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akarudsan — Expressive art 10 minutes sketch
#beauty #expressive #charcoal #charcoaldrawing #charcoalportrait #tradtional #tradtionalart
Published: 2019-02-07 03:08:55 +0000 UTC; Views: 420; Favourites: 37; Downloads: 0
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Facebook || Instagram || Reddit || BuyMeACoffee || AlexeiArt YouTubeContinue with expressive experimentation and on top of that with really slowing down....Instead of doing lots and lots of strokes I'm trying to think more carefully about placement and what I'm trying to achieve with it, hence no eraser was damaged in making of this 10 minutes sketch
I'll be releasing a timelapse video of it soon as I've recorded it too how I was making. I used a Direct Approach to draw it, meaning I didn't do any construction lines and drew it top to bottom (only returning to smudge a little with a finger as a second pass). Quite honestly I'm pleased with a result and maybe will not even work on her face and just leave it as is.Other work:
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Comments: 17
It's good that you spared the eraser, slow down and think about placement and such. And searching lines should be kept to a minimum. All good. But this idea of drawing directly without construction makes me wonder about your objective.
Some painters use what's called "the block-in", which is a way of carving up the page into shapes, clipping off more and more until the subject is defined. It's a radically visual method based on precise measures in two dimension. Everything on the page is reduced to x and y coordinates. One draws only by shapes. There is no searching out the form, or turning the edge of a form, or drawing around a form. And there is no putting oneself inside the pose to feel it. It's all executed from the outside and at a distance (both physically and emotionally) .
It's a good method for faithfully copying the subject. Not much good for expressive drawing or drawing from imagination. In any event, is this what you're practicing, or tending toward . . . the block-in?
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As you saw in my previous posts I was doing pure gesture, clay method, line method, etc etc to practice different things. I can't speak for others who are doing Direct Method but for me personally it was more of a test of my hand-to-eye coordination and visualizing proportions without putting marks down. In other words: slow down a LOT and think before doing things. I don't want to spread myself too thin and concentrate on everything at once so I'm concentrating on only a few things with each session but in order to not get bored and disinterested I keep flipping things around. This has worked for me and might not work for someone else. So with this particular sketch my goals were: paying attention to proportions a lot as this is typically my deficiency as I tend to "wonder around" to tune the proportions; use minimal amount of stroke to achieve a desired effect - because I tend to draw and erase, draw and erase to tune the tones.
So, today or tomorrow I'll be doing something else, might not be even working with charcoal which is my go-to medium.
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Okay. That explains it. Thanks.
You don't find that measuring out the space with a solid and accurate construction helps to establish good proportions? Or is the goal (in this exercise) to do that in your head?
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I'm actually trying to find a good way for me to measure things by eye. The best, so far, is doing it with parallel lines, like left side, right side of the face, then top and bottom. I've tried doing it with clay style and for some reason don't "feel" it. I'm always off by a lot doing it that way. So, even in this direct drawing, I was imagining those parallel lines and that's what allowed me to be more precise at proportions right from the get go. So, construction overall helps but it depends on how to do that construction.
Btw, one thing to not neglect, even though I was doing direct method it doesn't mean I wasn't using gesture. I wasn't doing things as a printer but was basically doing mini-constructions with gesture.
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Aha. I think you're on the right track trying out different ways.
Before one can use "feeling" (i.e. in the "clay" modeling way of drawing) one has to practice and nail down the 2D way of measuring by sight. For example, one can use calipers, or the end of a pencil, or charcoal stick, to translate measurements from the model to the figure on the page. After a short while practicing it, one can leave the calipers and do it by eye.
Another way is to build a grid, through which to view the subject. I built one from a small picture frame with wires. But a simple piece of cardboard will do. Cut out a rectangle of 3x4 inches and tape cross bars or thread to make the grid. Use this as your viewfinder to compose, then use it to measure relationships/proportions
yet another way is what Loomis calls the "visual survey" method. This is like a grid, except you first pick a point, like the chin, then drop a perpendicular and see what other parts of the body align with it. Maybe a knee? You generate as many perpendicular lines and horizontal lines as you find necessary to relate one part to another. I believe this is covered in either Fun With a Pencil, or Figure Drawing For All It's Worth.
The novelty of drawing aids can help make drawing more interesting and fun. if you practice with them the right way you'll get immediate improvement and, in a little while, be able to perform at an improved level without them.
BTW - I once had a hard time drawing symmetrically. Faces always big on one side and squeezed small on the other. I tried all sorts of ways to fix this, even practicing on graph paper. Turned out, however, that this distortion was the result of eye-hand cross-dominance. Once I became aware of that, I was able to solve the problem several different ways. I mention this because of what you said about the problem of how to use the construction, and the method of parallel lines. I don't think cross-dominance is an issue for you (based on what I see in your gallery), but doesn't hurt to check.
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Sure, and I'm actually using the reference kind of method like you've mentioned with Loomis with extending imaginary lines and see where intersections are to make sure that I'm making proportions right....I'd call this more like triangulation method because it's not just doing it for one point but rather do it in relationship with others: some vertical, some horizontal, and some diagonal. I don't have distortion problem per se because of the method that I'm using to check myself, because if I look back at my earlier works I can see it slightly there because I didn't do much triangulation at the time and used more of just parallel distances comparison. Now I'm using all kinds of visual markers by eye to make proportions right: stepping away form the drawing to see how it looks smaller, doing triangulation by eye, using anatomy knowledge to look for key landmarks and playing from there, compare relative sizes of body parts or whatever I'm drawing (basically abstracting myself from what I'm drawing and just comparing shapes). It's just you can never be perfect anyway, so I keep on working on improving my eye proportion coordination.
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That's the way to do it.
(Also, turning paget upside down to inspect - I'm sure you do that, too. Have you experienced actually drawing the model upside down? This is a way to practice 2D/visual measurement. Some say it is easier to draw accurately this way because the focus is so clinical/antiseptic. Of course, taking out all the feeling can ruin it, for some. It is, btw, a key to forging art and counterfeiting signatures.)
BTW - found this picture of the viewfinder/grid I made way back (circa 2002). It was very helpful to quickly train the eye to see relationships.
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I think I'm passed that point to use something like that grid 
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