Learn to Draw Digital Sketchbook by Walter Foster iPad App Review

I have a confession to make, I can’t draw. I’ve always wished I could and have envied that skill in others, but truthfully I’m pretty bad. So when MEDL Mobile sent along Learn to Draw on the iPad for review I thought I’d give it a test and see if it could somehow bring out my inner Van Gogh.

Learn to Draw is a digital sketchbook that features lessons from the renowned publisher of art instruction books Walter Foster. The App comes installed with a sample book featuring four sketching lessons with more lesson books available through in-app purchasing. As of now the choices and pricing are:
Dragons (10 Lessons $6.99)
Flowers (5 Lessons $2.99)
Horses (10 Lessons $6.99)
People (11 Lessons $6.99)

Learn to Draw teaches you how to draw via text and audio instructions while you trace blue lines in order to learn. In fact, it promises that if you “listen to the instructions, follow the steps in blue, you’ll be drawing digital masterpieces in no time!” Sounds easy enough. Each lesson is broken into five or so steps which are simple enough not to overwhelm you with too much information. They only take a few minutes to complete and you can replay any step until it clicks and you get it right.

I started out making my first sketch of a female profile from the Drawing from Life lesson, mainly because it looked like the easiest of the four. The audio instructor spoke clearly and broke everything down into the basic shapes of the head, hair, and facial features. I grabbed my nearest index finger and began tracing away at the blue lines and quickly learned that my finger isn’t a direct substitute for a pencil. It takes a moment to master the technique of tracing with your finger, but once I learned to be patient things were fine. You can use the iPad’s pinch and pull technique to zoom in or out giving you greater precision in the areas that require more detail.

You are given four primary tools to draw with: a sketch pencil (basic #2 pencil), a shading pencil, a detail pencil, and an eraser. You can select any of the four simply by tapping on them. It’s immensely helpful that the eraser tool is tied to each step of the lesson. This means if you want to erase a mistake you made while on step three, you don’t risk erasing your good lines from steps one and two. Very cool.
 
To augment these tools you have a size slider that determines the width of your stroke, a pressure slider the changes the darkness and finally a hardness slider that changes the edge of your strokes. You can drag these sliders from left to right until you get the desired effect you’re going for. There’s also a Reset button that returns the sliders to their default positions.

I traced away for about 20 minutes and ended up with my first drawing. It looked halfway decent (no doubt helped by the fact that the original was underneath it to guide me) so I e-mailed it to myself for posterity. Against my better judgement I’ve included it below so take a look.

OK, so I still need some work but fortunately there are three more included lessons for me to improve.

In addition to following lessons you can also sketch anything you want in a freehand draw mode. Essentially you’re given a blank canvas with access to the same tool set found in the lessons. As mentioned earlier, you can e-mail your drawings as well as share them on Facebook and Twitter or save them in your Photo library. If you’re an artist looking for a basic digital sketchpad to throw down ideas this might be your answer.

Final Thoughts

Apps like Learn to Draw are what make the iPad so great. If you want to learn the fundamentals of drawing with a minimum investment then you have somewhere to start. You can follow each lesson once or twice on the iPad and then attempt them on your own using a pencil and paper without a safety net. Right now you’re limited to just a few lesson books to choose from but hopefully more are on the way. Learn to Draw taught me some basics about drawing and there’s more than enough included with the four sample lessons to warrant a purchase even if you don’t plan on buying the other books. If you decide to dive deeper into sketching then you have that option.

As long as you have an iPad and a finger, Learn to Draw delivers on it’s promise.

Review Score: 9 out of 10

iTunes Link: Learn to Draw Digital Sketchbook by Walter Foster – MEDL MOBILE