Retired

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

You're making a lot of progress towards understanding the concepts introduced in this lesson, I'll be listing a few things I notice below that will hopefully help you achieve some better results in your future attempts at these exercises.

• Your arrows are looking smooth and well done. I like that you're utilizing foreshortening on the arrow itself but you do have room to experiment with it more in the space between the arrow's curves. Foreshortening this negative space as well as the arrow can really sell the illusion of an object moving through 3D space as discussed here.

• Great job keeping your organic forms with contours simple, a lot of people struggle to do so and end up over-complicating them. Only thing I have to note here is that you could push your contours a bit more in a few places, remember that we want to be shifting the degree of our contours along the length of the form. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here.

• In the texture exercises you're clearly focusing on your reference and doing a great job recreating cast shadows instead of focusing on outlines. This exercise in particular takes a lot of experimentation so the fact that you achieved the results you did is impressive. A few of your attempts were weaker like the orange slice and grass are focused more on outlines, but you are definitely on the right track in your rope and analysis attempts. Keep experimenting and remember that every texture is a different challenge, by using cast shadows we can imply information and create focal points utilizing gradients so it's definitely a tool worth having for larger pieces.

• If you feel like you don't fully grasp form intersections just yet don't worry, right now this exericse is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be working with them more in upcoming material. I do get a bit of an impression that you may have been hasty with this exercise, your pages are fairly bare and the quality of your forms is a step back from what I'd expect from your previous work in this lesson. Remember that it's not a race and to give not only every exercise but every line the amount of time it needs.

• As for your organic intersections exercise you're showing that you're understanding of 3D space is definitely growing. Overall these are well done, the ending ellipses on your forms could be bigger and shift with the rest of your contours but other than that I don't see any major mistakes. Just be sure to experiment with different lighting angles in future attempts, simple sets of forms like this are the perfect tool to build your sense of 3D space and light/shadow.

Overall this was a really well done submission. You have a few things to work on but I believe you've shown an understanding of the lesson so I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Be sure to keep doing previous exercises as warm ups, experiment to build up a deeper understanding and fill any holes in your understanding with more mileage.

Good luck in lesson 3!

No problem, hope it helps.

If you take a look at your contour ellipses and lines you can see that when going across the form the line is nearly straight before curving towards the end. I get the impression that you're trying really hard to keep them within the form so it's resulting in you stiffening up rather than really pushing the curve. If the contour itself falls short or breaks through the boundary of the form it's not ideal but it's still a stepping stone towards your goal. Just like in lesson 1 your goal is always to draw smooth and confident lines/ellipses if you do that accuracy will come with time. Hopefully that cleared it up a bit, if not just let me know and I'll try to tackle the explanation again.

Textures are a tricky exercise and it's often sadly a lot about experimentation. One way that did help me with them was taking extra consideration into the form that the shadow is being created from. You can also attempt to break down the texture into simpler forms in a way, as an example if there is a round bump, you can try to break it down into planes, while you obviously don't want to draw your shadows based on the planes it can kind of help you picture that bump in 3D space easier if you imagine it as form closer to a box. This makes it easier for you to think of how the light would impact on certain sides.

Another thing that can be potentially helpful in your understanding of the idea is to take an high resolution image of texture and put it into an image software of your choice, (photoshop, krita etc.) convert it to black and white and then play with the brightness levels, as you increase the brightness only the darkest of shadows will remain as the rest of the image blows out and vice versa as you increase the darkness. While you can't use this reference for this exercise since the entire point is building your internal understanding of this, at least seeing an example of it can be helpful.

I hope this helped, texture is really difficult and capturing shadows properly is so feel based it's always tricky to describe. Ultimately you have to do your best to capture the shadow itself, not the forms creating it but be mindful of where they are. Your image may not end up looking like the texture itself in this case because we are working with extremes and only have black and white as our tools but it's definitely a useful tool that helps later on.

If this didn't help at all just let me know.

Yep, that works.

You're making good progress towards understanding a lot of the concepts introduced in this lesson, I'll be listing things I notice below that will hopefully help you achieve better results in your future attempts.

• Your arrows are off to a good start, the only thing I'd suggest is experimenting with foreshortening more. By not only making the arrow larger as it gets closer but the space in between curves of the arrow we can really sell the illusion of an object moving through 3D space. You can read more about this concept here.

• In the organic forms with contours exercise you're close to nailing your simple sausages but do get a bit too complicated in a few spots. Remember that the goal is to keep both ends roughly the same size and to avoid any pinching, bloating or stretching along the form as discussed here. Other than that some of your contour lines could be a bit smoother, you shouldn't be redrawing them either. In the future remember that you want the degree of your contours to shift with the form. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here.

• When it comes to texture your analysis exercises are really well done, when it comes to the dissections however you do tend to focus more on the outlines and negatives spaces as well as resort to drawing from memory at times rather than using your reference enough. Remember that by focusing on cast shadows we can create gradients which are hugely beneficial when need to create focal points in more complex pieces. You can read more about these concepts here.

• If you don't feel like you fully grasp form intersections just yet don't worry, right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming material. I will note that your lines here do look a bit rushed and appear like they could use more time being planned, while there are some cases where it could just be error in attempting to add line weight there's also spots where it's quite off or looks like you're trying to redraw lines. Just remember that whether the goal is 1 box or 100 boxes/forms that you want to give each line the same amount of time and care.

• Your organic intersections are really well done. My only real complaint here is that your line work again could be a bit cleaner but that's a mileage/patience thing. I do recommend trying out different lighting positions when trying this exercise again, using simple forms like this can really help you build up a stronger sense of lighting as well as your sense of 3D space when moving to more complicated tasks.

Overall this was a solid submission, you have a few things to work on but I believe you can fix these issues with mileage. Seeing as how you show a good grasp of the core concepts introduced in this lesson I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups, and good luck in lesson 3!

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

You're making progress towards grasping the concepts introduced in this lesson, I do however see somethings that can be worked on to achieve better results in the future so I'll be listing them below.

If possible in the future I'd suggest just drawing on one side of the page, bleed through can make it more difficult for you and the person critiquing your work. If due to the circumstances you're trying to be conservative with your paper then don't worry about it and just do what you can.

• Your arrows are off to a good start, I like that you're experimenting with foreshortening. The only things I notice here really are that your work and hatching could be a bit tidier and that your lines do show a bit of hesitation at points which may be a sign of you slowing down. As long as you keep the fact that you should be drawing confidently in mind I have no doubt these will improve with mileage.

• In the organic forms with contours exercise you definitely want to work on your line confidence, your lines and ellipses here end up being quite stiff. Remember that smooth and confident is always the goal, besides that your forms are mostly kept simple which is great. I will quickly point out that you want to shift the degree of your contours along the form, your line quality here may be betraying you if you are attempting to do so, either way I'll give you this quick reminder. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here.

• Before going over your texture exercises I'll just recommend in the future to get a brush pen if you don't have one. (Here it looks like you used one possibly but like you didn't have one in later exercises.) Brush pens are really helpful when having to create shadows and fill in large areas of black. With that out of the way, I will say that it does appear like you're largely focusing on outlines and negative space rather than the cast shadows created by forms along the texture itself. This makes it difficult for you to create proper gradients because you have to explicitly draw everything rather than being able to imply information. By utilizing gradients we can create focal points in larger drawings which would become overwhelming if we had to draw every little detail, you can read more about these concepts here.

• If you feel like you don't fully grasp the form intersections exercise just yet don't worry, right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming lesson material. Other than that just make sure you're giving every line the proper time it deserves in terms of ghosting and drawing confidently.

• Lastly when it comes to the organic intersections exercise I'd suggest trying to simplify your pile of forms more. You draw quite a few forms but don't really wrap them around one another in most cases. By keeping it nice and simple not only will you develop a stronger sense of 3D space, but you'll also find it easier to work with light and shadow. Speaking of which your shadows don't really cast all that much here, and while it's definitely tedious using a fineliner for shadows it'll be beneficial in the long run. One last note is just the line quality isn't great here but i've addressed this previously so I won't beat the point further into the ground.

Overall this was a solid submission and while you have things to work on I think you can improve your results with some more mileage and focus on your line confidence/tidiness. With that said I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups and good luck in lesson 3!

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

While you are making good progress towards understanding the concepts introduced in this lesson you do have some things you can work on, I'll be listing what I notice below.

• In the arrows exercise there's 2 things I notice. The first being that your lines could be a bit smoother which makes me think you may not be drawing as confidently as you could be and slow down. The second being that you don't give yourself much room to experiment with foreshortening the space around the arrows because you spiral your arrows rather frequently. By foreshortening not only the arrow itself but the space between the curves of the arrow we can really sell the illusion of an object moving through 3D space. For more information on this confidence you can check here.

• Your organic forms with contours are off to a good start but you are making the common mistake of not keeping your sausages simple enough. Our goal is to have both ends be roughly the same size and to avoid any pinching, bloating, or stretching along the form as discussed here. Other than that just keep in mind how you shift the degree of your contours along the form. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here.

• When it comes to texture I can see that you're trying to grasp the concept and in some places you succeed more than others. It does appear like you're focusing on outlines and negative space rather than shadows in the majority of cases however, this makes it difficult to create a proper gradient which would be hugely beneficial when trying to establish focal points in larger pieces. You can read more about the importance and benefits of focusing on cast shadows here. I will also point out that I think you start to get a bit hasty in this exercise and possibly start rushing towards the end of the lesson, I mention this because it looks like you left some textures half finished and didn't draw any on a large section of a blank form.

• If you feel like you don't fully grasp form intersections just yet don't worry, right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in the upcoming lesson material. If possible in the future I recommend draw only on one side of a page if possible, the bleed through makes it much more distracting for yourself and for the person critiquing your work, and some spots where your lines break I can't identify if it's because you were being hasty, if your corrections made the lines fade or both.

• In the organic intersections exercise I'd recommend trying to simplify your piles of forms to start, while it's great that you experimented and tried to draw a lot of forms your shadows aren't always consistent just yet so simplifying it and putting some extra time into positioning your light source will be beneficial. Your line quality has taken a bit of a step back here and appears sketchy and wobbly in spots.

While you do have things to work on I believe you've shown a good understanding of the concepts introduced here and just need more mileage and patience to achieve better results. WIth that said I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Remember to practice previous exercises as warm ups, take your time and give each exercise the time it needs to show off your best work.

Good luck in lesson 3!

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

While you're making good progress towards understanding the concepts introduced in this lesson I do notice some things you can work on, I'll be listing them below to help you in your future attempts of these exercises.

• Your arrows are off to a good start, I'm glad to see you're experimenting with foreshortening. The biggest spot for improvement I notice here is your arrows could be tidier and smoother. You do get some wobbling occurring which shows you may not be drawing these as confidently as you could be, keeping this in mind I have no doubt with mileage you'll improve.

• In the organic forms with contours exercise you also suffer from a lack of confidence in a few spots, besides that you attempt to go a bit too complicated with your forms. The goal in this exercise is to keep both ends of the sausage roughly the same, and avoid any pinching, bloating, or stretching along the form as discussed here. Also be sure to keep in mind how the degree of your contours shift along the length of the form as well. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here.

• In the textures exercises you're focusing largely on outlines and negative space rather than considering how cast shadows would be created by forms along the texture. This makes it difficult for you to create gradients using implied information because you're explicitly trying to draw it all. Gradients are hugely beneficial when we want to create focal points in larger pieces where trying to draw every bit of information tends to overwhelm the viewer. You can read more on these concepts here.

• You're skipping drawing the minor axis in your cylinders in the form intersections exercise, you can get a reminder of the steps here. If you don't feel like you fully grasp intersections just yet don't worry, right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming material.

• Lastly in the organic intersections exercise your forms are looking good, the biggest thing I notice here is that you could push your shadows further. They often hug the form creating them and don't always cast in a way that makes much sense.

Overall while you have things to work on I believe you can improve upon your mistakes with more mileage. I believe you have a solid understanding of what this lesson is trying to teach you so I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups and good luck in lesson 3!

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

You're off to a good start building an understanding of the concepts introduced in this lesson, there are a few things I notice that you can work on to improve your future results and I'll be listing them below.

• Your arrows are looking smooth and confident, my only real complaint here is that you didn't really experiment at all here. All of your arrows curve and end up in the same direction just with the arrow point being on opposite ends. Be sure to experiment to really build up a stronger understanding of concepts.

• The majority of your forms in your organic forms with contours are kept nice and simple, to the point I'd like you to experiment with making them just a tiny bit longer because they're getting pretty close to spheres/eggs rather than sausages. You do a good job of shifting the degree of contours when drawing your ellipses, but don't do so when drawing contour lines resulting in the 2nd page of forms appearing flatter. The degree of a contour line basically represents the orientation of that cross-section in space, relative to the viewer, and as we slide along the sausage form, the cross section is either going to open up (allowing us to see more of it) or turn away from the viewer (allowing us to see less), as shown here. The ellipses on the ends of your forms with contour lines are also too small and not following the form of the sausage either.

• You had some solid attempts at the texture analysis exercise, just 2 quick notes here. The first being you could push the gradient further so it transitions from dark to light a bit more, and the second being that when drawing thin line like textures you should still draw the texture as shapes as seen here, it creates a much more dynamic texture overall. When it comes to your dissections you slip more into focusing on the outlines and negative space rather than cast shadows. By focusing on cast shadows we can imply data and create proper gradients and focal points which are hugely beneficial when working on larger more detailed pieces as discussed here.

• Your forms in the form intersections exercise are looking solid, if you feel like you don't totally grasp intersections just yet don't worry. Right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming material.

• Lastly I'd recommend when attempting the organic intersections again in the future to attempt some simpler piles of forms. You attempt to go a bit too complex and your forms suffer from it with some of them squishing and flattening out. By keeping it nice and simple you'll also have an easier time dealing with light and shadow before attempting more complicated pieces later on. Right now your shadows aren't behaving in a way that makes much sense and aren't following a consistent light source, so simplifying will help in this case as well.

Overall this was a solid submission, you have things to work on but I believe you can improve these mistakes with mileage and it's not a sign of you misunderstanding concepts. With that said I'll be marking your submission as complete.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups and good luck in the next lesson!

Hi I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

You're making progress towards understanding the concepts introduced in this lesson, with that said I do see some things you can work on to achieve better results in the future so I'll be listing them below.

• Your arrows are off to a good start, I'm glad to see you're experimenting with foreshortening. Your arrows could flow a bit more smoothly in places, you have some bulging occurring but with more mileage they'll become more consistent. The only major thing I notice is that your hatching is quite messy, remember that you want to be ghosting and confidently drawing ever mark you make, this includes your hatching lines. If possible I'd also suggest moving on to a new pen as well, it does appear like your pen is on it's last legs and it causes your lines to get fairly messy throughout the exercises as you try and draw over some of the weaker marks.

• In the organic forms with contours exercise you're almost making a simple sausage but you're still attempting to make them a bit too complicated. The goal is to have have both ends being roughly the same size and to avoid any pinching, bloating, or stretching along the form as discussed here. Good work shifting the degree of your contours along the form, a lot of people neglect this step.

• When it comes to the texture exercises I think you're on the right track to focusing on cast shadows rather than outlines, but may be tackling these exercises a bit hastily. It does look like you're working from memory quite often which is a sign that you need to slow down and observe your reference more as discussed here. Once you begin to properly observe your reference then you can clearly focus on the cast shadows and do your best to recreate them as mentioned here.

• If you feel like you don't fully grasp the form intersections exercise just yet don't worry, right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming material. Your forms themselves are mostly looking solid, but your pen is starting to betray you here and make things look less tidy than they could be.

• For your organic intersections I'd recommend trying to simplify your form piles a bit as you went a bit complicated and some of your forms flattened out because of it. By doing so you'll also have a perfect tool to practice using light and shadow before getting to more complicated pieces. Right now your shadows aren't behaving as if they have a consistent light source, having the light straight above is often quite complicated so it's often easier to start with a light a bit more clearly established on the left or the right.

Overall this was a solid submission, you have things to work on but I don't believe that you're misunderstanding any of the concepts you just need more mileage. Definitely give texture a bit more attention but other than that I have no doubt you'll improve through your warm ups. With all of that said I'll be marking your submission as complete and moving you on to the next lesson.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups and good luck in lesson 3!

Just for a bit of clarification on my end, you do make use of gradients in some of your dissections like your blackberry texture, I just suggest you keep experimenting with them and try different light sources etc. Experimentation is how we often build up a stronger understanding.

As for the textures inside the sausage form it's basically the same concept, you just pick a light source and consider which bits of the texture would receive the most light and be blown out, while the spots with deeper shadows would appear darker. It's essentially the same as the texture analysis gradient, just you have to be more mindful of where you place the light because you're not just working from left to right.

Hi there I'll be handling your lesson 2 critique.

Overall you seem to be building an understanding of a lot of the concepts introduced in this lesson, I do spot a few things worth commenting on and I'll be doing so below.

• Your arrows are off to a good start, the only real noticeable thing I have to point out here is that your linework and general flow of your arrows could be a bit cleaner. With more mileage these will tidy up nicely, be sure to keep experimenting with foreshortening the arrow as well as the space in between the arrow's curves as discussed here.

• The majority of your organic forms with contours are well done. There's a few spots where you could be drawing more confidently which would help smoothen out some rough edges you have occurring, other than that you just want to make sure you keep your forms nice and simple. There's a few instances where you get a bit too complex, remember that the traits of a simple sausage are that both ends are roughly the same size and avoid any pinching, bloating, or stretching along the length of the form. You can read more about these concepts here.

• Texture is quite difficult for a lot of people but you had some solid attempts, your second and third textures in the texture analysis are really well done. I only have 2 quick suggestions for these exercises, the first being that when doing dissections you can experiment with using gradients like you do in the analysis exercise and the second being that when drawing thin line like textures if you outline the shape and fill it in it will result in a more dynamic texture as seen here.

• If you feel like you don't fully grasp the form intersections exercise just yet, don't worry. Right now this exercise is just meant to get students to start thinking about how their forms relate to one another in 3D space, and how to define those relationships on the page, we'll be going over them more in upcoming material. The largest concern I have with this exercise is that a lot of your lines are very light and you used clean up passes to dark some of them, this however makes things look messier than it could be. As discussed here we should always be drawing confident lines and adding line weight where needed.

• Lastly your organic intersections show that you're sense of 3D space is developing nicely, when practicing this exercise again in the future be sure to experiment with different lighting positions to help build your understanding of light and shadow. The only complaint I have really here is just to work on your line confidence and quality.

Overall this was a really solid submission and while you have a few things to work on I believe you understand what is being asked of you, you just need some more mileage to gain consistent results.

With that said I'll be marking your submission as complete and moving you on to the next lesson.

Keep doing previous exercises as warm ups and good luck!