Pt 4 – Drawing Figures – Page 4

Proportions – Check and Log

March 29, 2014January 8, 2017Posted in 1 Proportions, 3 - Proportions - Check and Log, Pt 4 - Drawing FiguresTagged art degree distance learning, check and log, drawing figures, oca drawing 1, open college of the arts, part 4, proportionsLeave a comment

8th Sketch 10 Minutes Compressed Charcoal

Have you managed to make a complete statement within this time? What were your main problems?

Within 2 minutes? No, there is definitely a lot more time needed at this stage, however, with more practise drawing the human figure, two minutes could be enough to make a statement of a sort, more so with ten minutes. With one hour in ‘The Longer Pose‘ I do feel I managed to make a complete statement but the drawings did suffer with consistency.

Problems…

1. I have this knack of drawing the bodies really well with flowing lines but then when I get to the head and face I tend to tighten up and give the subject Action Man/Thunderbirds’ like features. I don’t know how other people see the drawings but that’s what I see.

How well have you captured the characteristics of the pose?

In the 2 minute life-drawing sketches In the ‘Quick Poses‘ exercise I would say about 50/50 I can see the original pose in what I captured on paper but then I would say that others probably wouldn’t get it. But then in ‘The Longer Pose’ exercise I would say ever I have managed to capture, in the pose, what draw me to it in the first place.

Do the proportions look right? If now how will you try to improve this?

In the quick poses the sketches do seem to be out of proportion in 2 or 3 but I think this was down to excitement more than anything else, it was the first time I had done any life-drawing and I was also worried that the model (my girlfriend) would be uncomfortable so I rushed my strokes. All the sitting poses however were in proportion and measured the same from the head to the seat of the backside.

Proportions – The Longer Pose

March 25, 2014January 8, 2017Posted in 1 Proportions, 2 - The Longer Pose, Pt 4 - Drawing FiguresTagged drawing figures, oca drawing 1, part 4, proportions, the longer pose1 Comment

I was meaning to draw the girlfriend again with this exercise but I came across two great opportunities to do two longer pose drawings on the same day. Firstly I was teaching a class of two teenagers but on this day only one turned up.

The girl who turned up was dressed in her lower-high school uniform, which are quite quaint and remind me a bit of the Victorian school uniforms so I couldn’t resist drawing her. Being the best English speaker of the two we managed to keep chatting while I finished. The drawing took me only about 40 minutes or so and I used the end of my Mars Lumograph pencil in front of her head and checking the measurement against the rest of her body. As with my girlfriend in the quick poses exercise her head fit into her body about 4 times to the seat.

However, it wasn’t the ideal drawing for this exercise, as the clothes weren’t tight fitting and the desk and bag cover a large proportion of the girl’s body but drawing from her waist (or desk) up it gave me some good practice and my subject fit nicely on the A4 sheet.

My second great opportunity came with my friend being in the dog-house and taking refuge at mine until he found somewhere else to live although this time I worked mainly from a photo as he could never stay still for long.

1 Hour Drawing in 6B on A3 — 1 Hour Drawing in 6B on A4

The drawing took me spot on an hour but a large portion of the time was spent getting his mouth right. I wish I had remembered what I had learnt from the OCA video below and asked him to keep his mouth shut. Nevertheless, I am quite happy with the finished drawing.

This time I drew from the waist out to the feet and then up to the head and again using my same method of measurement. Unlike the drawing of the schoolgirl above you can see more of his body shape and I could actually follow the contours of his body in the t-shirt and shorts. The hardest part of the drawing was his dodgy pointing finger and his open mouth which I had to resort to drawing with a 2B pencil as the 6B was just too big.

Proportions – Quick Poses

March 21, 2014January 8, 2017Posted in 1 - Quick Pose, 1 Proportions, Pt 4 - Drawing FiguresTagged art degree, distance learning, drawing figures. proportions, oca drawing 1 course, quick pose6 Comments

It was a nice refreshing change after the last assignment to do some quick drawings so I went into this exercise feeling quite optimistic. I had already done some quick 2 minute and a 10 minute sketch at school in my last sketch book from a life drawing site, so I was eager to get on with it. I was lucky to have my girlfriend come to visit me as she is a yoga teacher and a very willing model.

We left the yoga poses alone for now and just started with some simple poses, that turned out to be not so easy. Like I said earlier I did some quick sketches at school from a life drawing site and they really were quite easy. It was very different with a model stood in front of me swaying about.

I did as the brief said and started out drawing from the middle of the body then out to the head and feet and used the black end of my Mars Lumograph pencil for measurement.

The most challenging thing for me here was finding a pose that I could actually I draw and trying different mediums made me realize just how rubbish I actually was at figure drawing. I had always worked from memory or photographs when drawing the human body.

An other big problem I had at this stage was drawing my girlfriends profile and any of her facial features. So at this stage I scrapped even trying to draw facial features and went for drawing the outline of the face.

After experimenting with different mediums (graphite pencil, black Conte and Sanguine Conte ) I went back to drawing with a 3B pencil until I got my confidence up.

After 6 x 2 minute drawings I settled for a seated pose for the girlfriend for two reasons, 1 because she was doing a fair bit of wriggling and 2 because I didn’t want to put her off posing for me in future exercises.

I completed 2 x 10 minute drawings in graphite pencil and compressed charcoal, which I was quite pleased with as they did actually look like my girlfriend in shape and height.

From there I started to do a bit of experimenting trying 1 continuous drawing in felt tip pen which the girlfriend was quite pleased with as it made her look slim.

My Findings

From measuring while drawing and also measuring after drawing with lines on the sketches I found that the girlfriend’s head fit into her body four times to the bottom of the backside in a seated position if the girlfriend is willing to help me on future exercises then this knowledge will come in quite handy.

Earlier Drawings

The following drawings were drawn using a life drawing site while I was at school just before the summer holidays.

Researching Degas

March 19, 2014January 8, 2017Posted in Pt 4 - Drawing Figures, Researching Degas1 Comment

After seeing Degas’s Study for a portrait of Manet in the introduction to part four of this course I thought I would take a look at some more of Degas’s drawings. I was already familiar with his ballet dancer and horse paintings but it was really inspiring to see some of his studies and drawings.

Edgar Degas (1834–1917) Dancer with Arms Outstretched, ca. 1878. Black and white chalk, on tan paper

The drawing above was one of the first pictures that caught my eye, the black and white chalk really make the figure stand out on the tan paper. The girl’s pose is both simple and graceful and I can only see the upper part of her body I can imagine how her feet would be poised.

Three Studies of a Dancer' (ca. 1880) — Three Studies of a Dancer’ (ca. 1880)

I noticed there was a project called stance coming up so the next picture I decided to look at was Three Studies of a Dancer above, Degas again uses black and white chalk on tan paper but this time draws his subject from side, front and back in the same pose. My girlfriend who is also a yoga teacher has agreed to pose for me on some of the exercises and like ballet yoga has some graceful movements so it is nice to get some ideas from Degas’s drawings.

The third drawing that caught my eye was ‘Lying Nude’ a very simple half clothed nude lying on her back. Even though you only see part of the models chest stomach and one of her arms the pose allows your brain to fill in the rest.

Looking at the Seated Dancer Adjusting Her Shoes it is easy to see why Degas was so interested in painting ballet dancers with so many interesting positions and stance in their everyday dancing and training routines. In the drawing above something as simple as a ballet dancer adjusting her shoes before a lesson has allowed Degas to draw his subject in another very unique pose.