trying just as hard as the rest of you--updated mar 26

[Chichigo]

Going to start a sketchbook thread after seeing how much everyone else has steadily improved from doing this. Myself, i'm 17 and lives in Toronto. I'm lucky enough to have life drawing every day at my high school for the past year.

Skinny models are my favourite, especially when they're unhealthily skinny.



The pen and ink portion of my Sheridan portfolio


Sketching animals at the royal ontario museum last week.


Anyone know how I can make my pictures look less discoloured when they show up on screen??

[Chandan]

Hey there fellow sheridan..er. Nice to see some lifedrawing going on! Go often, stay the whole 3 hours and you'll see improvement in days. Also, nice bird sketches...and don't forget to update often. (Don't be lazy like me.)

[Chichigo]

whoa, real fast reply Chandan, nice to meet ya, a fellow torontonian?? Haha, I'm no sheridian yet, just trying out this year for illustration. Are you a student there?

I hate to say it.. but life drawing on my own is too expensive. consider the cost to transit downtown and then paying for probably dinner and still have the cost of life drawing on top of that. It was so much easier when the models came to my high school and we spent the period drawing.

[edit]: just checked out your sketchbook, your digital renders are really nice stuff!! That hammer.. wow.

[Chandan]

Yeap, i'm in Art Fundies there...good luck with getting in. Also...if you can't afford life drawing, sit at the transit station and sketch people. You'll feel like a pervert for the first five min. then you'll actually like it.

[Chichigo]

Building on main street in my city.

[~Faust~]

Wow there's some serious talent here and I envy you for your life-drawing opportunities . The shading is already top-notch, you know how to handle a pencil. Nothing to crit yet. What about some freeminded doodles?

[Chichigo]

;p thanks bud, i'll give that a try next. actually kind of nervous about how things turn out without references.

[Chichigo]

a little more nonsensical:

[Bloodsbane]

Yummy.. I like your rendering. Nice studies overall, especially the bird.

As for how to make your stuff less discoloured or washed out, what software are you using for cropping and resizing? Are you scanning or photographing? Generally, you might want to desaturate and push the contrast and gamma.

[Chichigo]

Thx for posting. Maybe you guys could give some critique next time?? ;D

You're using pretty advanced terms here, care to explain what you mean by desaturateing and pushing the gamma??? I use photoshop to colour correct the digital photos I take. I use the camera becuase it is a lot more convenient than scanning.

[~Faust~]

Yay, I can log in again

Well as for critique, I'm a bloody noob myself (drawing on a regular basis for some more than a year now), but I'll do my very best

About your figure-studies: There's a thread from Jason Chan somewhere here (didn't find it spontaneously), there he wrote that there are 2 different ways to do lafe-drawings. First its in a painterly way, you draw what you see, hopping from from to form, rendering shadows as you go. You define the values that you see. That way, you don't need outlines. It's not entirely analysis-free though. You still have to think about light and how it affects surfaces and forms.

The second is the analytical figure-drawing (I think that's what the thread was called, but I'm not sure). There you analyse the body, build it up on paper with simple geometric forms such as cylinders and cubes and spheres. Here you gain much theoretical knowledge about anatomy and a better understanding about bodies in space and perspective.

Long rant, short sense: I can't fully recognise either in your studies. This one looks fairly analytical because there's lots of helping lines and such. Unfortunately they don't seem to be put very wisely. You need a defined torso (There isn't), the hips are okay though. The right arm looks pretty wrong, too, this implies that you are either lacking in the knowledge of arm-muscles (then you have to do some extensive studying on this one) or were just sloppy. If the former was the case, you should take more time in the future.
Here we have a nother more analytical drawing where the basic shapes are treated badly. The legs are wrong (I think you see that) and the torso doesn't look very 3D. There are mistakes with the arms too, mainly perspective-wise.

For a drawing that's going wrong painterly-wise, there's This one. The outlines are far too much emphasized, and they are going around the whole figure, and that is not good. You should try to captures one form, one sillouette after the other, putting together a puzzle and having all the right part together in the end. Here, again, are many mistakes, first one the chair, which is off in perspective, the hands which are way too thick for a woman with that body and the body-parts look too much 2D, also.

The idea of this whole thing is, that in the end, all the analytical stuff happens in your mind and the painterly on your paper

Don't get this wrong, I still think you're better than me, and all those issues are something I have to work on myself, but you asked for it!

[T-Raktor]

Nice work here. Hope u will post more soon. Cheers!

[Orozc0]

keep up those studies.

[Chichigo]

@faust: I can't believe you spent all that time posting to help me, i'm so moved. I'll definitetly read up on Jason Chan, i'm not 100% sure what you mean by the difference between analytical and painterly. Actually, I was looking him up the other day because i remember LOVING a picture he drew about a year ago, ever seen Angel Kiss. Eerie picture. Wurd!! You've only drawn a year??!! I've been technically training since i was twelve, and i'm seventeen now, i'm pretty slow progresser :p Now for some ass prodding time, go draw because you haven't updated in a few days.

@T-Raktor: Thx for looking.
@Orozc0: Thx. Love your abstract pencil drawings.

[Denysiuk]

So... I like the way you put the shadows at this picture: http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v1...8/CIMG1086.jpg
Different ways of drawing makes the sketch/picture more interesting... and you have preaty good form in that one.
Secondly nice birds (not all of them are drawn the same, it's a big + to leave the part [eg. legs] unfinished)
3. Look for form and proportions in your pose studing... head for example isn't flat, and stomach doesn't contain so much shoaps I think...
Keep on drawing...
P.S. where are you from?

[Dile_]

Nice!
I like that building , abit out of perspective.. but good anyways
keep it updated!

[Bloodsbane]

OMG Faust, you are the master of feedback. The analytical/painterly thing is something I've been thinking about alot lately too, but not so explicitly formulated.. life drawing isn't supposed to be about making pretty pictures, but I have a hard time getting away from just making a nice rendition of what I see. My hat off to you!

Chichigo - If you're already doing your colour correction in Photoshop, there isn't all that much I can add. The best way to make the resulting image better is of course to take a better photograph. Even lighting and a steady camera (=tripod) helps alot. Still, what I meant with my last post:
Image - Adjustments - Desaturate = no more discoloration.
Image - Adjustments - Levels - drag the middle handle = adjusting gamma = no more dark pictures. With uneven lighting, it's hard to balance between removing shadows and losing the light lines though. As you can see in my latest sketchbook post, my results aren't really better than yours

[Chichigo]

Finally updating. Faust, I listened to you and tried out painterly life drawing, but you are way better at it than I am. it was very difficult to use shadows to suggest a form. Found out I've been too dependent on using lines, its so different using the side of the pencil for a change.


a couple of faces referenced from models


Fooling around with markers. No reference.


And my dumbass school assignment that's sucking away all my life and energy and the reason why I haven't been updating. pen and ink stippling on illustration board


Den: Thx, that pen and ink was part of my portfolio requirement for sheridan. It was (*scandalous* don't tell sheridan college) copied from a photograph so it was easier to plot in shadows and put down hatching.

Dile: perspective's wrong, you think so?? oh god, now i'm really scared because if you noticed, then the university's going to notice for sure. thx bud.

blood: faust is the man =D I actually found that as I'm life drawing, the lines plot themselves in my head before they go on the page, its harder to reign that in and do special exercises to train my eye instead of just drawing the first thing I see. I'm happy with the results of using desaturation, it works perfect.

[Car2nist]

thanks for the comment on mine... the secret with markers, work fast.

i dig that chicken you got up top, the face is funky ,funk is what i like

im going to SCAD for illustration this upcoming fall

[Ian Mack]

the perspective of your cylindrical tower looks a little off. I know it's being ref'd from a picture but are you using any perspective drawing tools to draw it? You'll be sure to have a more natural looking tower that way.

Positive: You have a good sense of values. With practice, you'll be very good at painting in tones/values.

Negative: Your lines are not as good...use as many different kinds of lines as you can...thin/light lines for things that are further away. Thick/dark lines for things that are closer or that are heavy/tense.

I'm in Toronto too! I'm taking animation here...and there is plenty of life drawing in the city. There is a free life drawing session @ OCAD every thursday from 3:30 to 6:00. You can also meet up with a bunch of guys who do subway drawing. http://www.imaginismstudios.com/sket...s_toronto.html

Life drawing is the key to becoming a great artist. Always draw/paint from life, observing and studying what you see.

[purb36]

yo whats up, cheech? nice place you got here.

the main street building picture isnt too much out of perspective, its just that some of the lines arent straight. and you werent allowed to use a ruler, so im sure its forgiveable. i do really like your rendering, i like the birds a bunch too. the reclining figure from life drawing looks good, especially the perspective on the head. the one kneeling on the chair...needs some work. the face looks flat, and the are under the chin looks like she has a beard. thats cause she doesnt have enough chin between her lips and that shadow, plus the shadow is so much darker than other parts of the body with that same angle to the light, which is also hard to figure out where its coming from (cause you didnt finish shading). if you're not doing it already, i would suggest taking your own advice that you left in faust's thread and picking up some bridgman or loomis or somebody, and doing a bunch of anatomy studies. its something that you never learn too much of. also, do a bunch of non-ref drawings, and post them too. that way, youll develop your imagination drawing as well, and people can crit your stuff and help you get better. so, if you can, draw everyday, and post anatomy studies and imagination stuff as well as whatever you like to post. i guarantee that youll improve tons over the next couple months (not money back, of course). take care dude, good luck with the sheridan app; maybe ill meet you there. peace.

[Chisa]

Helloo! Very nice work here, and I'm so envious of all you people going to art school!

Your figure studies look great to me, although it seems that faces, hands and feet are your weaker points, or you didn't want to spend much time on them. I really love the bird, its ended up looking really realistic. I think the faces you've done recently are pretty good, although the noses seem a little off with the shading or wonky. I remember someone mentioning in a different thread that model photo references aren't good to work from, because the lighting and photoshop effects mess up the shadows.

That tower looks like it must have taken a long time! I think it looks a little crooked towards the top though.

[~Faust~]

Not ALL of us people go to art school

Yo, Chichigo, for the figure-study: do the analytical stuff, really. You learn much more about the whole thing and only do the painterly stuff only once in a while. It's only good for shading ,picking value practice and training the eye, actually. can't say much about the study itself since I don't know how you approched the problem.

The marker looks funny , markers are nice ... in the architectures the curves around the tower are wonky I think.

Oh, and listen to purb. He knows what he's saying.

[Denysiuk]

Hey... those faces of models are good. They show how the model is like.
Draw more (maybe a bit bigger)

[~Faust~]

Hey, how about you scan in some shiznit and we comment on that?

[bhanu]

You should pay attention to life drawing anatomy and other artistic nuances.
The best way to learn is making art from real life,so get that sketchbook out and start drawing things around you,anything would do but the main aim is to draw and draw and draw some more .
Keep going

[Chichigo]

I'll be gone for the next three days to catch up on schoolwork. But for now,
Otherside told me about a free life drawing session in my city. Anyways, I dropped in for the three hours yesterday. The model was an unbelievably big woman, talk about body type diversity.

Studying the forms of the body and seeing the masses instead of contouring like I usually do.



Earlier in the day, another animal study from the museum.


Loomis study:


And a little freak rat, that came out of my head



Carni2t: That's why i like working with markers so much, i love the speed. Thanks for posting.

Otherside: Hope I get to go drawing with you again sometime, i'll don't think I can make much more of those life drawing sessions though, yesterday was my march break, but i have school to worry about. Thanks for the tips.

Purb: That's what I'm hear for, to improve like mad, I looked into loomis and i couldn't find bridgeman, but yesterday I also heard about one professor who compiles all his anatomy lesson plans into a book, i'd really like to check that out, but i need to find the name first. Thx bud.

Chisa: Thanks. I forget on a daily basis how lucky I am to go to an art high school, thanks for reminding me again. Fixing the tower currently after faust deconstructed perspective for me. oh god.. deadline's on monday, i don't think i'll finish

Faust: yay, for a second i thought i was in trouble there.

Bhanu: Lately, i've started taking around a mini sketchbook with me everywhere I go, a little pencil attached to the binding, definitetly, draw draw tons. my drawings are still looking like lines on a page right now, need to work on the speed. Thanks for the tip.

[~Faust~]

You have free lifedrawings? How does that work? Do the models get paid my welfare or do they just follow some kind of fetish?

Your rendering is improving! Actually, that fat woman is good practice for that because the muscle-struture isn't that obvious. Good job!

[Bloodsbane]

That raccoon is totally rocking it

It's not very apparent what the freak rat is doing, but he's scaring me.
.. is he plucking teeth out of someone's deformed mouth?

[Chichigo]

I gave photoshop a try today, it was pretty fun to colour with, just playing around. 20 minutes.



I'll post in everyone's sketchbook tomorrow hopefully when i can find the time, toodles.