Darren's Sketchbook

[Darren_1989]

Hello everyone, I'm new here, sort of. I signed up this account awhile ago, I don't remember when, and I have been occasionally lurking anonymously on this site for a couple years now (ever since Justin Oaksford told me about it), admiring the art here (both the finished pieces and the sketches), and decided I'd finally try to participate. Thought I'd post a little intro about myself here while I'm at it, if you get bored just skip down to my drawings

I'm 18, and a freshman in college. I'm a history major, and I plan to be a high school teacher. I'd like to minor in art though, because I've always been interested in it, but I never took a serious approach. So while art is a hobby for me, I'd still love to improve. I have almost no time spent in art classes, I took one art class in high school and the teachers was not so good, and I'm in an introductory drawing course right now at my university. So, that being said I'm looking forward to learning from all of you here I know I'm not a particularly talented or experienced artist, so don't hesitate to offer direct critiques, that's what I'm looking for and I won't be offended.

EDIT : Went through and made them attachments, sorry about that. Left the descriptions even though they aren't with the pictures anymore, don't think it'll be too hard to match them up though.

Here's some of my slightly older sketches (Between a year and two years old)
Oh, I should note that the reference pics of those are all from Anatomy for the Artist by Sarah Simblet.

Here is a portrait I drew of an athlete I admire, Cal Ripken. This is from February.

And here are some drawings from the class I'm in right now (only a few weeks in) Sorry for the nasty quality, the actual size of these is 18x24 and I can't scan that, so I tried photographing them with not so great results. But hopefully you can get the gist of what I'm doing in class. I'll make sure my next batch of images are of better quality.

Thanks for taking the time to look, I will try to update this a couple times a week, but I have a lot of homework so I don't know if I will keep up with it. I'll try though. And sorry if my post is too wordy, I ramble a bit.

[Justin.]

Hey man, it's a great start, and the book (Anatomy for the artist) is one of the best. Just remember to draw from life as well, but for studying muscles and structure, it's hard to find better ref.

[Darren_1989]

Thanks Justin. I'm hoping to take a life drawing course next semester, but it might not be until next year. If thats the case, I'll try to find something local when I'm home for the summer.

Okay so I'm still trying to get back into the swing of things with drawing, I haven't drawn consistently for quite a few months, and I really miss the span where I was drawing every day. So I don't have a whole lot right now, but I'm going to continue to draw more frequently, hopefully I'll be back to drawing at least a little every day.

5 things that I've done in class since my last post. Note : Again, they are slightly crooked and overall poor quality, I'm not sure how to take a good picture of a drawing. For the attempt at drawing the planes of the head on the statues, no idea what I was doing.

A couple pages there I did out of class at the end too.
These I scanned but my scanner is letting me down. The software for it is not compatible with my new computer so I have to import through another program and the results aren't as good.

Once I see my drawings on a monitor, my mistakes seem to stand out more to me.

[Evxyza92]

Your still lifes have really clean lines. Not much else I can say just keep uploading and drawing.

[Darren_1989]

Thanks Evxyza

Ah like a day and a half instead of a week and a half this time. Thats a little better. I have one drawing from class, thats the charcoal still life. First one time I've ever done a still life using value, and the first time I've ever used charcoal in my life. It was interesting, I guess we're going to be working with it for awhile. By the way, the still life was all white. Other two are pages out of my sketchbook, mostly all reference from Head and Hands by Loomis. I'm bumming about my scanner, it used to do a much better job with my old computer and the actual software. Anyways -

[Darren_1989]

I'm way overdue on this one. Sad to say I'm coming nowhere near my goal of drawing every day at the moment, but I'm going to keep at it. I'll work it into my schedule so that I really do it everyday.

Onto the actual art. My first ever self portrait, done in a mirror, my second ever charcoal drawing, a pencil drawing done a bit ago of a skull of some kind, and two drawings of a girl in my class who could not sit still. But thats not why they're so bad. That is my fault :p I have some stuff from my own sketchbook but my roomie is asleep and my scanner is loud, so it'll have to wait till tomorrow.

An added note, sadly my charcoal drawing has gotten scraped and smudged. It doesn't take too much away from the overall quality, or lack thereof, but its got its blemishes.

[Darren_1989]

Argh, my scanner just won't work right anymore without the actual software. I wish Vista was compatible, I don't have anywhere near the money to buy a new scanner right now. Two more selfportraits, one pencil, one charcoal, neither very good. In the pencil one I look like I'm five or something. Only one page from my sketchbook because there wasn't much good in there and scanner issues left me too frustrated to keep snapping pictures. Anyway...

[Justin.]

Darren these last ones are great!! keep doing 'em! Yo ure really getting the hang of it!

[Demo]

pretty good so far it so weird im doing this exact same stuff right now check out my sketch book too see im posting emm soon

[Darren_1989]

Thanks for the encouragement guys

The two figures are girls in my class, my university is having trouble finding models for our time slot. I hope they can find people for next week. Anywho, a few things here.