10:52 PM, Tuesday September 27th 2022
Starting with your arrows, you've done a very good job of executing your linework here with a great deal of confidence, which plays an important role in conveying how these structures move fluidly through the world. This carries over quite well into your leaves exercise as well, where you're capturing both how these sit statically in 3D space, and how they move through the space they occupy.
When it comes to building upon the basic leaf structures, I can see that you've experimented with edge detail, although honestly you didn't really put as much time into each individual little edge detail mark as you could have - likely, as is not by any means uncommon with students, deciding that because they were smaller, they could get away with less time being invested in them. Unfortunately, you are going to have to get used to investing as much time as each mark requires - on an individual basis - allowing the task at hand to determine how long they should take, rather than your own preconceptions.
So for example, if we look here, we can see that your edge detail marks cut right across the edge, overshooting it, rather than seamlessly flowing out of and back into the existing edge. As a result, we do not get the impression that we're changing the 3D structure of the object, but rather that we're looking at a collection of lines on a flat page.
Remember - what we're doing here is not putting down a rough sketch to use as a guide. We are effectively introducing a structure to the world, as though it were a simple leaf shape cut out of a piece of paper, and as we add edge detail to it or build up its structure, we are actively making physical changes to that existing form. If we want to add spikes to its edge, we're physically adding more pieces of paper to it. If we want to create a wobbly edge, we are physically drooping and lifting sections of its perimeter in 3D space. And if we want to cut into its silhouette, then the lines we're drawing represent the paths a pair of scissors would follow to cut it out, as shown here.
Continuing onto your branches, I do have a few notable concerns here:
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This exercise's main focus is on how we employ our edges - laying them out such that they overlap in a particular way to achieve a smoother, more seamless transition from one segment to the next. I can see you doing this, but in varying ways - sometimes you'll only extend slightly beyond the previous ellipse, instead of fully halfway as noted in the instructions. In other cases, it seems like you deviate more from the specific approach requested, and instead have a single edge segment extending further than it should, instead of going from one ellipse, past the second, and stopping halfway to the third. You will likely want to review these instructions more closely.
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In most of these - though admittedly not all - your ellipses appear to be maintaining roughly the same general degree. Don't forget - as noted in the Lesson 1 ellipses video, when sampling cross-sectional slices along the length of a cylinder, they're going to steadily get wider as we slide further away from the viewer. The fact that these branches are flexible tubes does also need to be taken into consideration (as the tube comes to face us head-on, the degree gets wider even if it's coming closer to the viewer) but farther = wider is a good rule of thumb to work from.
Before I continue, I want to take a moment to point out that the assigned homework here included one page of leaves and one page of branches, and that you've submitted more than that - along with some pages that appeared to mix the leaves exercise with your plater plant constructions. Submit only what is requested, as outlined here in Lesson 0, and note that doing more work, but demonstrating signs that you didn't necessarily take as much time as you should have on each attempt, is actually a common problem amongst students. It trains our brains to think that it's more important that we produce things quickly and in greater volume - when in fact first and foremost doing the work to the best of our current ability, even in a more limited quantity, is far more effective, at least for what we're doing here.
Additionally, sticking to what's assigned and keeping the different parts separated from one another simply does a world of good in helping me critique your work more efficiently.
Looking at your plant constructions, I can see a lot of clear signs that you have the capacity to do an excellent job - although your tendency towards rushing does hold you back from achieving what you're capable of. The mistakes I'll note below aren't grievous, or dire, but they speak to an overall pattern that you will want to take effort to address.
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Constructional drawing is all about breaking the process up into steps, so we can make decisions one at a time, instead of all at once. This depends heavily on maintaining tight, specific relationships between those stages so that the decisions we make previously are respected and reinforced, rather than contradicted and undermined. So, for example, if you start out a flower with an ellipse to defined how far out each petal will extend from the center, it's important that the subsequent flow lines you draw stop right at the perimeter of that ellipse, and in turn that the petal itself stops right at the end of its flow line - not overshooting the ellipse's perimeter, or leaving an arbitrary gap between the end of the flow line and the tip of its petal.
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When dealing with the edge detail in these plant constructions you're very prone to zigzagging edge detail back and forth as explained here, which both leads to weaker relationships between the phases of construction, as well as breaks one of the three principles of markmaking from Lesson 1.
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On the potted plant on this page, I can see that when you're getting into textural detail, you're allowing yourself to drift as well into adding form shading to your construction. Note that as discussed here, form shading should not be playing a role in our drawings throughout this course.
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Also in relation to that same drawing, I noticed that you were attempting to add line weight somewhat arbitrarily. Try to limit its use as explained here, so as to avoid having to trace or chicken-scratch back over long lengths of existing linework.
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This one's not a mistake - but in regards to how you handled the sweet peppers on this page (which for the purposes of this lesson is totally fine, and even well done), I recommend you read through these notes. Basically, it'll be a mistake going forward, but isn't one in the context of hits lesson.
Now, like I said before - you are showing clear potential, strong observational skills, and a good sense of form (albeit one that is not being leveraged as well as it could). The issue comes down to what the responsibilities of this course's students are. We do not ask for students to produce perfect work, nor do we ask for good work. We ask for them to invest as much time as they require into following the directions as closely as they can, and to spend as much time as they require constructing each form, drawing each shape, and executing each mark as they require to do so to the best of their current ability.
While the prospect of a full redo did cross my mind - I have done so in the past, and have found that it provides students with the necessary shock earlier on in their progress to restructure their priorities and how they tackle their work - I will not be assigning that for you. At least, not yet. Instead, I'm going to assign some revisions below, and based on how you handle them, will decide what to do from there.
Next Steps:
Please submit the following:
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1 page of leaves
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1 page of branches
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4 pages of plant constructions