An art-related rant

I know I promised art in my next post.

I lied.

Have some musings/a rant instead.

So, this isn't really in response to any specific instance.  Just some observations of artists copying things exactly as they are, and the response that that seems to evoke from people outside the art community.

Obviously, there are different reasons for copying something line for line, shadow for shadow, what have you.

1. If you are a beginning artist, copying (even tracing) is a way to gain better control over your hands--pressure control, line weight, etc.  It's normal.  Most people who dabble in art seem to do this, too, and usually only to have an exact copy of something--nothing more.
2. There is photo realism.  The artist's intention is to create a painting (most that I know of are taken directly from photographs, which I have mixed feelings about.) that is as real and terse as an actual photograph.  Nothing being done to 'touch up' things that may be unflattering to the subject.  This is an accepted artistic style and another perfectly good reason someone might try to copy something exactly.
3. Then, there is drawing a subject in an attempt to understand its form.  Generally, the artist strives to create a likeness of the subject--perhaps not to the degree of photo realism, but, in general the more detail you put into one of these drawings, the more you learn about 3D form.  This carries over to more imaginative drawings and makes them more believable.

Now, you could probably make an argument to put categories 1 and 3 together, but I feel that many people who dabble in drawing do not pursue or study it extensively enough to get past the first stage:  drawing so that the end result looks exactly like the subject, be it a photograph or a cartoon character.  They are probably not drawing with the intention of understanding the form of whatever it is they are copying.  A drawing that looks like Invader Zim or Sonic is literally the only result they are aiming for.
Category 1's lack of experience and intention for understanding what it is they are drawing are what separates them from categories 2 and 3.

So, why am I bothering to type all this out?  Well, mainly because people don't seem to know that most artists draw what they see as a means to understand something.
That sketch that you see that resembles a lion or a person is not usually the end result.  Far from it, in fact.
Think of the sketches that an artist does in the way that you think of a pianist practicing scales.  The scales are not at all the final product--you likely won't find any master pianists playing them at a concert.
The same for sketches, or otherwise drawings that may resemble a thing exactly as it is.  These drawings are a way for an artist to understand a 3 dimensional surface.  They later take what they learn form these sketches (the scales) and incorporate them into a more groomed art piece (the concert).

TL;DR:  When I draw something from a photograph or copy something from life, my intention is to understand the form of my subject.  The sketch is not something that I really consider to be a work of art, and it is not a final product by any means.  It is literally an exercise.  (I know there are other artists who think differently, but I'm only speaking for myself here.)