This little Daeva-bird: BAR09

Friday, 17 June 2016

LIFE DRAWING :: Reflective Statement 02

Just as with term one, I feel that the weeks spent in life drawing this term were really helpful, and that I have gained another set of useful skills from them. It was wonderful to come back on the first day, remember the lessons about line of action, exaggeration and form that we had learned previously, and immediately apply them to our warm-up drawings.

I really enjoyed the classes on drawing from imagination, trying to get an idea of how the figure would move and how sketching out 2-3 poses from imagination helped to convey the way the body moved and gestured. It was also quite enjoyable to turn the model into an animal. A lot of my sketches for that week still look terribly anthropomorphic rather than a posing animal, but I would like to practice this more in the future. I feel references of actual animals would help in getting a sense of accuracy - the shapes of the bat I had to do for homework for that week really gave me an idea of how megabats are shaped and the kind of silhouette I should be trying to aim for. Things such as my tiger and dragon from week 10 look ridiculous in comparison as they come across as generic cartoons, lacking an understanding of anatomy and shape.

The points on drapery were particularly striking. Though my practice is lacking in that area, it really helped to know where folds should lie and how they are created in a garment. I'm quite pleased with the later drawings I have, though by drawing from sight I overestimated the length and size of a lot of the garments. It is not particularly noticeable, but I am frustrated with my own shortcomings and feel that further research and practice is necessary for this area in particular.

The lessons on construction were my favorite. My base sketches have always been flat and two dimensional, I had never considered applying 3D aspects in order to achieve a result that would be closer and more accurate to life. Drawing squares was a lot easier than drawing softer organic shapes, but when we combined the two, I found that my proportion control had improved significantly - it worked especially well when I applied it to my own personal drawings. With construction I am finding it much easier to recognize instantly when my legs and torsos are too long.

Faces and rendering are still difficult for me, though I am getting a better understanding of imagined lighting. When rendering I noticed I struggle a lot creating lighter shades and my shadows tend to become very dark very quickly and do not represent the lighting at hand very well. It may be an issue I have with how tightly I hold and press with my pencil, in spite of the way that I hold it for this class. I am noticing that I have gained a little bit of control over tone and shade which becomes apparent in week 13 and 14's work, but I still have quite a long way to go. Looking at the rendering of masters such as Da Vinci and Carravagio, I'm amazed at how such light shading can make the form look so soft yet so defined at the same time, and how thicker outlines imply weight and tension.

Overall I feel where term 1 taught us the basics, term 2 has built on refining our form and figures to bring them closer to life. Its unfortunate that we only have life drawing once a week as I would like to practice and hone what we have learned this term further, but lack the free time to do so.

Tuesday, 12 April 2016

LIFE DRAWING :: 11/04/16 - Reflective Statement

Life drawing this term has been an interesting experience, and vastly different from last year's classes in the methods we have tackled. I feel that with a wider variety of techniques, I have gained a better understanding of how to apply ideas of structure, gesture and anatomy to my own work.

I'm quite pleased with how my early silhouettes have turned out, especially when combined with the line of action work that Thaw had us draw in lesson one. The exaggeration and direction really helps to solidify the sense and weight of the pose, and would definitely help with natural gesture and weight distribution in future animated works. There are still quite obvious issues with my anatomy - my legs continue to be too short and arms are still generally too elongated, but for the first week I'm still very proud of how they turned out.

Anatomy studies are also an area I feel like I have improved in - it was helpful to reference sketches done by masters such as DaVinci and refer back to the anatomy sheets that we had been given last year. Combining these with the exaggeration of the previous lessons made for much more dynamic skeletons in my opinion, and a much more pleasing composition over all. I feel as though I can study a skeleton and be able to tell apart males and females now, even though I may not be able to name most of the major bones of the body. As I wasn't able to sit in class to study a live model, I had to refer to Bridgeman's anatomical drawings to get a better sense of how muscles sit under the skin for the next week's work. Repetition and different angles really helped me to solidify which shapes appear in things such as the torso and legs.

Sculpting was perhaps the most difficult out of all of our lessons, as working physically with clay is a medium that I am still very unfamiliar with. I feel as though my first two sculptures were not very good - the second one repersenting the arms especially, as I focused too much on the torso and ignored the arms completely. However, the third sculpture of the legs shows some definite progress and a better understanding of how to block out and shape the form of the body.

Overall, I feel like I have gained a better understanding of the different areas of life drawing and hope that I can combine these lessons further to continue to grow and improve. Sculpture in particular has been an exciting part of our studies, and I am definitely eager to learn more techniques in that particular field.