[bonzelite]

personally, i never used grids. never saw the point of them. didn't need them. i eyeballed everything, then grasped the nifty gift of tracing. then combined both. but these tools are tools: gridding, tracing, templates, etc. and they are just tools.

the problem i have with only-tracing, or only-gridding, is that the person puts themselves in prison: they are limited by the grid. ie, they cannot take a pee or sh!t without carrying the grid to the toilet with them. it is very confining and rigid. there is no room to explore multiple angles of anything, there is no spontanaeity with a grid or tracing.

unless the artist succumbs to a life of drawing only from photos, and/or gridding a photo and then drawing in the 'quadrants' (which is essentially tracing, by the way), they are forever in jail. they cannot just toss out a sketch off the top of their heads, exploring uncharted waters, concepting scenes, and maybe even entire vehicles.

it seems like to use only grids or trace, which is one in the same to me, the artist is forever using training wheels. to be able to use it all, plus eyeball the subject to where it pretty much looks like it was traced, is a more respectable goal and state of existence.