Honestly, as much as patience allows. Maybe finish one piece and be done with it if it's not what I was looking for, maybe do every excercise in a page, maybe dedicate exactly 3 hours - but if I'm not doing this for a particular project, it's a little hard to push myself to like EVERY study you want on that subject without burning out. Variety is what works best with me, I save a bunch of reference pictures and do them in a slow day instead of one theme.
So you say you prefer to studying subject reference structure as opposed to developing style?
Sorry if I misunderstood your answer.
I guess I would have to say it's all influences? Because I don't study things like anatomy anymore; I quit the fundamentals back in middle school. Since then all my practice has consisted of finding things I like and figuring out how to emulate them, and it works pretty well for me.
I'm kinda the same way in academics, actually...rather than spending hours going over theories and trying to make sense of literally everything, I'd prefer to get just a few solid examples of what I'm supposed to do and go from there. I learn faster that way.
That's super interesting! I feel like to do animated it's very useful to have that. When I draw cartoons it's so hard for me to see what things make my drawings more or less interesting unless I have consistent coaching confirming that my technique works. I guess it's my wiring.
Personally, I've been so conditioned to analytical and theory based thinking my whole life. Working in computer programming. I'm also useful in the planning events and what-if scenarios. I hope theres still a place for that in the art world. People seem more engaged with my newer approach.
Yeah, I'm the kind of person that prefers to slowly build a style by practicing a reference and finding my way through it, rather than exactly what I see. Sometimes I'll study someone's style but it's for very quick excercises, like trying to emulate a cool texture or a very particular way of connecting details. Most of the time, let's say I practiced this type of process to draw a nose, I'm going to use this nose to try and find a good way of adjusting it for different shapes until I've got my own way of making them.
I'm also a REALLY messy artist so it's really about getting a "mental library" from many different sources to make a style based on what I like. When I remember I also have digital reference, which helps when I haven't drawn something in a while...
(this is just the folder for overall great sources, I also have specifically anatomy, props, hair, etc)
So the techniques you stored away are ideas other artists used to get around a problem and then you kinda mixmatch them?
Ah, I meant pretty much what @Iris-Grimoire said in their last post.
I tend to find my own way by using reference pictures, but most of the time I just have a repetoire of ideas built up over the years and I remember them at random.
I think all those things go hand and hand. You can't really do style without understanding anatomy and you can't just straight up draw good anatomy without having an understanding of design and style. And like trends and styles change a lot over time and are dependent on the project at hand for what you need. As my needs change, so do my interests in what I decide to study.
But in simple terms, if I see a piece I really like, I break it down--save the colors in my color picker so I can access them later--see if I can draw it myself (so copying, but with intent to learn and not ever actually posting my studies) and try to learn the technique and predict the brushes and the programs they used to paint it. But in order to do that and copy masters, I have to already know fundamentals like anatomy and color theory and stuff.
Makes since. The way you draw the dragon is pretty catchy but distinctive.
I'm finding If I wanted to draw a dragon realistic I would need to reference a few monitor lizards and maybe a lion.
To do it cartoony I would at best need to mixmatch 4 or five artists techniques
I've found that cartoony is the easiest way for me to express my ideas. I have a hard time doing realistic stuff. Even with references.
Yeah, im an extreme when it comes to fundamental and theory, so Im just accepting my fate lol. It's a bit dull but it does make it more clear what went wrong and what was done well without requiring constant critique.
I swing back and forth with my focus leaning heavily to one side or the other at any given time, and usually with a large quantity of work in between shifts. For example recently:
In 2017 I had just been getting back into drawing after taking a long break through college. So I focused a lot on subject matter rather than style to get back into the swing of things.
But then after a while when I decided I wanted to get back into comics, I shifted my focus back towards style/influences such that I could refine them to a point that I was comfortable starting a lengthy project with.
After finally starting the comic late 2018 though, I started focusing way more on subject matter way more again. The style was in place, so it was more important to me to draw things to an acceptable level of accuracy (details, proportions, perspective, etc.) and continue improving that through the run of the comic.
Now I'm nearing the end of said comic and, while I'm wanting to work on both style and substance between now and starting the next arc, the style side is nagging at me more lol so I've been thinking about doing some proper studies into my influences to refine that some more in the near future.
Well props to you for being able to adjust. Im finding a little peace now having a direction, but it took too much out of me to figure it out. I still need to finish my ongoing project knowing that its not what I do.
I personally try to at least spend 5-15 mins doing figure drawing studies before starting with my everday workflow. It works well as a warm up and I get to practice anatomy.
For style studying tho, I just don’t do it? I don’t personally go out of my way to figure out other people’s works. I just try to touch up my fundamentals and somehow my style keeps evolving as I go.
I do both, as you need both 
But I tend to focus more on studying subject matters because I don't care too much about my own style, I just let the flow lead the way.
And I know regardless of the artstyle, fundamentals apply all the time.
With a strong backbone on subject matter, it becomes easier to achieve the style you have in mind.
You can't really say that the other way around.
Yeah i never learned to apply many fundamentals from my portrait works to my cartoon works, so embellishing the right elements and being expressive was a diceroll. I couldn't not make it a science. Having a clear external goal gives me enough foundation to maybe tweak and remove parts of the end product and I guess it still works. Muscle memory probably.
