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8:41 PM, Wednesday June 7th 2023
Congratulations on getting through lesson 1! Here is some feedback.
Lines
First off, most of your frayed lines start at one point, and only fray at one end, as they’re supposed to. Did you use a ruler to draw the initial line? It’s hard to tell by looking. If you did use a ruler, move on, but keep doing these as warm ups. If not, redo them with a ruler. When you do these as warmups, also try some curved lines.
The point to point lines look fairly confident. Keep doing these as part of your 5 minute warmups to increase accuracy.
On the ghosted planes, again, you have the idea, but the pen confidence/accuracy will come with time. When you draw the crosshairs (not the corner to corner “x”, but the middle to middle “+”), the lines of the “+” sign will go to the same vanishing point as the other lines that are parallel to it in 3D space. (this explains better: https://imgur.com/a/ZRm2n13 )
Ellipses
On the ellipse tables, they look smooth and confident. You could use some more variation in angle, and remember to pass through each one 2-3 times. The ellipses in planes are also confident, and you do pass through them twice. Same thing with the funnels. With practice, the accuracy will improve. You may want to experiment with how fast you draw them. There’s usually kind of a “Goldilocks speed” to get a good balance of smoothness and accuracy—not to fast, and not too slow.
One thing to try is to draw a few quick super loose ones (not in a table or anything), then a few aligned with a minor axis (like this: https://imgur.com/a/FVVPp6Z ), then do constrained ellipses (like one or two panels of a table).
Boxes
You have the right idea on the perspective of the boxes for the 2 point perspective. On the rough perspective, the lines are often not quite converging to the horizon—they either converge towards another point, or diverge. Not all of the boxes are checked with a ruler.
The idea is there on the rotated boxes. On the organic perspective, You’ve gone small to large and followed the lines. I do see a lot of diverging lines, but you’ll work on this on the 250 box challenge. Likewise, you’ll continue to work on line confidence and accuracy.
Here is one way of drawing boxes that helped me understand: https://imgur.com/a/CP1JmaBA
Also, there is a pitfall of accidentally drawing your convergence lines the wrong direction. Here is how to avoid it: https://imgur.com/a/3YXACR6
Next Steps:
Frayed lines: if the initial lines weren't drawn with a ruler, draw a line with a ruler and redo the exercise. (If the guideline was drawn with a ruler, ignore this.)
Rough perspective: Redo these 2 pages, making sure that the lines generally converge, and head towards the horizon. It's okay if they don't perfectly meet up at a single point. Check all of the convergence lines. If you find this confusing, try doing one or two panels with a ruler to get the idea, then go back to freehanding.
Continue to practice lines and ellipses as part of your 5 minute warmup. Ellipses will be important when you hit lessons 2-5, and it will take a few months to develop them, so that's a good thing to do during warmups when you're doing 250 boxes. On ellipses, try to discover your just right "Goldilocks speed"--fast enough to be smooth, slow enough to get a bit more accuracy.
After that, it will be off to 250 boxes.
Good luck!
8:35 PM, Friday June 9th 2023
Thank you so much for your critique! For the frayed lines, I believe I did use a rule to draw the first line. Also, how often should I be doing these warm ups, and how do I know which ones to do?
"Here is one way of drawing boxes that helped me understand: https://imgur.com/a/CP1JmaBA"
Unfortunately, this imgur link is broken so I am unable to see it. :(
Once I finish redoing these 2 exercises, should I show them to you?
Thank you again for your help! It is much appreciated! ^^
8:47 PM, Saturday June 10th 2023
Yep, just post the redo here.
https://imgur.com/a/CP1JmaB resending that link
Ideally, each day you sit down to draw, you do 3-5 minutes of warmups. I usually put on a 3-5-ish minute song while I warm up, and when the song is done, so is my warmup. Pick something random (and simple) from lesson one, like frayed lines (straight and curved), ghosted planes, table of ellipses, etc. Shoot for that "goldilocks speed."
One nice thing about the 250 box challenge is that it gives you time to get good at ellipses, before you need them for lessons 3-5. I did a lot of ellipse warm ups during the 250 box challenge, and it helped when I hit those later lessons.
Next Steps:
(as said above)
4:31 PM, Monday June 12th 2023
Ah alright! Would you mind explaining to me what “Goldilocks speed” exactly is?
Here’s the updated images by the way! I decided to redo the frayed lines exercise for the fun of it!
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