Hand of Light - Thursday Group

Thursday Art group - Session 17

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Proportions 3

In this session the group were asked to continue with progressing their practice of proportional drawing, concentrating on both unit and relational measurement.

Video clips from the previous week have been left at the bottom of this page for reference.

Take a look at some of these other pages on this website:

Depth and Shadow | Shadow | Ink Pen Drawing

Rendering by Sue (from previous Tuesday group)

Shadow | Video clip (bottom of page) - Pen and Ink Textures

Stan worked up his drawing at home, from the previous week, refining his shading and bringing life to the drawing. Some sharpening of line around the plate and jug would help to crisp up the image to create additional spatial relationship. Having said this, the image has a nice rustic quality. (Click on images to enlarge).

Stan also produced this drawing. His shading and mark making works well and the three dimensional form of the log is clearly reproduced. Because of the lightness of touch, his drawing doesn't really convey the weight and density of the log, so shading could be heavier. Nevertheless, a nice drawing.

Kathy took a while to refine her unit of measurement and for a while struggled with the position and shape of her cup's handle. In the end, this turned out well, although, looking at the photo below, other proportions of the cup and saucer require some similar fine tuning. Some nice shading is beginning to give weight and dimension to the objects. (Click on image to enlarge).

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Nan encountered some difficulty with her arrangement in relation to her viewing angle and it was proving difficult to get both the relationship and angle of positioning between the jars. Adding the material under and around the jars produced some additional reference points and the drawing started to come together. (Click on image to enlarge).

Mags was away on holiday this week.

Lorraine continued to work with her log from the previous session and produced another good drawing. Towards the end of the session, she was having some difficulty pulling out the form from appearing flat, but a bit of work with a rubber to lift some of the pencil in the reflective areas suddenly brought everything to life. (Click on image to enlarge).

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Tracy brought in a large vase. Initially, its size dwarfed her viewing position and we had to move it back to the table opposite. Working out a unit of measurement took several attempts, but in the end the narrowest point in the middle of the vase was used to then calculate further dimensional relationships. Towards the end of the session, proportions were making more sense and she was able to begin rendering the areas of transparency and reflection. (Mouse over and then click on image to enlarge).

Mary has captured some of the shapes and surface texture qualities of her jug, although some compression has occurred. Quite a bit of attention was given to the top of the jug and its lip in relation to its alignment relationship to the body. Crisper edge lines, particularly around the handle and main body areas will help to smooth and bring out the glossy, reflective glazing of the jug. (Click on image to enlarge).

Vee produced an initial cup and saucer drawing, but then moved onto this shell. Whilst the overall dimensions and tail end of the shell were effectively mastered, Vee encountered some difficulty in reproducing the area around the opening and differentiating its shadow and light areas. Sharpening of the line began the process of form, but the session ended before more shading could be applied. (Click on image to enlarge).

Rebecca continued with her car and greatly improved its proportions. Imagination took over and she coloured the car and painted a landscape. I don't think she was too keen on the result, but this is the nature of art. Sometimes you produce something that starts to work well - in this case the original line drawing - and then you lose some of the qualities you liked when attempting to develop the image further. Working back into the image with some line detail could still bring back some of the original, now hidden, qualities and a lightening of the road and better shading where it meets the car would send it under the car, rather than up to it. (Click on image to enlarge).

Although the video below discusses figure drawing, the principles of measuring apply to all of your subjects:

The Measurement Technique: The Unit of Measurement

How To Draw Anything - and Pencil Technique

Techniques demonstrated

Holding the pencil in the best direction for taking and conveying measurements, i.e. tip led.

Finding a unit of measurement from the object and then using this to determine other in-scale measurements.

A reminder of relative measurements, i.e. how objects and backgrounds, etc., line up in relation to parts of the object being drawn.

A reminder to draw cross-lines (vertical and horizontal) as relationship guides to the vertical/horizontal position of the object being drawn, e.g. is the object perfectly vertical or leaning slightly?

Observations

Everyone showed improvement and better understanding of the task this week. It would be good to see some of the drawings further refined and completed in the next session - if not at home.

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