Part of my learning process is to see things as they are and this, for a start, involves creating a number of contour drawings. Principally I think that this is because they very directly confirm whether or not you've captured the structure of an object accurately; if the lines and angles don't match then you've drifted too far from reality. In time I hope to practice this with overlapping objects but for now I'm sticking with relatively simple items that have strong lines.
So I picked up an old padlock from my garage and captured its form in the manner seen here:
For comparison this is roughly how I viewed the lock from my seated position although it's remarkable how small changes in viewpoint can significantly impact perspective:
Anyway, looking at the positives, the aspect that I really like about this picture is that I've nailed the angle and curve of the shackle. I was concerned that I'd mess this up, given how the shackle is projecting 'out' of the picture, but this part works well. The body of the lock is ok, if somewhat distorted, while the key is in the correct plane but perhaps a little smaller than it should be. On the whole then a reasonable, if not wholly successful, attempt.