Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes

5:46 PM, Saturday March 28th 2020

DaB Lesson 1 - Album on Imgur

Direct Link: https://i.imgur.com/JZjQnO7.jpg

Post with 46 views. DaB Lesson 1

Lesson 1 clear! (again)

In general, I think I definitely still have issues with using my shoulder properly. Still getting a large amount of my wrist taking over, even after ghosting. Hopefully, warmups will eventually fix this. And on my ellipses, still need to fix the shape on them. Plenty of distorted ellipses.

Thanks to the TA and/or boss who will eventually review this!

A few questions though, more directed to the boss.

  1. Regarding the next thing (250 boxes), I vaugely recall something in the Discord group of not having to do them if I've done them before? I've done some lessons before getting the Patreon subscription, so I've done 250 boxes already. I'll do them again if needed, though.

  2. I've actually done 12 textures for the 25 texture challenge before doing this lesson (again, did some DaB things before becoming a patron), so would I need to start from scratch after doing lesson 2 or am I good to continue with what I've got?

In either case, I can upload an imgur album of what I've done (250 boxes and some textures) if you'd need to check them. Thank you!

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10:44 PM, Monday March 30th 2020

Hey there I'll be handling your critique.

Alright so starting off with the Lines section, the trend across these first 3 exercises is pretty similar. I'm happy to see that you're experimenting with different lengths of lines, and plane shapes but you are getting some waving in your lines. Your accuracy isn't too far off your intended points, like you mentioned however this is a sign that you're not using your shoulder as much as you should be and why you super imposed lines begin wavering as soon as they do rather then just having them drift towards the end. Part of this may be that you're worried about your accuracy more so then letting your arm create a smooth line, remember accuracy will come with practice and it's ok to overshoot your intended stopping point at this point as long as the line is smooth and confident.

In the Ellipses section it's a bit of the same story. You're doing a good job experimenting with sizes and shapes which is always great to see, you're keeping things relatively in bounds but at the cost of your ellipses being quite loose. They're not squaring off which is good to see, it's a sign you're ghosting and trying to create them in a smooth motion. So the reason they're as loose as they are is probably a mix of not using your shoulder enough and just needing more mileage. And just like with the planes exercise, if you're ellipses break the boundaries a bit it's fine at this point, smooth confident ellipses are your first priority, being accurate while great is just a bonus. One thing to keep in mind for your funnels exercise is that you want to try your best to keep all the ellipses aligned to the funnel's central minor axis as shown here (https://drawabox.com/lesson/1/13/notaligned) I can see that you were attempting to do so, you just need a bit more mileage to get it more consistently. Just don't forget to keep it in mind when you do this exercise as a warm up in the future, it's a common mistake people make.

Lastly we have your Box exercises, you filled your rough perspective boxes quite nicely and I can see that you tried to make sure your horizontal lines were parallel, and the vertical lines were perpendicular to the horizon which is great. Your lines are a little wobbly but we've touched on this, overall you grasp the concept being asked. The last 2 exercises are meant to throw students in the deep end, and it shows that've you tried them in the past because you have some understanding of what's being asked of you in terms of 3D space. You have nice spacing between the boxes in your rotated boxes exercise, and achieved an admirable amount of rotation, while having nice size variance in your boxes depending on their distance in your organic perspective exercise.

Overall this is a great start and you'll only achieve better results with more mileage while doing these exercises as warm ups.

I believe you've shown an understanding of what's being asked of you in terms of the lesson but you do need to work on your use of your shoulder and tightening up your ellipses.

I'll be marking this lesson as complete and moving you on to the Box Challenge.

With your critique complete, I can now answer your questions.

  1. So seeing as how you have completed the box challenge in the past you don't need to redo it all, you've shown some understanding of 3D space and your boxes are fairly solid. However you do need to wait 2 weeks before you can submit your boxes in for critique and move on to lesson 2. With that being said I want you to use that time to draw 25 extra boxes that you will include with your 250 submission. Make sure you do your best to show your current ability, take your time and do your best to ghost every mark and use your shoulder.

2.You're good to continue with the textures you have so far.

Next Steps:

-Draw 25 extra boxes that you will include with your 250 box challenge.

-Remember you have to wait 14 days from now.

-Keep doing these exercises as warm ups and work on using your shoulder.

-Remember to draw for fun as well.

This critique marks this lesson as complete.
9:37 AM, Tuesday March 31st 2020

Thanks for the crits! I'll bear them in mind.

So if I'm understanding things correctly, I'll just re-post my old 250 boxes + 25 "new" ones in 14 days, submitting it officially?

12:47 PM, Tuesday March 31st 2020

Correct!

12:52 PM, Tuesday March 31st 2020

Alright, thanks!

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