TheGeek sketchbook

[TheGeek]

Hi all !

I begin by apologizing for my bad English, I'm a french speaker.

I'm 23 years old and it has been a long time a read this forum, i finally decided to post some of my drawings. I hesitated for a long time because of the poor quality of my sketches comparing to what i see here. But visiting the first page of allot of sketchbooks i remarked that allot of people started at the same level as me (level 0) to improve heavily after that.

I begun to draw since i learned to hold a pencil, i draw this when i have 3 years (i think it is a man holding a toy):


when i was a child, i drawn on walls, on plaints, on every surface i found, it was more than a hobby, but at the age of 14-15 i stopped to draw regularly ( for allot of reasons). From about 2 months, i returned to drawing, and i wonder why WHY did i ever stopped drawing.

So now i m at the same level that i was at 15 years. My goal is to masterize the drawing of human being, i know its a long and difficult quest but i m ready for that.

I don't have allot of time because I'm a mathematics student but I'll try to update this thread regularly.

All this drawings are drawings a made when i was 12 - 15 years old : (to the end of this post)
I'll put some new stuffs in next posts. Here are some caricatures of my family, some football players and other people.














An auto-portrait (for the ears, it is not a drawing problem) :



my grand-mother :



my uncle :



an old man :



Some hands drawing (i voluntarily didn't care about proportions) :









And some other things :








Waiting for some criticism and advices

[TheGeek]

Here are some new stuffs :

Some gesture drawing (at least i try) :








Some Brigdman studies :
My goal wasn't to copy the drawing but to redraw them to understand and memorize better.














and some other stuffs :

[TheGeek]

last week during a boring course :




I bougth a wacom bamboo fun, those are some brush tests :

[Prion]

Sweet caricatures. It looks like you're on the right track.

Looking forwards to watching your progress. Keep posting!

[TheGeek]

Hi,

@Prion : thanks, i'll try to concentrate more on portrait drawing for a while until i feel confortable with it.


It's been a while since i didn't update, mostly for being busy with my studies.
I'm trying to concentrate now on portrait drawing. Here a portrait i did from reference few moths ago (i have a very bad scanner, sorry) :


I just finished the book from William L. Maughan "The Artist's Complete Guide to Drawing the Head", and here are the first sketches (15-45 minutes sketches using pastel) :








I have problem with the details with pastel since the drawings are on a small paper (A4). I also don't spend time on rendering since i still need allot of training before doing something serious.

I'm looking for good advices from you.

[TheGeek]

I went to Italy for 4 days to visit my grand-father who is in bad shape, and I drawed my first portrait from life :




and here another portrait from reference :



feel free to give me any advice.

[TheGeek]

My first attemp with a charocal pencil ! and my eyes are bleeding

I don't think I'll finish it, I'll rather begin a new one





any advice is welcome.

[TheGeek]

hop quick morning sketch :

[jouzinka]

Hi, Geek, love your username.

Thanks for stopping by my sketchbook and I really dig yours. The pastel portraits are amazing to my eye. Good luck and keep it up.

[TheGeek]

@jouzinka : thanks to you.


Here's a new sketch I totally messed up :





I stopped when I realised how much the eyes are totally wrong. I also started a new thread asking for some question in the Fine art section about portraits.

[tronrobot]

i really like ur stuff man, u were definately better than me at 15! you got some really nice portraits......id say to keep going with those anatomy studies. =)
and thanks for looking at my SB!

[overclocked~fox~]

Its cool to see your progress!


If you haven't already try working with compressed charcoal. You might also have fun drawing on tone paper. Go for more contrast. Sometimes the darker colored paper is fun.

Also digital painting doesn't take much patience, its cheaper actually.

[TheGeek]

@tronrobot : thank you, i like your personal style, Keep working (remember to use references/life ) .

@overclocked~fox~ : thank you for your advice, I tried once (few post above) to use a charcoal pencil, it is very nice, but I feel pastel is more easy to use as you can erase very easily (just with your hand), you can smooth it easily, and your can make good contrasts ... very useful for Chiaroscuro method. I tried digital but for now I prefer to stick with traditional tools until I feel comfortable.

Here I tried a second time a sketch of the last model (from ref), I don't know some faces seams more difficult to draw then others.

[TheGeek]

Here's a new one.

I stoped when I accidently droped some water one it

[TheGeek]

Some sketches from my "help me drawing the head" thread.

[Featheredface]

Very nice stuff. Loving the caricatures from when you were younger. I find it really interesting that you seemingly started at caricatures THEN progressed to a more realism style.

Keep up those studies, you're doing good, mate.

Cheers!

[Ivan_kolor]

You're doing well! I'm impressed from the "sanguigna" portraits, especially your grand-father..drawing from life is better, I think we can learn faster and better!! I'd pay a little more attention to the space of the head over the eyes, sometime I think there should be more space for the brain.

[TheGeek]

@Featheredface : thanks ! actually I stopped doing caricature as I feel that for me it is like cheating, as I don't have to care about proportions. When I feel comfortable with realistic portraits, maybe I'll continue with caricatures.

@Ivan_kolor : Thanks ! and you're right about the size of the space over the eyes, it was I mistake I did allot.


I bought my first sketchbook yesterday, here's the first pages :

[TheGeek]

I didn't had to many course today

[TheGeek]

I was a little tired today with my studies, so today's sketches are a little "tired".

[TheGeek]

Today's morning I had an hour of free time, so I managed to draw this sketch from a picture in news papers.

[RyanRyan]

Wow, leaps and bounds. Envious.

[TheGeek]

@RyanRyan : Thanks, I appreciate.

Here are sketches from my "help me drawing the head" thread.

[Butterknife]

Those are a ton of studies . I love the skulls, and the way you're transforming each part of the face into different shapes. That last guy is especially creepy . Awesome skull sketch there too. I must check out your 'Help me drawing the head' thread .

[TheGeek]

Thanks Butterknife, I'm like you, trying to learn drawing the figure, I feel it is easier to progress when focusing on one subject, so I choose to begin by head drawing.

[4tonmantis]

Geek, glad to see you're still doing studies.
The tall Nosferatu looking guy - Not bad, you captured the general feeling/likeness but a few observations:
The cranium could be a bit fuller and needs a semi-flat plane on the anterior.
The cheekbones are a tad larger on the ref and the negative space created by them adds to the creepiness.. I'd definitely make sure that translates.
The eyebrow could arch and turn a bit more.. he has an inquisitive look that gets slightly lost.
The corner of the mouth, the top of the shadow is too pronounced and adds more of a smile to his look (this needs to disappear as this guy does NOT look like the smiling type in the original ) and the bottom should lead into a jowl and point backwards just a tad more up the slope of the jaw.
The hanging skin on how jowls needs to be there.. that's apparently missing.
The jaw line in the ref is lost a bit approach the socket connection of the mandible to the skull. There are a few other areas where your values could stand to be less contrasty and don't be afraid to lose lines.. not all of our features flow neatly into one another in a text-book fashion.

I won't comment on the other portions of the drawing since you said the point is the face/head. The progress is evident though, keep up the good work

[TheGeek]

Hi 4tonmantis, just take in concideration that my goal is NOT to copy the reference, specialy with quick sketches, but I appreciate your comment. I see your also progressing, keap your good work

[TheGeek]

I hate this drawing and I hate myself for beeing able to draw a piece of shit like this.

[TheJackal]

Some times the perspective on your faces skews abit, if you can get that right then they will look a hell of alot stronger, thinking about the brow level and how the eye farthest away would appear at the angle you've placed it. good work thou!

[TheGeek]

@TheJackal : thanks for the advice ! I put that in my list of things I have to fix.

heres another failed drawing (confused volumes, values, bad rendering ... ) .