[Clickme]

I started out in a similar position, though I would eyeball some anime artwork I liked (Fullmetal Alchemist, Tenjou Tenge, Please Teacher) and more or less recreate it free hand as a way of learning to space things out and basic positioning by working from various poses and angles. I only did a few though, and started more trying to learn from my own work and move up from there. there are still a few times I go back to using general references, and figures or dolls, but mostly I work on my own now, and I think it helped to start with something to shoot for, which was one day being able to create art like that without the eyeballing part ^_^

And I'm glad you're lookign to improve yourself and not jsut trace forever lol. I look forward to seeing what you can do later down the road ^_^ Keep drawing!