I am sorry, I don't see any unnatural bends in those leaves. They are going into the page, away from the viewer. Similar to the ribbon exercise. Should every leaf be drawn as if they are flowing along a flat surface perpendicular to the viewer's eyes? If so then I missed that from the material.
Everything else I understand and can see.
Thank you for the critique!
Hello RiggityRenekt, you can find here a more in depth explanation for why the different leaves you've drawn look flatter than they should.
While it is clear your intention is to draw them as if they were moving away from the viewer that is not what the constructions actually communicate.
Think of leaf structures as you would a piece of paper or arrow, in these cases your leaves look like they bend unnaturally because the bends are contained to their width, not their length. Take a piece of paper and bend it in your hands, you can bend it in several different ways, but if you try to bend a sheet of paper to look like the first image it will rip apart, that's because the length of a piece of paper will always be the same, it can bend and fold but it cannot compress or stretch, in order for the red sheet to be possible it would require one side of the piece of paper to be longer than the other, while a piece of rubber may be able to achieve this state paper doesn't possess these same characteristics and so only the green sheet comes across as bending naturally for a piece of paper or in this case, a leaf.
The same is true for the other leaf constructions, sometimes there are also size inconsistency problems, that is, the part of the leaf that should be further away from the viewer and thus look smaller actually looks bigger, this is most noticeable in the first leaf of the second page.
The second leaf, while not as noticeable as the others looks unnatural due to the contours, which are all evenly spaced with the same exact degrees in between them, which communicates that the tilt of the leaf would be consistent throughout and thus the leaf is not actually moving backwards in space. There's also no perspective in it, both ends of the leaf if you were to draw it on a piece of paper look the same size, as such it's important to remember the rules of perspective and apply it thoroughly, even a simple leaf still abides by the rules of perspective.
The last leaf, while still not very noticeable, still has no overlaps in it.
I hope that this has been useful.
I hope that this has been useful.
Immensely! I really appreciate the time you've put into this. Thank you!
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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