7/1/17 Figure Study

Ref: New Master’s Academy #3 (YouTube)

Materials: 4H graphite, Charcoal “Hard”, white charcoal 

Loved the contrast of light and shadows in this pose, especially the core shadow running from the arm down the torso. 

6/12/17: Figure Study

Reference: Photo by Stan Katz (https://onefotoperday.wordpress.com/2017/05/19/one-picture-a-day-day-1365-nude/)

Medium: Charcaol white/black, graphite

A fellow blogger, Stan Katz, has an excellent site called “One Picture a Day” where he posts nude figures with professional quality lighting. Perfect for sketching. Thanks for letting me use the photo, Stan! I believe his work is for sale, so check it out!

It’s been a while since I sketched figures, so it was a bit rough, but a great study to work on! I started with 4B graphite, filled in shadow shapes with 3B graphite, highlighted with white charcoal and then deepened the darks with “hard” regular charcoal. It seems like the light was close to the figure highlighting the face and torso, but not the legs so much, so I left the legs with an unfinished look. It was the dark cast shadows that I liked about this study. The face, the breast and especially the outstretched hand casting the shadow across the hip that I wanted to emphasize by using high contrast and sharp edges. I also enjoyed the pose with the hand outstretched producing a highlight away from the body to add variety to the composition. Well done, Stan!

 

Faces 5/18/17

Ref: Google, Pinterest board “choonhachat”; black/white charcoal, mechanical pencil, Prismacolor Terra Cotta pencil. 

I’m taking a class in Schoolism.com by John Hardesty titled “Realism”. Excellent class. He discusses seeing proportions in different ways, each meathod double checking the other for accuracy. I have a long way to go, but it’s evident 90% of realism is spending the most time double checking and correcting before getting details. Also, less is more, especially around the eyes. 

The first round I looked for photos taken a long time ago since they tend to have better lighting for drawing with shadows. On the second session, I found an illustrator with a great reference board on Pinterest. His name for searching is “choonhachat”. He also frequently does live drawing sessions on Instagram. He been drawing figures for years and it’s amazing to see how fast he is. His instagram is also “choonhachat”. 

Figure Sketches 4/27/17

Ref: Croqui Cafe, Meredith Rose album; black/white charcoal on tan paper

I started a new Schoolism.com class with Johnathan Hardesty to learn to capture realism. We’re on the “blocking in” stage to gain accuracy from the start. I had trouble and I didn’t catch the likeness to Meredith, but enjoyed working through the shading stages and trying to see the figure as just large masses of shadow and light. Difficult, but worth many the million mistakes it takes to get it right. Great class so far. The subscription to that site is worth every penny. 

Life Drawing 4/25/17

Ref: Croqui Cafe 247; Prismacolor Terra Cotta pencil/ white charcoal on tan paper

It was interesting to note the difference drawing the dark skinned lady as compared to light skin. The highlights and shadows are more pronounced, probably because I can’t see too much into the shadows from the camera. I decided to leave the shadows largely the same value to accentuate the lighter values. I kept the white charcoal on a leash today and just added a few highlights of the face and breast. Really fun study! 

Life Drawing 4/24/17

Ref: Croqui Cafe 142, Prismacolor Terra Cotta pencil and white charcoal on toned paper

I’m liking the toned paper for these sketches. Still learning to limit my highlights, but it’ll get better with time. I liked the final 5min pose so I paused it to about 35min. 

Life Drawing 4-18-17

Ref: Croqui Cafe 178, Prismacolor Terra Cotta

I’ve noticed quite an improvement in not having to spend time correcting mistakes by slowing down and double checking my first pass in the “stick to figure” method (see Croqui Cafe tutorials). In the first minute I can get the stick and “bean torso” in,  second minute start filling in form and I spend as long as it takes on the final pose to go through all the steps. I also notice by making myself go though the “cylinder” stage, plotting cylinders over the stick figure, I start to automatically shape the cylinders to the form without thinking about it. I highly recommend that tutorial! 

Online Life Drawing 4-12-17

Ref: Croqui Cafe 259, Primacolor Terra Cotta in white paper

After watching the “Stick to Figure” video series they have, I found it really helped to see the form and proportions much better! This is the initial gestures (1-2min) where I put down the stick figure, then went back to fill it in with spheres, the “bean-torso”, countours and finally shading (as told in the videos). Highly recommend! 

Figure Sketch 4/7/17

Prismacolor Terra Cotta (PC 944) on paper

Ref: Croquis Cafe 255

Been a long time and feels good to get back into these studies. Croqui Cafe is doing a lot more short poses which is great to warm up to the last pose. I’m loving the warm prismacolor color pencil for these! Smooth. 

9/1/15: Charcoal Portrait Study

Reference: Google images for “interesting faces”, ~2hr

I saw a video where vine charcoal was smeared across the face, then the highlights were produced with erasing. I only have compressed charcoal and I doubt it spread out as well, but it worked somewhat. Most of the time was spent trying to map the face in as accurate as possible. Still have a lot of work to do with this… Fun study!