THE CRIMSON CADAVERS

[Tristan Berndt]

Olooriel - I really didn't expect that... Damn, you tackled that critique head on! That's really a lot better relative to your last post. Some further minor critiques is that the femurs are a little wide and bulky at the knees. The iliac (hip bones) is somewhat crunched. It's one of the harder areas of the figure and fairly difficult to get right. If you look at some reference and try to do a few more, just focusing on that area I think you'll get it right! You might also like to draw the hipbones separately a few times to get familiar with their complicated shape. 

Adam - Hey, looking back I was a dick and an apology is in order. I'm sorry for being a jerk. I got a bit annoyed as "my" anatomy thread was getting a bunch of figure drawing in it after I felt that I addressed it. Still, I hope I see you post more in the group :)

Amit - I learned a ton from tracing over classical sculpture, finding all the landmarks and drawing the anatomy. It's really fun and difficult. Classical sculpture had a very high standard when it came to figurative art so you would rarely find a mistake in their anatomy ^^ 

Also, "militant fundamental euro atelierist", I try not to be ;) I do however have a tendency (like most) to forget to include more nuance in advice and critiques. It's a flaw in character that I need to work on. 

Kurt - I'm putting this under a spoiler so we don't fill an entire thread with a discussion about drawing in an anatomy thread ;)

Spoiler

Regarding sight size and comparative, it is a discussion that is based in some misunderstandings. I had the privilege to have a fairly lengthy conversation with Andreas Birath and this topic crept up. I used to be a big proponent of the comparative method but after having the "debate" explained to me in detail, it's all really grounded in some misunderstandings. 

The core principal of sight size is that you draw what you see. That's most of the philosophy behind it. You compare your drawing to your subject. Everything else is just different methods of approaching this philosophy. 

The comparative method can be used in conjunction with sight size. It often is, however sight size can not be incorporated in the comparative method. This is the main issue I have with it. People are focusing on a smaller sub-section of a larger philosophy and through that, loosing more than they're gaining. There is no good reason for abandoning sight size to exclusively use the comparative approach unless a specific drawing/painting needs it. 

The reason I believe sight size to be important is because it lets you be much, much more critical of your work and a student can "better" learn through it. Stepping back and seeing your drawing/painting next to your subject in the same size lets you be extremely critical and adjust your drawing by using your eyes. Your eyes are doing a lot of the work here and through that, getting more sensitive.

In exclusively using the comparative method you need to look, memorise and check your drawing. There is a level of distortion that makes it less appropriate to use as a learning tool. You can not train your eyes in the same way as you can in sight size. There is no seeing a subject and painting in the same view because they're rarely equal in size so you must rely on measurements rather than your eyes. 

So yes, practice both but I think it's a good idea to focus on learning the greater philosophy behind sight size rather than arguing over how we measure our subject. Seeing your subject and painting in the same view trains your eyes and that is something I find valuable. It comes down to how we choose to measure but I think one lets a student be more critical and I believe that is a good enough reason to use it. The comparative method is more versatile so there are situations where it is more favourable.  

They're not too different so you can easily get really good at one and then switch over. This is another reason I think sight size should be used because having the advantages and only using the comparative method when needed lets you train your eyes faster without loosing much of anything. 

In the end these two approaches have the same goal. That is to not be needed anymore. They're tools for students to check their drawings and we should all strive for training our eyes, hands and minds to a point where we don't need to use them anymore. 

I'm looking forward to seeing you post some of your work! :)