bentilador2

Hi, it took a while, but here's the revised work. https://imgur.com/a/PKjb3kc Thank you too for the drawing notes and previous critiques.

I did the tamandua first and something clicked after that. I feel like I learned a lot in this set of revisions, but is it in the right direction?

Thanks for the critique. I realize now at some point I was definitely relying on observation to bypass understanding the underlying "sausage" of the limbs and body. On the lack of sausage forms, I was looking through the lesson notes again and I must have confused the instructions with the procedures in older demos that didn't have them, like in the oryx and elephant construction.

I tried again, focusing on including all the simple forms and eliminating contour lines: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1-7Bp7W6t7srOUYKSqr5z92zr9R77EfV3?usp=sharing

Using simpler forms definitely made constructing hybrids easier.

Also, sorry for the upside-down images earlier. For some reason my phone didn't save the edits when I uploaded the set to Google Drive, though it usually works out fine in imgur.

Thank you for the in-depth critique! Also thanks for the examples of the sausage forms, they helped a lot. I think I failed to grasp that part properly before so now I'll work on "finding the sausage" and "wrapping the sausage."

Looking forward to crustacean representation in the future!

Hi! I think you have a good grasp of how to wrap details and contour lines around sausage forms, and this translates to your placement of texture and details on the insects.. You also have a good sense of proportion. You space the legs accurately on the body showing an understanding of roughly where they should connect to the bug.

Legs:

Your earlier drawings show some weakness in the gesture of the legs (they look splayed out and not clearly supporting weight or showing tension) but by the time you draw the red weevil, I think this aspect improves and the legs show more tension.

Textures:

Maybe things like hairy textures and bumps can be suggested by a few strokes along the silhouette and areas of high contrast/transitions to shadows as opposed to all over the form. This will help the drawing look neater. I think the katydid and the orb weaver display this well, whereas page 6's spider and mantidfly may benefit from grouping darker values as opposed to spreading out texture marks. The silkworm moth on page 7 may also benefit from finer lines to suggest fuzz rather than large zigzags all over the segments, but it's good that the fur shows a clear direction. Perhaps contouring only along areas in shadow may read just as well, like the lower half of this sausage form: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/423fe2b2.jpg

Anyway, very good work. You understand these forms well and apply surface details to them in a way that is readable and interesting.

Hi! Good work on completing the assignment.

Arrows: they flow well on the plane of the paper, but don't seem to be receding from the viewer or approaching the viewer, you can try to work on having them flow towards or away from you by compressing them (further) or widening the gaps betwen waves (nearer). Try to have your lines flow confidently and avoid fraying.

Leaves: Same thing as arrows. Also, details on leaves should follow the forms, so lines that seem straight if the leaf were pressed flat would bend as the leaf bends. This would help your leaves look more alive.

Branches: Good work, practice avoiding fraying of the lines so you can achieve a continuous silhouette.

Plants

You generally follow the demos well, but I think there are some challenges when applying it to your own plants.

First area would be form and proportion. Know whether you're looking down on the subject or up at it, and know whether the forms are pointing towards or away from you. This is evident in the rafflesia and the last mushroom.

A noticeable area of improvement would be details flowing along forms.

From the flower, cactus, and mushrooms, I think you could focus on minimizing detail and incorporating them sparingly so the whole image reads better. For instance, incorporating wrinkles and bumps along places in shadow or the silhouette only.Additionally, allow features to flow with the form. I think you captured this with the hibiscus and mushroom, but the monstera and other leaves don't flow as much with the form. The potato plant leaves could also benefit from this treatment. I think you improved this in the rafflesia and the plant before it.

To help with this, maybe you could adjust your line weight to be on the lighter side when the image is in light so that the textures don't show up too heavily.

Your organic arrows have good flow and confident lines. To make them really look like they flow through space, note that both positive and negative spaces compress the further away they get. this is seen in some of your arrows but a lot of them don't show this trait.

Your sausage shapes also show good lines. In the contour ellipses, It's not clear whether they are bending towards or away, so make sure to distort your ellipses to show this. (See the mistake: degrees all the same on https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/contourlines) The forms also tend to squash a bit in the middle, but are okay. For the contour lines, this aspect improves a bit but it could still use some work.

Texture analysis: You do a good job of capturing the forms using solid shapes without unnecessary lines or hatching. You also understand when to eliminate detail based on how much light the area receives. Good work. You could also try using more solid shapes.

Though you understand how to eliminate detail based on lighting in texture analysis, you draw every line and add shadow in the dissections exercise. You understand how to capture the forms and wrap them around a surface, but remember that detail will tend to disappear in very light or very dark cases. Recall: https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/ad811558.jpg

The prickly pear, moss, rough concrete, and hedge are good examples, though I would recommend using less lines in the well-lit areas of the hedge. The lizard skin and stone wall are examples that don't show any lighting.

Your form intersections generally look good and cohesive. The pyramids and cones tend to look a bit out of place, however, because of extreme distortion in some areas. Good work on determining the planes of intersection, I think you can visualize these quite well for curved surfaces. (I'm struggling with straight edges myself)

Organic intersections: The cast shadows are well-placed and look like they convincingly wrap around the forms. As with the earlier sausages, they look like they mostly point in the same direction, without heading towards or away from the viewer very much, but it is more evident here than in your previous exercise so there is some improvement. This could be some aspect to work on for later.

Anyway, good work, and good luck in the next stages!

Hi! Congratulations on finishing your first set! I'm glad you had lots of fun, it gets more fun.

First, superimposed lines looking pretty accurate. Try to draw in one confident stroke to get really straight lines. Ghosted lines could use some confidence, which is more important than accuracy. Accuracy comes later, with practice.

You get more confident in the planes, but I still see some wobbling. And by the time you get to the boxes, I see you're a lot more comfortable with making bold straight lines.

Ellipses: Draw them quickly and go over them just once. Your ellipses in planes could be more round, don't forget to draw from your shoulder and not your wrist. https://drawabox.com/lesson/1/3/shoulder Your accuracy in the funnels exercise is pretty good.

Perspective:

For the ruled perspective, I can see you get how to use the vanishing points pretty well.

Freehand perspective: just remember that in one-point perspective, you'll still have two planes of the box that remain at 90 degree angles, so you shouldn't have the back face tilting away. You improve by the second page, but slip up sometimes.

Rotated boxes: I can see the forms rotating, this is a good first attempt. Remember that at the far ends, we see a lot less of the face of the block and it flattens out into the edge.

Organic perspective: Remember that each box has a vanishing point of some sort. Start from the "Y" and build from there. The edges of the 3D box that are parallel to each other should distort so that they converge to roughly the same point on the paper. I would suggest drawing two planes first then plotting out the other corners with a dot (so you can try to visualize multiple times without committing to a wrong line). Check this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jlJ6rwj3PKg

Thank you so much for the clarifications and comments on where to improve. The textures were definitely difficult and I'm grateful for the tip on where to focus.

Hi again, Rob! Thank you for your comments and for the suggestions to level up my boxes. I'll keep them in mind moving forward.

1. Superimposed lines: Clear, confident starts and ends with minimal wobbling. The longer lines and arcs on the second page show quick improvement.

2. Ghosted lines: Looking good. Your trajectory is usually right and though it overshoots the mark, the accuracy of your ending point will get better over time and practice

3. Planes: You laid out all the points and did great work meeting the marks. Some of the dots aren't at the exact midpoint, but that's OK as you nailed the starting, ending, and confidence of line. Clear improvement over Ghosted Lines, though those were already good.

Ellipses

1. Table: You have strong, confident lines. The points to hit don't always match this time (Like having the edge of the frame just against the edge of the ellipse) and the minor axis wobbles quite a bit. Also as your ellipses get bigger, I see some egg shapes, or difficulty in maintaining an even oval.

2. Ellipses in planes: Same comment as above, the points don't quite meet the lines that are supposed to frame the ellipse, but they're more or less there. Good work. Try working towards going over the ellipse only twice, and keeping it tight.

3. Funnels: Improvement in hitting the edges, very minor tilting of axis but otherwise quite good.

Boxes

Plotted and rough look good, though I see some very slight wobbling. There's a lot of improvement by the second page of rough, your lines get a lot close to the VP.

Rotated: I see some lines that haven't been drawn through, Don't forget to draw them through to check. Also the corner boxes are missing. Make sure lines on each box converge to their own vanishing point, which means the back face of rotated boxes won't have 90 degree angles.

Organic perspective: Make sure each set of 3 lines on each box converge to their own vanishing point. There's some improvement by the second page, but some sets of lines don't have a clear idea of where your VP was supposed to be. Try to imagine where the VP is then ghost through to it each time you draw a line.