The Last Post: Life Drawing Final

This has been a very interesting and beneficial class. I was eager to begin and learn how to draw the human body, hoping to increase my strengths in drawing as well as other media. Overall, I am happy with the work I've done in Life Drawing and the knowledge that I will take away from the class.

I believe that my work over the course of the semester shows that I was able to make good progress towards achieving the course objectives. I am able to view the human body with an understanding of how it all goes together, from the bones out to the skin. Before Life Drawing, I would view a person as just a couple of shapes and attempt to grasp things like proportion based on rules-of-thumb that I learned back in elementary school. I didn't understand the planes that make up the human body; for example, I would look at a skull as simply an oval rather than viewing the planes of areas like the forehead and noting the change of the direction of the line as I use it to move around the planes and create form. After learning about actual anatomical landmarks and the muscles of the body, I feel that I am much more comfortable and successful at drawing the human form.

I could improve upon the use of line weight and variation in my work. I've become better since I started this class, but I still find that I have a hard time using it correctly. I've learned that there are so many ways to use line, and I have yet to figure out which method I prefer to work with or which I find most successful. This hinders my ability to add good depth to my drawings, so a bit more practice in this area will be very beneficial to me.

The feedback that I received from my midterm portfolio included comments about my gesture drawings and the long poses in class. I needed to work on getting rid of outlines in my gesture drawings and focus more on using the long axis to capture the motion. During the beginning of the class, I would draw what I believed to be the bone structure as the basis for my limb gesture drawings, but they would never end up looking right. I have made efforts to correct that an now try to use the surface as the axis line for the limb. I need to use cross-contour more in my gestures in order to build depth; outlining the shape only flattens it. I haven't improved in this aspect as much as I would like, but I'm hoping to work on it a bit more in Life Drawing II next semester.

I really believe that my more recent drawings show a stronger understanding of artistic anatomy than some of the work in my midterm portfolio. I better understand how the form comes together as a whole and how the surface lines make their way across the planes of the body. I've made an effort to practice better proportions, and I've made progress with that, as well. I still have some room for improvement, but I'm happy with what I've accomplished. My next goal is to be able to get the same drawing results in less time. I like producing good work, but I also like sleep.

Life Drawing I will be very helpful for future classes, my concentration, and my career. I'm enrolled in Life Drawing II next semester, so obviously the things I've learned in LD1 will help me be successful in a higher-level course. My interests in the multimedia concentration are in 3D modeling and animation. As I mentioned in one of my first posts on this blog, a big reason that I took this class was to strengthen my skills in the modeling of 3D characters. If I want to successfully model anatomically correct characters, I have to have a proficient understanding of the human form, and LD1 and LD2 are going to help me immensely in achieving that.

As the semester is coming to an end, so is this Life Drawing I blog. I am glad that I can look back and be happy with what I have accomplished this semester. I had a good time learning, and I'm sure I will be more than pleased with everything I learn next semester. Until then, adieu.

Life Drawing final portfolio

Click here to see my Life Drawing final portfolio. The sets that are part of the final are: Maniken, Long Drawings, Homework and Gesture Drawings

Self Portrait

For our final drawing, we were assigned a self portrait. It was time to test myself on what I'd taken out of Life Drawing I. The following details a bit of my process.

First of all, I have a tendency to set high expectations for myself, and I do my best to follow through with these expectations. I knew this was going to be a strenuous and time-consuming piece, but I was determined to do all that I could to make it as successful as possible. Twelve hours of drawing and two sunrises later, I am very happy with the final product.

I've never studied artistic anatomy before this semester, so I still have quite a bit of room to grow as far as perfecting my skills. I started my self portrait by developing the planes and proportions of the skull. I then moved on to the features of the face: the nose, eyes, ear, and mouth. I finished up with the neck and shoulders.

After going through a draw-erase-draw-erase cycle quite a few times, I was happy with the proportions, but I was left with a number of smudges and line shadows. This made the drawing look very messy right away, and I felt that it would look sloppy and leave the structural planes too visible in the final piece. I decided to start over, but I would use what I already had done to help me.

I darkened the lines of my first piece, traced it onto a sheet of newsprint so I didn't dirty the back of my final paper, and then placed a new sheet of drawing paper over the newsprint. (On a side note, I've heard that famous painters who aren't satisfied with a piece sometimes paint over their entire canvas and start over, so I'll consider this my modified version of that step...) The resulting drawing can be seen below.

This last step made it easier to add the features to my face. The biggest issue I came across during this phase was proportion and placement. I probably drew the equivalent of four portraits with the amount of erasing, resizing, and moving I did. At the end of it all, I was glad that I started on a clean sheet of paper, or my drawing would have been far messier.

As much time and effort as it took to complete my self portrait, I enjoyed the assignment and am incredibly pleased with the results. In my mind, it is without a doubt the best piece I've completed in Life Drawing I, and it demonstrates what I have learned throughout the class. I look forward to further developing my skills in artistic anatomy in Life Drawing II, and hope to complete more work that I am this proud of.

This is my first draft of the drawing. I was left with a number of smudges and line shadows after establishing the main planes and features of the form. I decided to start over, but I darkened the lines of this draft and used it as a reference for my final.

The completed version of my final drawing.

Just a quick one - 5/11/10

I did these drawings in class today, April 8th. I like the way they turned out, so I decided to write a little bit about them.

This gesture drawing (1 minute) is a pretty one. I think that it describes the form and movement of the pose quite well, although more variation in line weight would help emphasize the parts which bear the most weight.

This drawing is a cross-contour that I spent about 2 hours on. While slow in the making, I think that it's a successful piece. I spent most of my time working to get the proportions correct; with a bit of help from my professor, I think they turned out alright. The torso seems a bit short, but I don't find it too drastic. I'm proud of my use of line weight, particularly on the torso area. It does well to show the smoother and sharper curves of the form.

This little eye of mine - 5/4/10

This piece took about 30 minutes to draw. It was a good experience; I haven't drawn eyes before, and I find that I quite enjoy learning the "rules" of artistic anatomy. The little things, like the 3-dimensional planes of the eyelid or the top and bottom of the iris being just overlapped by the lids, make all the difference. It's rather exciting to learn these things and watch yourself develop the ability to draw anatomically correct features. I don't think it's too bad for my first eye drawing, although the nose I drew isn't as spectacular.. I'll be working on that. I'm eager to find out how the rest of the face will go for me as I learn more and when I draw my self-portrait for the final assignment.

Here's my first nose drawing.. I think I need to continue practicing this particular feature.