I think ill do a portrait for the show in a super soft style like this old woman portrait, its a study after stefan molyneux, i think. The figure might be an eric gist copy. The others are me practicing quick head lay ins with ballpoint, very challenging to draw small decent head indications in less than 2 minutes
I'd recommend drawing these portraits on a smaller scale and using a mechanical pencil.
really focus on the shading and not doing a lot of 'sloppy' drawings and rather do 1 good drawing.
hope this helps!
Leonard: thanks bro, you shoulda heard the mom voice i read your name in when i saw the comment lol; I pretty much did what you reccomended and pinpointed the exact reason my shading was sloppy.
See, i have this portrait book by nathan fowkes where i had read a thing i misinterpreted over time. What he did was take compressed charcoal, put it in the darkest darks, then with the side of his hand in 1 motion, scoops the mass into the other side. I made the mistake of thinking i could do that motion repeatedly and in different directions, which as we all know, causes the shading to go against the form, which makes stuff look well, confusing. Its really interesting how the wrapping lines and hatching really turns the form.
So i did this piece for the upcoming show, and im gonna tune it up a little more tomorrow before i head out and add some values to balance it. But yea, i figured out where i was going wrong is just i need to hatch in the same direction, duuuh. and for compressed charcoal, it has to be one intelligent motion. I worked on this portrait all day from a photo i personally took and i think it looks solid, even kinda reminds me of how i painted like my orangish winona painting about a year ago. Its really crazy how ppls mark making remains consistent in digital and traditional.
Im glad I did a lot of those studies, because they helped me come to that revelation... my eye is bugging me on the face, but its only after i look at it for a while, i can shut the light off and on and nothing jumps out at me. that sensation kinda happens with me anyways on drawn heads. I especially cant look at a yearbook upside down, gives me nightmares
I prefer to shade in one direction as well. Harold Speed says in his book that when you shade in one direction, the special cases in which you change the direction are more powerful. You don't have to wrap every line around the form, but obviously you can do that too. I recommend the Speed book, though I'm guessing you've read it.
I've also read the Fowkes book. His portraits are great, but it was kind of a reality check to find that at the heart of the secret technique was really just accurate proportions and good construction.
Anyway, I think the unshaded drawing looks good. After the shading I kind of feel that the nose got thin/small.
I think one of the main thing we can see if we let say study leonardo is the focus on the feature.You see how he use contrast to show the form yes everything as not to be defined.Art is also about drawing less and giving the illusion and let the viewer fill the gap.
Tips:If i am correct he seem to smudge the line to indicate is form instead of hatching to show form.
Shading is better in the last two drawings, but I think you can push the values (unless you are still working the piece). This looks like a first or second pass if you are building up the values in layers.
Nice portraits though. Keep posting! And good luck with the show.
Darkiste, Shin, joseph, Thank you for the feedback i cant type much because my forearms have this tightening feeling and i need to just take it easy tomorrow and not do a lot of things with my hands. drawing as much as i do is not psychologically taxing, but is sure is physically taxing. I have some proko studies, not sure if i will update tomorrow, i will just be trying to nip this joint pain before it gets to be an issue
alrightey so i was outta commission past 2 days because i literally have carpal tunnel syndrome. However i have problem solved my way out of it and am working more intelligently with more intelligent stretches. I also have these really great arthritis gloves that are just magical for the pain. Anyways, it felt like a miracle finishing this piece for the show as i thought sincerely that i wasnt going to be able to draw for a week or two or even ever again, but the stretches really fixed it. Dr Levi Hariss on youtube, stretches for gamers, great shit.
Gonna be loading up on some back muscle stuff tomorrow and studying how kim jung gi draws figures in crazy perspectives and trying my hand at simplifying those into blocky forms because that is something i struggled with at life drawing in those freaking reclining poses. Im on schedule so im feelin good
(10-26-2018, 03:53 PM)darktiste Wrote: I think one of the main thing we can see if we let say study leonardo is the focus on the feature.You see how he use contrast to show the form yes everything as not to be defined.Art is also about drawing less and giving the illusion and let the viewer fill the gap.
Tips:If i am correct he seem to smudge the line to indicate is form instead of hatching to show form.
I don't see that at all. Leonardo was a master of the hatching in uniform direction to shade. The subtle tones indicating the turn of the form into shadow reveal form. Compare the value of the shadow to black, and you see that it does not even approach it. Even the line between the lips that you'd swear is black, isn't even close. The drawing is not high contrast at all which should serve to prove that high contrast has very little to do with good drawing.
I apologize for my harshness, but your obsession with contrast is misguided.
Did this quick sargent study as im nursing my hand back to normal. So challenging to control this pencil so delicately, to like indicate the subtle anatomical changes in the back. I feel like the overall thing reads, which is good, but all too often my pencil would get dull and it would ruin the subtelty i was going for. The trick with it is to really get it pointed throughout the exposes charcoal, not just the small tip area. Cone like more or less.
Yea the straight hatching thing is a big part of clean rendering. The artist who runs the studio i do life drawing at is a master of it, his shading is so neat it looks almost like wood, its very beautiful and i am trying to learn to emulate it.
Anyways, gonna lay in another thing for the show tomorrow, just the lines and stuff, then ill have life drawing friday and may do a study on top of that before shading it, then one more piece and ill have my four done :) Definitely gonna lowball my prices because i want to at least sell one thing to pay for the frames, and there are some artists there who are very bad who are selling for much higher than id dream of asking for, even where im at. Buuut they arent professionals so that shouldnt be surprising
After that ill finish up the studies from this folder i have of stuff i wanted to practice too, then get back to masters of anatomy and eventually maybe by december attempt an illustration since i feel much more equipped to do that now. I have like a much better eye for things and a deeper respect for process and research
Nice going on faces, you nail them consistently. Kudo on the leonardo study ! Always found interesting to do michelangelo and leonardo study because their stuff is so volumetric and stylized.
Baldgate: thanks! but that is the original that darkiste posted. Ive never done a study of da vinci or michealangelo aside from the lessons from karl gnass, huston and vilppu ive watched, so i guess ive actually done a few!
Abnormal: brotha if my hand would let me id be smashing out tons more studies. Im gonna have to resort to less drawing and just reading and instructional vids for a little bit as much as i want to draw more
Life drawing was a lot of fun, i used a much smaller paper and i was surprised what i achieved with a 2b pencil. That quick sketch practice pays off, just gotta get more savy on anatomy. Also my drawing of the stretching girl got warped from probably sunlight, so im going to have to redo it or do this procedure im trying now to get the wrinkles out. You spray with water, let dry for a day, then steam the room like a shower, then dry for a day, then iron it beneath a cloth, if it doesnt work ill just trace and redo it, so im not holding my breath
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