Regarding perspective studies

[El Tigre]

I've recently acquired Loomis' Successful Drawing from the library and wish to get some serious studying in. However, seeing as it begins with teaching perspective, I've hit a little snag. It's one that I've bumped into a lot when I see this subject in art books.

Whenever you find a section focusing on other subjects like drawing the head and such, you'd usually receive a handful of step-by-step images showing how the object was constructed. However, when it comes to perspective, I rarely see a plan treated the same way. They always seem to just have an entire image or two fully complete, with only worded instructions above or below it not nearly explicit enough for you to go by(such as "establish the horizon and vanishing points and then have the sides recede into the VPs" without saying where to put the first line, what particular side you're supposed to start with, and whether or not you need to draw your lines going to the vanishing points or from the vanishing points). And when there are some steps showing how it's done, there aren't nearly enough.

So what I'm wondering is, do art books rarely have handfuls of visual steps for each perspective plan because everyone constructs, say, a particular plan slightly different and in their own order of lines(but all still using the horizon and vanishing points as guides, of course)? Or, are those who learn from the same book supposed to recreate the plan they see in a certain "correct" order of intersecting lines and so forth?

[QueenGwenevere]

such as "establish the horizon and vanishing points and then have the sides recede into the VPs" without saying where to put the first line, what particular side you're supposed to start with, and whether or not you need to draw your lines going to the vanishing points or from the vanishing points

Uh......... It doesn't matter what order you draw the lines in, or what direction you draw them in. AT ALL. For goodness sake, you don't need everything spelled out THAT explicitly, take some initiative. Try things and see what works.

If you really need someone to tell you where to start, draw the horizon line first.

(Although you can do it the other way around and start by roughing in a square or other object in the approximate perspective you want, and using it to establish the horizon line, and work out the rest from there. There really is no one "right" way to proceed.)

Drawing is not like writing Chinese characters, there's no "correct" order or direction of strokes for drawing anything. You do whatever works for you. All that matters is it looks good in the end.

[El Tigre]

If you really need someone to tell you where to start, draw the horizon line first.

Well, duh, that's obvious, heh. But what I took interest in was the order other people construct their objects after that point. Like me, when I do a cube, I'd start from the vanishing points, and have two lines on each side intersect with each other to make a flat square in perspective, and try to build up off of that. I'm interested in how else others would begin the same cube.

The reason why I'm freting so much of this is because I always perceived the study of perspective to be so daunting and an aspect that needs more precision and particular steps to successfully produce a good object and such in perspective. I've been trying to draw seriously for a few years, and while I'm not that good, I never falter when I try to study other subjects in my journey of learning art, and I always try to approach other things in different ways and orders. I was just wondering if learning perpsective needs a far more stricter approach or it really wasn't that big of a deal and I'm thinking too much of it.

[blogmatix]

Try things and see what works.

It is only relatively recently that I have begun to understand the importance of this point. Trying out all manner of approaches, and making a thousand horrendous bugger-ups and stumbling down another thousand blind alleys, are all part of the learning process. It appears that lessons we learn painfully we also learn well. :-)

[black-swan]

formal perspective is just a tool, it's not that complicated (well not 1,2 and 3 point anyways)- it's the kind of thing you just 'get' after studying it for a while. I wouldn't say that Loomis' book on perspective is a good one for beginners, I believe there is a perspective 101 thread on this site by Seedling, just do a search for it. 'Perspective Drawing for Comic Artists' by David Chelsea is also a good book on perspective.

At the end of the day, you are probably going to encounter problems and things you don't get, but just keep trying to solve those problems as they come. Don't worry about using a 'perfect' method or sequence, nothing is perfect.

there is also informal perspective, a more freehand approach. ctrlpaint.com has some good videos on it and it is very relevant to drawing from imagination.

[El Tigre]

formal perspective is just a tool, it's not that complicated (well not 1,2 and 3 point anyways)- it's the kind of thing you just 'get' after studying it for a while. I wouldn't say that Loomis' book on perspective is a good one for beginners, I believe there is a perspective 101 thread on this site by Seedling, just do a search for it. 'Perspective Drawing for Comic Artists' by David Chelsea is also a good book on perspective.

At the end of the day, you are probably going to encounter problems and things you don't get, but just keep trying to solve those problems as they come. Don't worry about using a 'perfect' method or sequence, nothing is perfect.

there is also informal perspective, a more freehand approach. ctrlpaint.com has some good videos on it and it is very relevant to drawing from imagination.

Thanks. I do also have Perspective Made Easy(which Successful Drawing recommends), which is a bit more simpler, but I was a little intrigued with Loomis' method about building objects in boxes, even if it's pretty confusing. Would it be fine if I switched to the other book for perspective studying and use Successful Drawing mainly for the other stuff that's in the book(the figure, lighting, etc.)?

[Notophthalmus]

Another book to try is "Perspective" by Gwen White. It goes through perspective step-by-step, slowly and clearly, not only telling you how to construct things but explaining why as well. I found it very helpful for things like figuring out how perspective changes depending on distance of the picture plane from the focal point, how to figure out where to put vanishing points depending on the orientation of the object, and so on; when I learned one point and two point perspective in school, none of that was explained, we just had to wing it.

[JeffX99]

Couldn't agree with Queenie more...study and understanding requires effort. You look at the illustrations/diagrams...you read the text...you try things out...until you understand it! Perspective is not that difficult and just requires playing with it and experimenting and trying to understand the principles. Keep it simple at first and develop your awareness as you go.

Some recommendations I would offer...do NOT work on small paper - work on 11x17 at least. Use a ruler. Draw lightly. Erase confusing construction lines as necessary. Keep it simple.
Have fun.

[black-swan]

Thanks. I do also have Perspective Made Easy(which Successful Drawing recommends), which is a bit more simpler, but I was a little intrigued with Loomis' method about building objects in boxes, even if it's pretty confusing. Would it be fine if I switched to the other book for perspective studying and use Successful Drawing mainly for the other stuff that's in the book(the figure, lighting, etc.)?

It's entirely up to you, look at a few different books, try out different methods and find out what works for you

[Elwell]

Would it be fine if I switched to the other book for perspective studying and use Successful Drawing mainly for the other stuff that's in the book(the figure, lighting, etc.)?

What do you think might happen?

[ebi]

I'm a newbie at drawing, but I can definitely recommend the book that I'm working from to understand perspective: "Vanishing Point".
First you start with the techniques used for each type of perspective (like one, two and three point etc.). the author gives you step by step instructions for it.

Then,you get to reconstruct a drawing that the author already made. And the author kind of guides you through that drawing and tells you what steps you have to apply where. Though I think it does help if you have a little bit of an understanding of drawing in general here.

and once you've completed that, you can also do the extra assignment that he gives you ( basically drawing any room with rectangle/square objects...and of course you apply whatever you have learned in each lesson).

Not sure if that is what you're looking for, but you can take a look at the book over here:

Vanishing Point on Amazon

and on Parka blogs

[creeptool]

has any one seen gnomon workshop dvd's? Fundamentals of Perspective 1

One-Point Principles and Concepts with Gary Meyer http://www.thegnomonworkshop.com/store/product/1014/

[[email protected]]

Loomis is not the best source for perspective, as he tends to cut some corners: you may want to switch to Raynes or Norling.

[AndreasM]

If you're willing to spend some money, Carl Dobsky has some tutorials here on the site as digital downloads. These tutorials covers the most basic diagrams in 1, 2 and 3 point perspective and should be very helpful in going through the core foundations (I think).

If I have understood it right, though, most industrial designers like Feng Zhu and the likes never plots down their work as meticulously as Gary Meyer does here (using measurements and plans&elevations), but they have been through the most thorough training of the core foundations of perspective either way. Feng Zhu continually says in his videos that the most thorough, "hardcore" is neede to design in perspective with the freedom he has.

Edit:
Just saw that the greg meyer videos had been posted.