Camilleon's Sketchbook

[Camilleon]

Hey, everyone! Welcome to my sketchbook. Any complimentary comments, critical critiques, helpful hints, or random remarks are appreciated--I take note of all!

Last month there was a free week at the Chicago Art Institute, so I went and sketched my favorite sculpture every lunch break. I felt like there was a tangible improvement with each sketch--whaddya know, the experts are right! You have to practice to get better at something...









Then a month went by and I was a bad girl and didn't do any sketching, just painting. Then I visited my sculpture again during one of my lunch breaks last week, and this is what I got:



Shame and failure. A valuable lesson, though. So, I spent several hours trying to redeem myself by redrawing her based on the photos I had taken (which, by the way, I will post to the Resources section on this forum):





What was really fun was when it was just about time for me to head back to work when this kid ran up to me (maybe 12 years old?) and said, "Here!" He handed me the drawing he had done of me while I was sketching! Not bad at all no less! Can you imagine how good he's going to be as he gets older?! He was shy and ran off before I could tell him something rueful like "Keep drawing no matter what! Even if you don't think you want to become an artist...because you could change your mind!"

[Jaik]

Very Nice. Keep it up, I can see an quite an improvement too. If that kid works really hard he'll really become something.. wonder if he knows that :P

[Camilleon]

Ok, it's been a while, so I figured I better make an appearance. First off, stuff from my sketchbook--working mostly from Stephen Rogers Peck's "Atlas of Human Anatomy for the Artist". Unfortunately, tourist season is off to an early start, and the crowds have been keeping me away from my dear sculpture at the Art Institute.


Hands, as always, pose a bit of a challenge.


I realized that I have trouble with the upper arm area, so I've been looking at its muscle structure.






I drew the first figure from Artsy Poses and then tried to recreate the pose out of my head (not looking at the first sketch).


Did ok, but I think her arms look a little large compared to the rest of her body, but I think that was the case with drawing based on the photo, too!

And a couple doodles, trying to keep good anatomy in mind...although I cheated with the mermaid since I didn't have to draw any legs!





And now I'd like to share some pics of a work in progress. No, I did not do any thumbnails, but after I had taken the reference photo, I did 6 or 7 loose drawings (all terrible, so I'll spare you) and finally a "tight drawing" as Justin Gerard might call it (although his line work is a million times better than anything I might attempt):







And now to transfer what I've learned from the drawing to the canvas:




Pencil drawing outlined in ink, so it won't smear under the first layer of oil paint.


First wash of color in burnt umber.






It was at about this point that I was like, "Wow, this looks really wrong..." and solicited Dan's and Alex Negrea's opinion. They were kind enough to put me on the right track. The funny thing was that I realized I actually already knew the basic perspective rules that they were telling me, but it totally didn't occur to me to apply them to this painting until they mentioned it! Why does my brain work this way???


With the corrections and some more detail...

Thanks for looking! Any feedback is appreciated!

[Camilleon]

'Tis the season for pumpkins! I saved this from some soup I made.



I realized one of my big issues with digital painting is that when I'm painting stuff out of my head, I just can't seem to get myself to push and sharpen the values the same way I can with oil--how am I going to overcome this? By doing lots of still-life studies! I think I'll do a buckeye next.

[Camilleon]

I NEEDZ A CRITIQUE! I posted my piece over in the critique needed section: http://crimsondaggers.com/forum/thread-2150.html.

[Camilleon]

So, a friend of mine convinced me to get a Moleskine sketchbook...bearing this new acquistion in hand, I'll try to post more studies and sketches!