Hi Itsmekitara, congrats on finishing lesson 1! I’ll be handling your critique relying on the guide provided here: https://pastebin.com/dYnFt9PQ
My critique will be divided in 3 sections: lines, ellipses and boxes. Let’s get started !
First off, I want to congratulate you on your superimposed lines exercise because I’m seeing absolutely no fraying on the first end of your lines, which shows that you have executed this exercise with a lot of patience and care. Fraying on the other end is completely ok and will get better with practice.
Your lines are very good both in the ghosted lines and in the ghosted planes exercise, with little to no wobble, good job! They do arch a little bit, so really focus on drawing from your shoulder, and if they tend to arch in one direction you can try to consciously have them arch the other way to compensate. I’m not seeing any dots on the ghosted planes exercise, so just in case do remember that starting a line with a starting and ending dot is important for applying the ghosting method, and this should never be skipped, even in exercises where you’ll be focusing on other things.
I see that you are drawing through your ellipses, they also look confidently drawn and are nicely symmetrical for the most part, good job!
They are however very uniform when it comes to their degree, so in future warmups I want you to push yourself to vary the degree of your ellipses more (that is, making them wider or narrower). This is something that you can integrate next time you attempt the ellipses in funnels exercise. It is also something that can help for your next ellipses in planes: when doing this exercise in the future, something you can try out is focusing on having the ellipse reach 2 opposite corners of the plane rather than its sides, and trying its major axis with the diagonal of the plane going through said corners. You’ll see that even the thinnest ellipse can easily reach all corners and fit inside a plane that way. See example here: https://ibb.co/album/zhKcZD
You kept your ellipses aligned with the minor axis in your ellipses in funnels exercise, so that’s very good!
In the rough perspective exercise, there are some instance where the width lines aren’t parallel to the horizon line and the height lines aren’t perpendicular to it, so pay attention to that in future warmups while planning your lines using the ghosting method. I don’t really have a straightforward piece of advice regarding the accuracy of plotting to the vanishing point, as this is something that will get better with practice, especially when doing the 250 boxes challenge. You should definitely really take your time planning your lines using a starting and ending dot, something that might also help is ghosting the vanishing lines as well before placing the ending dots for your lines.
In the rotated boxes exercise, you don’t have quite enough rotation in my opinion and didn’t keep your corners close enough, here are some observations/corrections that might help: https://ibb.co/album/MBypM0 . I’m going to ask you for one more page of this exercise as a revision so I’d also definitely recommend reading through the instructions + watching the video for this exercise one more time. Please reach out if you have any questions or if some things aren’t clear enough.
In the organic perspective exercise, there are some instances where you did not draw through your boxes (that is, when boxes are overlapping the box that is behind should still show, as if the box in the front was transparent). In order to really convey the illusion of 3D space, there should be much more size variation (the front boxes being much bigger than the boxes in the back) as well as overlap, so I’m going to ask you for one more page of this as well in order to make sure that you understand the purpose of the exercise. Definitely also go through the instructions for this one again if you’re unsure about anything.
That’s the end of this critique! It was all in all a very solid submission, and I’m sorry to ask you for more work, but I feel that this is necessary before letting you move on to the 250 boxes challenge. Above all, stay motivated and committed!
Next Steps:
1 more page of the rotated boxes exercise
1 more page of the organic perspective exercise
provide 10-15 minutes at the beginning of your drawing sessions for warmups, using 1-2 of these exercises and keeping my comments in mind
I also added the ellipses in planes exercise to my warmup routine, I'm starting to get comfortable drawing ellipses in different degrees and orientations. I had trouble drawing the hatching lines from my shoulder, I wanted to ask: Is it okay to draw smaller lines with my wrist, Or should I just practice drawing shorter lines with my shoulder? Thank you for the critique and the suggestions!
Hi ! You should practice drawing all of your lines from the shoulder, I know it's especially difficult for the smaller ones, even more so when it's hatching lines and I can't say that I 100% abide by it myself but from what I understand that's what's advised. If you're really having trouble with it & are able to draw small straight lines with you wrist I guess you can probably give yourself some leeway there, but that's in no way an "official" guideline, so don't take my word for it. Maybe ask around in the discord server for some other opinions.
good work on your revisions also, your rotations already look better in the rotated boxes exercise in my opinion. good work on the overlapping boxes in the organic perspective exercise, but your boxes are still pretty uniform in size, so I'd also advise you to incorporate this exercise in your warmups and really push yourself to draw bigger boxes in the front. Remember that since they're overlapping, you don't need to be afraid of not having enough room left to draw the boxes in the back.
I'll mark this lesson as complete and let you go on to the 250 boxes challenge, best of luck to you and don't hesitate to ask if you have further questions !
Next Steps:
move on to the 250 boxes challenge
Thank you so much! I'll definitely practice drawing smaller lines from my shoulder from now on! Thank you again :))
This is a remarkable little pen. Technically speaking, any brush pen of reasonable quality will do, but I'm especially fond of this one. It's incredibly difficult to draw with (especially at first) due to how much your stroke varies based on how much pressure you apply, and how you use it - but at the same time despite this frustration, it's also incredibly fun.
Moreover, due to the challenge of its use, it teaches you a lot about the nuances of one's stroke. These are the kinds of skills that one can carry over to standard felt tip pens, as well as to digital media. Really great for doodling and just enjoying yourself.
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