This turned out OK but the teacher took all our pics that day, and I didn’t have my regular camera so this is a slightly crappy ipod photo, colored slightly blue and highlighted in photoshop. If/when I get the original back and take a better pic I’ll post that.
Haven’t handed it in yet… I should have investigated more fancy techniques such as draping etc… There would be quite a bit of bespoke tailoring though… beaded top, lace-fronted godets etc. I have to do the technical and then mount it. Meh…
A bit boring, this.
In the version I’m gonna hand in there will be speech bubbles, comic-style, where lady #1 accuses lady #2 (a friend) of wearing the same dress, lol :-) We had to do the front and back, and it just looked silly mounted that way so I thought I’d poke fun.
… or, as my classmate calls her, “Grid Lady”.
It was surprising to see a very (not super very, but quite very) elderly person posing for life drawing. I don’t think we were prepared. But actually this presented a great drawing opportunity. Also, I’m the only lass in the class, and I’m not saying that that is why this is, but I’m the only one who captured the (Caesarian?) scar. I actually thought it was kind of pretty (as far as accidental 2D patterns go)…
The grid-mesh effect is me attempting to do the “cross-contour” exercise we were set. I don’t think this is quite what the teacher had in mind, but he didn’t seem to mind, lol… Anyhow when it was time to do proper drawing laziness had descended upon me (what else is new) so I decided to just shade on top of it… Oh, and my teacher did the hand on the lap! It was NOT happening otherwise…
Fur’s a bitch. Oh well… He (or she, for all I know) turned out reasonably huggy in the end, which is what mostly matters…
Second floor @ the ROM, should you want to attempt a sketch yourself (or perform like-ness testing).
… we had an exercise where we were allowed to pick just a portion of the body and zoom in on it. So naturally I decided to do the face! lol… Ideally you’d be closer if doing a portrait, but oh well.
I’ve never drawn anyone’s face this well before, so hopefully this is a sign of progress…
I think this is my favorite piece of life drawing so far.
In this session I learned about blocking in the figure with charcoal, and then smearing it completely until you have just the shadow of it left. This also creates a midtone over the whole page from which you can build back up with more detail. Then with kneadable eraser you can pick out the highlights / increase the range of tones. It all makes so much sense it makes you wonder why you never think of doing all these things until a teacher tells you! :o)
I hate wax crayons. I dunno… they’re just so annoyingly waxy and… and… UNBLENDABLE. I dunno what kids see in them. I bought a tiny 6-pack of crayons yonks ago (I had forgotten how I disliked them) and one sunny day I sat outside and doodled in a tiny notebook I had bought for doodlery. It had this horrible thick paper (I dunno, I hate thick paper too) so the combination of this paper and crayons were just irritating to the max and I wondered, what if I tried to pretend I liked them both and tried instead to celebrate the qualities of both the paper and the crayons for a change? And this was the result:
So…
Did I succeed in creating something celebratory, or DOES MY HATE STILL SHOW THROUGH?!!! lol…
Really badly put together, but what the hey. I think I’m going to revert to the less naturalistic style of drawing going forward, for fashion illustration. It was more fun and just… I dunno, less irritating.
I don’t like all this presentation board malarkey either, lol! I hate putting ‘em together! I wanna just draw my figures and move ON. No such luck…
So what exactly was accomplished? What I’ve learned is that my drawing is highly inconsistent… sometimes I can do very good work and sometimes I can execute the most childish, crude things. It mainly comes down to how much time I think I have. I’ve always been a slow thinker / slow person.
Well, here’s the arc of progress – from the very first ‘Heart’ exercise where we just drew anything based on the theme ‘heart’, on the very first day of class, all the way to some shading and life drawing attempts. Uhm, I should mention that this is the “better” stuff. I tore up the other attempts – especially the really bad life drawing ones :o) Also, the pic at the top of this post was severely “Harvey-assisted”… see how the face has a touch of realism? Yah… See how the rest doesn’t? Yah…. lol. Continue reading
…the teacher hits you with 3-point perspective.
Look at this crapulence!! It’s enough to make spiderman throw up… >(
