Dancing Skeletons! (due Nov. 10)

[Tikeo]

Is it too late to post this?

They... kind of dance.

I'm so bad at coming up with poses.
Should I make the image smaller?

[Maledict]

Another:

[Miracula]

Miracula – I’m the addition of horizontal lines, and the scaling might have helped out a little, but there are still some problems that can only be resolved by redrawing, I’m afraid.

Yeah, I know - it was just a kind of "quick-fix". But my problem is, that I can't really figure out what is wrong...
Some of this guys are looking weird. The last one for example: He looks kinda flat and I know somehing is wrong with the perspective, but it's very, very difficult to make it looks right... It's frustating

I find very dificult to represent the bones foreshortened,maybe because im not used. I ll do my best!

Ha, I think that's my problem too Maybe I should work on this....
I'll try!

[Pretty_Angel]

Hi there!

Just discovered this classroom and want to join. Here are my first dancing skeletons in quick sketching manner - after excessively watching Fatboy Slim's "Weapon of Choice" music video for inspiration.

[Verastegui]

My goal in this exercise is to just make a good proportional skeleton and be able to work my way up without making much changes and be sure the final piece doesn't feel flat.

[Maledict]

Here are 3 more pages of skeleton poses.

[Miracula]

I never thought it would be so DIFFICULT!

I tried to draw my last skeleton (the one lying on the ground) again, but I failed and failed and failed again...
So I did the last one in the first row again and looked up what Andrew Loomis says about proportions. In addition I used curved lines for arms and legs to make the guy looking less stiff... It turned out a little better, I think, but there's still a long way to go

[Bl@stzone]

hey. sorrty i was so late with this. had to wait till my guests had left. heres my meagre offering...

[Burtzum]

just stumbled upon this section of the forums... decided to try a few of these
Having trouble with pelvis, forearms, hands, everything else.. hehe.

[armando]

So this is what I came up with. Basically a simplified version of the other idea.
The main thing I learned from this is that composing is a lot like balancing coins, and I couldn't quite do it. This was a great exercise though, thanks Seedling and Ilaekae.

[sweet&sourpb]

Scratch what I said earlier, life got in the way.

[Seedling]

Great work everyone! I'll be back tomorow with final comments for everyone. (My in-laws are visiting right now, so I can't stay long.) Be sure to check out Ilaekae's first assignment!

[Maledict]

Thanks for dropping by again Seedling. I've already started on Ilaekae's first assignment. Almost finished doing the piece of wood and bark. I'm just having problems with cast shadow of a square piece of wood/bark being propped up against a wall.

Also, my skeleton's aren't that good (Mainly due to two things, the line quality, which is how I draw, and the quality of the paper. Everyone else somehow manages to have their background completely white!). But I'll post 3 full female figures that I did yesterday


Edit:

Ok, here they are, maybe I wasn't too clear before in my introduction as to what I was hoping to be able to achieve and make myself better. It's drawings like these that I made the other day, only better with more knowledge of skeletal anatomy.

[Seedling]

I've already started on Ilaekae's first assignment. Almost finished doing the piece of wood and bark. I'm just having problems with cast shadow of a square piece of wood/bark being propped up against a wall.

Awesome! You should go tell him that in his thread.

[Ilaekae]

I snuck in for a look-see and there's some really cool stuff in here. I oughta do one of these--skeletons are my all-time favorite thing to draw...

[chaosrocks]

hey guys the old kitty threw his name in the hat fo rLMS3
wheres the sprout?
git in there girl!
chaos

[Seedling]

Hello everybody! It’s been such a delight popping into this thread all week and seeing your progress! I had a wonderful weekend with my in-laws. They headed back to Michigan today, and there was other excitement, including a strange, large, beautiful bird that died tragically by flying into a window of our house. A grouse, it turns out to be. And this only hours after seeing a cluster of Northern Flickers in our yard, which are a type of woodpecker that I’d never seen before, either. It’s raining birds. Anyway, sorry I’m tardy,

Tikeo – Nope, you’re not too late. But if you hurry now you can get in on Ilaekae’s class with more time to enjoy the assignment. Anyway, welcome to anatomy! It’s fun stuff, and the more time you put into exercise like this, the easier time you’ll have when you go to draw people from your imagination. You’ve made a good start here, especially with the foreshortened limbs of your skeletons. You’ve got the proportions pretty well, so maybe a good exercise for you to try next (if you wish to continue studying the skeleton on your own) would be to try doing a detailed and precise drawing of a skeleton, either by copying a photograph, or (preferably) drawing from a model skeleton, if you can get your hands on one. That’ll help you get the specific shapes of the bones learned better.

Rabbisatan – “the ability to draw the fully nude figure in dynamic poses and render them to make aesthetically pleasing to look at.” That’s a terrific goal to have overall, but a bit ambitious for a single project. Anyway, you have made some great improvement between this drawing and the last. I understand your eagerness to explore what you can do by distorting the skeleton, but keep in mind that old adage about learning the rules first so that you can break them. Very nice tilting pelvises in those bottom drawings! And foreshortening on the limbs of those same two skeletons. The bottom-right is particularly subtle the way it recedes into space, which is great, and you really captured the curve of those leg bones. With that structure to build on, just think how easy it would be to layer on some flesh and have a full human there. WOAH! You snuck in more pages! Rock on! I am impressed with the one that is bowing to the camera – that’s tricky, and you got it well. Your figures are looking good, and adding in a knowledge of skeletons will boost them along further. Line quality comes with practice. Don’t worry about what materials you are using. Any material is a good material. In fact, I’ll have something to show you in the next post to demonstrate how material really doesn’t matter. . .

Miracula – Don’t let your frustration get you down. That struggle is your brain stepping up to the next level, and your progress is visible. There’s some old saying about slow progress being better than no progress; and slow progress is certainly better than that imagined progress that we all think we’ve made from time to time. You are developing a very elegant short-hand for the skeleton, and I bet it’ll come in handy when you go to draw figures from imagination.

Pretty Angel – Walk without rhythm, and it won’t attract the worm! You never did state what your goal was, but I’m guessing that you were going for the quickly-sketched animation route. These are great studies – I can glance quickly from left to right and see the animation. Consistent proportions seem to be the tough spot for you. Rib cages especially – the rib cage is a smaller structure than it seems it should be. (It’s odd that under the differing amounts of muscle and fat that different people have, everyone has a very similar delicate-looking bone structure.)

Verastegui – Your goal was to “make a good proportional skeleton and be able to work my way up without making much changes and be sure the final piece doesn't feel flat.” I think you were successful with that. The upper-left skeleton seems ready to topple to the left, so keep an eye on the center-of-balance next time. But that couple on the upper right is a wonderful challenge that you pulled off very well, including the balance!

Bl@stzone – LOL, the square-headed figure has given me the giggles! Next time be sure to state your goal as well as posting art. You’ve got good stuff going on here. If you were to continue with this, I would suggest leaving out the fleshy outlines, and focus on getting head-to-toe skeletons with correct proportions. Adding the skin on works a lot better once you’ve got a good bone scaffolding to hang it on. Be sure that the hands and feet are always invited to the party, too.

Burtzum – Ooh, nice! You have got a very solid grasp of the skeleton. For anyone aiming to draw the skeleton from imagination, this is a good level to aim for. What you might want to focus on from here are foot and hand bones. There’s got to be a good way to break those clumps of bones down into useful masses, too. You forgot to state your goal with this assignment, but I’ll let you off the hook this once.

Armando – Nicely done! That is a delightfully quirky image you’ve worked up. The perspective works, and those bones look like they’re supposed to. There are some minor trouble spots: the skulls on the upper right, which seem a bit stretched, but are otherwise in proportion and turning nicely in space; and the skulls are all a bit large. The left-hand skull seems to have had the dome of its skull lopped off. You’ve captured some very complex shapes with a lovely minimum of lines. I get the feeling you’ve scribbled in the background with some thin-pointed pen. If that’s the case, you need to get yourself a brush and a jar of India ink, silly!

Sweet&sourbp – no problem about life getting in the way; it happens. This is a good start you’ve got here. If you continue with this, try breaking down the skeleton into 3D shapes – including the long bones, feet, etc. It is easier to construct a skeleton in space if it has a little more 3D to it. This will help you not only with the positions of limbs, but it’ll also help you capture the twisting and turning of the torso relative to the pelvis. That twisting and bending of the trunk will help to make your figures to not be stiff.


*phew* I need to creep off to bed now. You guys are all awesome for participating! I hope you enjoyed this exercise. I’m going to take a look at Ilaekae’s grading scheme and see if I can’t make some sense of it for you before my next class starts.

[Seedling]

Oh. . . one last thing. While dredging up the old art for my in-laws, I found the skeleton studies that I did in college that inspired this exercise. Thought you might like to see. The first is a master-copy of a drawing by some long-dead artist whose name I have forgotten – and a skeleton drawn in pen on tracing paper over that. The second is a self-portrait with skeleton done in charcoal on tracing paper. (And almost entirely rubbed off; oh well.) Both of those were double-checked against a skeleton model.

The last one is the one I’m the most proud of. The very first day of one of my classes, the teacher had left black paper, white paint, and paper smudge-stumps on the table. It looked like a set-up for preschool art time. He said “using this stuff, draw a skeleton”, and gave us about twenty minutes with no reference. Everybody else made skeleton diagrams, but I decided mine needed to be dancing, and it needed to make an interesting composition on the page. I think I leveled up that morning by just deciding to stretch the assignment to include those extra tidbits.

Enjoy!

[Pretty_Angel]

Pretty Angel – Walk without rhythm, and it won’t attract the worm! You never did state what your goal was, but I’m guessing that you were going for the quickly-sketched animation route.

That was what I meant with...

Here are my first dancing skeletons in quick sketching manner

These are great studies – I can glance quickly from left to right and see the animation. Consistent proportions seem to be the tough spot for you. Rib cages especially – the rib cage is a smaller structure than it seems it should be. (It’s odd that under the differing amounts of muscle and fat that different people have, everyone has a very similar delicate-looking bone structure.)

Thank you for that helpful feedback - I'll keep that in mind.

[iwantjelly]

Seedling : thank you so much for the feedback. This classroom is very active for a start, that's great !

Burtzum : I love your ones, they're wonderfully drawn.

[Alzorath]

Yea, I know it's past the due date, just felt like dropping these in (Skeletons drawn while looking at photographs of normal people) - my goal was to work on the dynamics of the figure with this set of skeletons, see how far I can stretch them and such when it comes to action (or constriction based on the bottom left one) - I'll likely do more in the future, but I am following these exercises even if I'm about 4 days behind on posting for them .



(Handstand, Leaping, and Curling - not really 'dancing' but same principle of accentuating action ).

[Seedling]

Those are beautifully done, Al!

[chaosrocks]

seedy that last one of yours is really sweet!

[alesoun]

Jeez, Seedling! You're cute, but you got the growl factor! Now I'm just jealous!

[Seedling]

LOL, thanks guys.

This class is over. In order to prevent confusion and to move the crowd along to Ilaekae's classroom, I'm going to lock this one up now. Thank you for participating!