Algae's Sketchbook

[EveningAlgae]

I'm a first year art / math student from some university. Currently taking a fundamentals course at my university. Know I need to improve but not sure where to focus on first.







I try to be careful with my proportions with comparative measuring, so I think that's ok thus far. I think my biggest weakness right now lies in value / rendering, which I'm not sure how to rectify other than doing a lot of studies of basic shapes following lessons from something like How To Render. My rendering overall is pretty poor.

Everything so far is from life (I got an old Yoshi figurine lying around).

[darktiste]

You will probably never get a teacher to teach you properly how to do value if your not in a classical academy that just the sad reality of art now a day.That why you probably struggling to see any progress when it come to turning your drawing into something that as volume and proper light and shadow.You probably will learn way more by going to drawabox.com than you will in your university class.Specially if you have to go throught art history and all this.

Yea so like i say try your skill at drawabox.com it might seem like cake when you look at it but don't be fool by the first impression you will get look at the exercise.

I encourage you to go there and do the exercise they suggested.It as been suggested by many people before me and i even did it myself so yeah highly recommended.

[EveningAlgae]

You will probably never get a teacher to teach you properly how to do value if your not in a classical academy that just the sad reality of art now a day.That why you probably struggling to see any progress when it come to turning your drawing into something that as volume and proper light and shadow.You probably will learn way more by going to drawabox.com than you will in your university class.Specially if you have to go throught art history and all this.

Yea so like i say try your skill at drawabox.com it might seem like cake when you look at it but don't be fool by the first impression you will get look at the exercise.

I encourage you to go there and do the exercise they suggested.It as been suggested by many people before me and i even did it myself so yeah highly recommended.

We focus really heavily on observational drawing and technique, with a lot of focus and work done on observational skill / accuracy, perspective, value and composition. I've seen the work of students coming out and of the instructors and everything seems to be quite good from a fundamentals standpoint, comparing to graduates from other universities much more renowned for their art. We put in the work; the hours are very long (they expect you to spend 2-3 hours outside for every hour in lecture, and my intro class is a daily 3 hour studio).

I've looked at drawabox and the constructive approach is interesting. Thanks.

[EveningAlgae]

A bunch of quick studies.





Was a 2 hour still life for class; struggled with the foreshortened plane on the top of the last box, and fucked it up as a result. Rest of it looks good though imo






Really looking forward to doing turnarounds of that little bat dude right there. A big milestone would be to get a couple waddling animations for that bat dude thing, and thankfully I can look to how Kirby's waddles are animated to get an idea of how to make my bat dude waddle look nice. Interesting too how much the Moggle design looks like a bat straight up; I had no clue how much inspiration the Moggle design took from bats alone (seems like everything except the humanoid form and that little bobble on its head).

Only got in like 4 hours practice today; gotta up those numbers! Need to take photos with better lighting too.

[EveningAlgae]

Been doing a lot of work, been too lazy to post. Here's some stuff done today, along with a still life I did a while back. Everything is done from life.



I'm not super comfortable with value yet so this took me around 2.5 - 3 hours. I think I need to push my midtones way more; the statue was all a dark bronze color and it was in plain daylight.

[EveningAlgae]

7 hours so far on this still life




Based on the feedback that I got, the left shadow is way too flat to make sense of the form so it doesn't make logical sense. Also, the form on the top right that kind of looks like the back of the box is ill defined. These are the two parts I'm struggling with the most. Also, I'm not sure what to do with regard to the tone outside of the subject. I might blend it as it is and leave it as a 10-15% dark, maybe fading out to like a 20-30% dark. Not too sure yet. I didn't use a ruler during my construction which was unfortunate, as some of the lines in the block look wonky.

Keep in mind that the exposure of the camera is different than what light my eye would be seeing; the general relationships between the values should be the same, though.

Once I fix these problems up I think it'll be a pretty solid drawing, though. There are some proportion issues (and my shot wasn't close to perfect with regard to my viewpoint) but it still looks convincingly like a cloth, so I'm okay with how it is. For my first serious tonal drawing I'm very happy with it.

[darktiste]

The value on your shadow are much stronger by a good amount than on the original picture and you can adjust the exposure of your camera to match the eye so no excuse.Concerning the background i don't think it important that much in this study in particular but atleast putting a grey base will prevent the white paper natural tone from flatning the image.

[EveningAlgae]

The value on your shadow are much stronger by a good amount than on the original picture and you can adjust the exposure of your camera to match the eye so no excuse.Concerning the background i don't think it important that much in this study in particular but atleast putting a grey base will prevent the white paper natural tone from flatning the image.

The values in the photo and life are not the same... The relationships are the same though...

[EveningAlgae]

Another still life; 4 hours in so far, planning to render it in conte crayon. Done from life with vine charcoal on dark grey canson mi tientes.


Spent a very long time making sure all of the proportions worked to the best of my ability, and I think it turned out pretty well so far.

[Baldgate]

Hey Algae, nice studies work. I like the structure on these folds and how your line drawings are super clean.

I struggles with the same issues you are describing (values, rendering) , so I'm not sure I can say anything valuable, but I think you're on a good track with still life drawing. Its commonly said that life drawing / painting teachs the most, and the few times I did it, I actually felt like it was true.

For rendering, I suggest trying coloured paper, white chalk and black pencil for your pencil rendering, so you already have your midtones and only need to add hightlight and shadow. I find it easier, but its may be only me.

My 2 cent for your rendered drawing since you were wondering what to do : Since nature is usually full of soft edge, I would blend background and texture in shadow area. Also maybe add a cast shadow for composition purpose, on the wall behind it.