There were two particular questions that I have encountered while creating these constructions:
How does constructing the muzzle work when an animal is full profile?
Do adding masses work by fitting the mass AROUND pre-existing forms?
I decided to push forward and complete the constructions anyways to better apply the previous points that you made.
I appreciate your feedback and have no qualms if you feel that more revisions should be made.
Hi! Regarding your questions:
On the running rat demo, you can see how to construct a muzzle in full profile. If you look at your fox reference, you can see that, even though he's on a full profile view, the different planes of the head are still visible.
Yes, we fit the mass around pre-existing forms. I think Uncomfortable describes it as bags of flour; I tend to think of bags of flour when the masses are directly on top of things, and clay or sticky gum when they're below or around other masses; the point is that they have to wrap around the constructions. That rat demo from before is a good example of that.
Your constructions are looking a lot better, as is your line. In particular, your deer looks good, but you tend to slack off on the difficult parts such as feet, and you almost never add any masses to the head where they're necessary.
Remember that if you're going to use lineweight you have to ghost your lines the same way you would do it with any other line. Again, don't try to capture the whole image with a couple of forms, instead, build simple forms as an initial construction and then add masses to replicate those complex forms seen on the reference. This is something you tend to do, especially on the legs.
Here are the corrections for the fox. Most of the issues I see are addressed there. I think you're almost ready, but I'd really like for you to make another 2 animals.
One should be the same fox, and another non hooved quadruped. Think of all the corrections, and keep in mind the rat and the donkey demo when working. Treat the legs as carefully as any other section of the animal, and make those lines as confident as you can.
If you have any questions, I'll be around to answer them. Good luck!
Next Steps:
Redo the fox drawing.
Add one more non-hooved quadruped.
I have 2 more questions.
How do I construct the muzzle of an animal with an open mouth?
How should I approach the feet if they are obscured in a photo?
The first question I feel was a bit of a problem for me on the fox photo I previously chose. It has also dictated me to find only photos of animals with closed mouths, and honestly felt pretty limiting to me. I have included a bonus construction where I attempted to draw a yawning wolf. It came out nice, but I don't think I really constructed it all that much, and I was wondering if you knew how to approach this? I want to remove this limitation I have.
The second question was a problem that I encountered while constructing the African Wild Dog (the second one), where his feet where obscured by the foliage of the savanna. It was a problem for a few of my previous constructions as well, and I would like to know how to get around this. Should I be finding separate reference photos for the feet?
I appreciate all of the help you have given me thus far. It has been extremely helpful.
Hi! Sorry for the delay. I'll give you my notes and then I'll go to your questions:
On the fox you made the whole neck-ears form in one stroke. Go step by step, it's better for the mental processes of building up forms. In this case it ends up flattening a bit the form. Is it intersecting with the cranium sphere? Or is it a superficial layer, where the ears are located? Of course we know what you're trying to do, but the point of this is to build on forms, step by step, one by one.
The hind leg isn't constructed; if you can't see it completely, you can look at other references or make an educated guess based on the leg you can actually see.
The added masses are where they're supposed to be, but be careful with those corners. Look at the corners in these masses. They're are aligned with the middle point of the sausage, signaling the way in which they wrap around the form. On your hind legs you almost got it, but not quite, so be really careful with those. And you can notice that, in that demo, where the corners are not needed, there ain't any of them.
I highly encourage you to look at this whole submission. Uncomfortable did the critique, so it's better than anything I could tell you, and it deals with a lot of the same issues you have here.
I would also encourage you to make your own archive of corrections, if you don't have one already. I've been saving a lot of random Uncomfortable's corrections on these lessons and it really helps to see different problems and the way they're resolved.
Your head construction is getting a lot better. Be careful with the eyes still, remember that they're bigger than we can actually see, and that they're covered by an eyelid most of the time, even when it's hard to see it. On your hyena for example, the eyelid doesn't wrap around the eye as it should, instead looking more representational; the muzzle could still be broken into more planes, as it is, it looks a bit flat.
As for the feet, you've got the right idea, but remember that once you have the basic form, you have to break it down and/or add secondary masses to make the actual form of a foot. Here's another demo from the lesson linked before that deals with feet.
Don't forget about the intersections. Your legs still look weak, and the intersections between sausages will help with that.
Now to your questions:
Your head looks good, but yeah, more definition on the planes of the muzzle and a more defined form on it would've helped. Also notice that the nose has its own subdivisions. Try to think of the teeth as the claws on Lesson 4; you can revisit those in the informal demos section. So yeah, it looks good, and it's suggesting the right things, but just a bit more definition on the forms would go a long way.
So yeah, you're on the right track. Just to prove the point, I'll ask you for a last non-hooved quadruped, draw it big, search for a good reference photo and make sure to check out all the things pointed out here and in the critique by Uncomfortable. That would be the last one, we're kind of grinding on Lesson 5 and we should avoid that :P Anyway, good luck!
Next Steps:
These are what I use when doing these exercises. They usually run somewhere in the middle of the price/quality range, and are often sold in sets of different line weights - remember that for the Drawabox lessons, we only really use the 0.5s, so try and find sets that sell only one size.
Alternatively, if at all possible, going to an art supply store and buying the pens in person is often better because they'll generally sell them individually and allow you to test them out before you buy (to weed out any duds).
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