This simple yet effective halving method improves your proportion skills, helping you create more accurate and balanced sketches and designs.

Mastering Proportions in Design Sketching: A Quick Guide

Do your sketches look out of scale? And you are looking to elevate your design sketching skills?

One of the most crucial aspects of creating accurate and visually appealing sketches is mastering proportions. In this tutorial, we’ll explore a simple yet powerful technique to sharpen your sense of proportion, as featured in the Designer Starter Kit.

Feel free to download it and find the right elements for a good start in Design sketching.

The Designer Starter Kit Book
The Designer Starter Kit Book

How to Sharpen your Sense of Proportion

The Power of Halving

The key to achieving quick and accurate proportions lies in a surprisingly simple technique: dividing objects by half. This method offers several advantages over traditional guesswork:

  1. Efficiency: Halving is much faster and more precise than incrementally estimating proportions.
  2. Speed: By reducing the thinking process, you’ll significantly increase your sketching speed.
  3. Accuracy: This technique allows for more precise estimations without the need for rulers.

Simple division exercise:

How to sharpen your sense of proportion - Industrial design sketching
To obtain quick and fast proportions, take the good habit of dividing things by half.
It is much more efficient and accurate than guessing by incrementation (in pink).

Capture d’écran 2015-09-04 à 12.07.09 am
Doing so, you will rise your sketching speed. Don’t get me wrong. It’s not about tracing your lines faster but reducing your time of thinking process. With this technique, you get instantaneous results. Some more, you won’t need any ruler.

Applying the Technique

To put this method into practice, follow these steps:

  1. Start with a basic shape: Begin with the overall form of your object.
  2. Divide in half: Visually split the shape into two equal parts.
  3. Repeat: Continue dividing each section in half as needed.
  4. Refine: Use these divisions as guidelines to sketch your final design.

Why It Works

This technique is particularly effective because:

  • Symmetry in nature: Many objects in our world are symmetrical, making this method widely applicable.
  • Instant results: You’ll get immediate feedback on your proportions, allowing for quick adjustments.
  • Versatility: This skill can be applied to various design elements and objects.

Practicing the Technique

To hone your skills:

  1. Grab your tools: All you need is a pen and some paper.
  2. Start simple: Begin with straight lines then basic shapes and gradually move to more complex objects.
  3. Increase speed: As you become more comfortable, try to divide shapes more quickly.
  4. Observe your surroundings: Practice visually dividing objects in your environment.

How to sharpen your sense of proportion - Industrial design sketching - Symmetrical
Most of the things on earth are symmetrical.

So this technique gets really powerful to estimate proportions.

Beyond the Basics

As you master this technique, you’ll find that it becomes an intuitive part of your sketching process.
This will allow you to:

  • Sketch faster: Reduce time spent on proportion calculations.
  • Improve accuracy: Create more realistic and balanced designs.
  • Enhance creativity: Focus more on design ideas rather than technical aspects.

Conclusion

Mastering proportions through the halving technique is a game-changer for design sketching. By incorporating this simple yet effective method into your practice, you’ll notice significant improvements in both the speed and accuracy of your sketches. Remember, like any skill, it takes practice to perfect. So grab your sketchbook and start dividing!

Don’t forget to download the Designer Starter Kit for more exercises and tips to jumpstart your design sketching journey

Happy sketching!

Cheers,
Chou-Tac

Previous video tutorials:

  1. How to draw straight lines
  2. How to draw perfect squares
  3. How to draw awesome circles

3 comments

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Hello! I'm Chou-Tac, a Product Designer from France.

If the sketching methods I’ve acquired aid me in my life and in my industrial design career, I believe that they can also help you reach your dream goal as a student or professional designer.

Leave a comment in the blog or send me an email at choutac@thedesignsketchbook.com : )

Chou-Tac

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  • Derry: “22, Riva, Google Search, perspective drawin problems, i want to change my mindset about sketching.Jun 15, 23:46
  • RoZ: “1. I’m from France and i’m 22 years old 2. I need to improve my drawings 3. Google search 4.…Jun 15, 22:30
  • Andrés: “1. I´m from Colombia and I´m 49 years 2. I love to learn something new allways 3. Chat GPT brought…Jun 15, 06:36
  • Simona: “Hi, I’m Czech living in Italy, I’m 42. I graduated a few months ago in product design. I would like…Jun 14, 22:06
  • Simona: “Hi, I’m Czech living in Italy, I’m 42. I graduated a few months ago in product design. I would like…Jun 14, 22:05
  • Smash Karts: “This tutorial is fantastic! I loved how you broke down the steps for drawing a cube in 2-point perspective. The…Jun 14, 03:57
  • Chou-Tac: “Love that answer. :)Jun 14, 00:32
  • Chou-Tac: “That is a beautiful goal you have Mayhiv. :)Jun 13, 13:03
  • Foxy: “I love art and sketching. It heals me.Jun 12, 11:58
  • Foxy: “I love art and sketchingJun 12, 11:57
  • Mayhiv: “I’m from spain but living in Germany. almost 40 years old. I want to become Children llustrator. I discovered via…Jun 9, 03:31
  • Khushi: “I love to sketch,Jun 8, 19:19
  • Chou-Tac: “Yes, 2015 Antonis. Thank you for your support since the beginning of the blog!! :))Jun 8, 15:12
  • Chou-Tac: “Sure you can Leo :)) I invite you to try this tutorial. It is great for beginner to get instant…Jun 8, 15:10
  • Abdurahim: “From Ethiopia,20 year old B/c I have interest You tubeJun 8, 05:07
  • tpink: “NSW in Australia 50+ learnt art at school have more sketch books with 1 to 3 drawings in them then…Jun 8, 02:17
  • LEO DOHOGNE: “Chicago-78, To prove to myself I can draw more than stick people. Everything. I found you site in an internet…Jun 8, 01:46
  • Antonis: “Sweden / 46 New ideas and problem solving. Old follower. No problems. Want to evolve.Jun 8, 01:39
  • Keagan Degoede: “hi! Im from south africa , im 17 years old. im going to do mechatronics after school and i have…Jun 7, 22:55
  • Shravani shashank shende: “I come from india. My age is 21yrs . Because I am a product designer. And i want to improve…Jun 7, 13:35
  • Adi: “Accra GH, 37 yo. Learning to sketch for industrial design. Research looking for some, sort of product design workbook.Jun 6, 13:29
  • Chou-Tac: “Ola Miguel, Que tal? Estoy de acuerdo que dibujar con el mano esta mas la libertad de communicar con las…Jun 6, 01:00
  • Chou-Tac: “Awesome Bria! Congrats for your new job as an Art teacher! I am actually relocating to USA, and considering looking…Jun 6, 00:56
  • Chou-Tac: “Hey Mary, Singapore, so cool. I used to live and work there (Charles & Keith) for quite a few years.…Jun 6, 00:53
  • Chou-Tac: “Hey Joshua, please thank your colleague for the recommendation :D. Let me know how it goes. You may find this…Jun 6, 00:51
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