing is very good practice. your brain needs a library of information, before you start inventing stuff. so you're not ding anything wrong there
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Same here! Or when I'm drawing something, I might look at it for reference.
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You're doing it very, very wrong if you get a picture of Link when you search for Zelda
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Thank you. My last internet just broke and I didn't have money for a new one.
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Nestly: I think there is a fine line to which tracing becomes unacceptable and just plain uncalled for, but I also believe that it is a learning curb for many young artists who are not yet confident in their artistic skills to complete pictures on their own. And I do believe it really helps build confidence and to get their feet wet in the atrist's pool.
Anyone who harshly criticizes a kid for tracing needs to get a life. So long as that person is not claiming it as their own and building drama over stolen art, it's not hurting anyone, then no big deal. Especially when credit is given.
If someone were to trace my art, I'd actually be flattered that they liked my art enough to try to imitate it. As long as they don't fully claim it.
That's just my random opinion for this subject. xD
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The problem is, most that trace do claim that it is their's and when the original artist calls them out, the thief does not think they did anything wrong. They did that to a professional artist that works for a comic book company. The whole world has seen his art work. The thief wasn't fooling anyone by trying to claim it as their own. I see it too much on this site and it has to stop. They even do it on facebook and refuse to give credit to the original artist because they claim it as theirs.
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Well, yeah, those people suck. xD I remember that comic artist drama way back when. Very crazy how that happened. I wonder what became of the situation?
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I don't know. I wish I knew. I hope they sued that person because really, that is an arrestable offense.
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When they trace, they hurt themselves.
I don't see how tracing will build confidence, because it's not the same thing as drawing, it's a dependency on other people's art. I'd understand trying to eyeball something to understand the technique used, but tracing is a waste of time.
When I was a kid, I drew like shit, but when I look back on it now, I'm still more proud of the shitty drawings I made, than the stuff I copied.
Btw, why did you prefix your comment with "Nestly:" when your username is identical and literally ten pixels above it?
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Nestly: Some artists can be very discouraged about their own art at times, and tracing/referencing can help them feel motivated. It also helps learn styles and curves to drawing that you wouldn't have been able to learn before. It is never a waste of time if you can learn from it.
Same here, but that's just it. You learn either way. There's no point in putting someone down for trying to learn.
It's just an old habit and something I habitually do.
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Tracing doesn't encourage analyzing technique or learning.
This is especially so with the work above, where it is already highly stylized.
It's a practice of following lines and filing in spaces and is as much a tool for learning as a crayon coloring book. Anyone who is actually looking for what they need to learn from such a thing (technique, anatomy, rendering) is inhibiting their practice by tracing rather than experimenting using their own work or emulating the technique.
Think of it this way, it's like a person, who knows nothing about Japanese, speaking Japanese using an old English to Japanese dictionary. If that person tried to speak, it would be unintelligible because they are skipping grammar, pronunciation, phrasing, and etiquette. They have no idea of the usage (the 'why's) of the words because their practice never called for it, and the only thing they would have practiced is opening their mouth, just as the only thing a tracer would have practiced is making lines with a pencil.
It's a waste of everyone's time.
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Nestly: But you're missing my point. I'm not saying that people need to trace. I'm not saying everyone needs to do it once or learn that way starting out, but some people do, and some people learn that way. And really, it's not hurting anyone. If they want to improve later and expand on their art, then they can move on and actually start using techniques and ya know, not trace anymore. That's cool.
Some people, unfortunately, never stop tracing, because it's easy, and go a little too far with it, to the point where it's rude, lying, and just wrong.
But I will say this again, putting someone down, especially a young artist who doesn't know any better and is only practicing and drawing for fun, is absolutely pointless and cruel. People need to relax and chill out a bit about that.
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Or we can just kill the beast before it's born an teach people that tracing does not equal legit art. That way they break away from it early on and stop being dependent. Bad animu art is still better than tracing.
Also this is a problem especially on this site, but most tracers seem to have no idea what plagarism is. Tracers are bad artists, but they are even worse at sourcing their work. It doesn't just evolve into "rude, lying, wrong." These people have no idea how disrespectful it is because no one is telling them, "Hey, this is actually someone else's work. Tracing and uploading without a source is stealing".
That is the point of this group.
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Nestly: Telling them politely is fine. I'm just against people ganging up on them in angry mobs over the internet, putting them down as an artist forever, and never letting it go, even if they do stop tracing. It's absolutely ridiculous how far people go to shove their 'rights' in others faces.
If someone just wants to trace for fun, and has the artists permission to do so, there is nothing you can complain about there, though.
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what if you only trace photographs to get a specific shape right? that's pretty much what i do if i find a pose i want to use for a character, then i go over it until i feel comfortable producing it on my own. i'd never claim it as being a 100% original work, but by the time i'm done i've effectively made it MY drawing, and not just a trace.
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You can study anatomy instead to help you understand WHY the body looks that way.
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I have actually witnessed someone doing this, but with a Rin/Len Vocaloid pic. In school. Using the light overhead to make it easier. o.o
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funny because i can draw, but i can't trace WORTH. A. SHIT.
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i suppose that's a good thing! :3
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Indeed. I reference a picture once in a while (for character design and sturf) but I have NEVER traced a picture. Not since I was... 7 or 8
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i can't remember the last time i had really, but i ref if i REALLY like the way something looks
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This captures the problem so well! I remember when I was around 8, and I had a manga drawing book, I drew one of the characters in it. My older sister looked at it, and just said, "That's not art, that's their picture. You don't have any talent if you need someone else to draw it before you can." Ever since then, I have never traced any drawings (besides my own). I have friends who have done this, and when I look at it, I just can't compliment them fully. All they did was show minimum competence to draw what they see. It feels wrong to me. I know some people trace to learn how to draw, which I think is probably acceptable as long as you're not showing off the picture afterwards or claiming that you "drew" it without crediting the real artist. I know my feelings would be hurt if I saw somebody holding up one of my pictures slightly altered and saying, "Look what I drew!". I draw OC's and am proud of it.
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Tracing is something only childs do.
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i dont think you should post it on deviantart and claim it as having put the full effort into the picture but tracing is one of the ways that people can learn how to draw. I have seen people do it and then later gain the confidence to draw something amazing by themselv-shit i wrote a whole paragraph
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Tracing is almost as annoying as when people use fake pictures on the internet.
But srsly.Gtfo with tracing 
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thank you... i hate it when i see "my pics" albums on facebook, and im like "traced traced traced!"
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Yay!
We have the same printer!
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tracing, not the way to go xc
i traced up until recently, and now i have a style that is pretty much a replica of some other people's, and hardly original at all
i feel ashamed for it.
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