Lesson 3: Applying Construction to Plants
3:17 AM, Tuesday March 17th 2020
Hello, I've finished up lesson 3, looking forward to your critique.
Starting with your arrows, very nice work! They're fluid and demonstrate both the compression of the positive space (the width of the ribbon) and of the negative space (the space between the zigzagging sections), and in doing so they convey the full depth of the world in which they exist.
You've captured the same fluidity in your leaves, which frankly is excellent to see. A lot of students will stiffen up, given that they're overly focused on drawing something tangible and real, and so they focus too much on drawing something that looks solid. You instead have achieved a degree of solidity, but also have captured how the leaf moves from moment to moment, how it passes through the space it occupies, and how the wind and air drives it along.
You've honestly done a fantastic job with your branches as well - there are a few visible tails here and there, but by and large you're doing a great job of making these longer, more complex lines appear as though they are made up of a single continuous stroke, despite having several smaller segments that flow seamlessly into one another. I'm also very pleased t osee that you're maintaining a consistent width throughout each branch, which helps encourage the perceived solidity of the form.
Moviong onto your plant constructions, you certain are applying the principles of the lesson quite effectively throughout. When it comes to constructional drawing, you're doing a great job of building upon simple foundations, focusing on maintaining the solidity of your underlying structure before developing it further in later phases, never adding any sort of form or detail that is not supported by what already exists.
Your overall approach to texture is coming along well - I can see where you're attempting to move away from thinking in terms of outlining textural forms, and focusing more on the shadows they cast. There certainly is room for growth with this - the veins you've drawn on the leaves here are definitely going in the right direction, but I think their scale might be a bit big relative to the leaf itself.
Since your work is largely well done, I'm mostly nitpicking at little things that caught my eye. Another one was how you applied line weight to the edges of the leaves on the potted plant here. The key thing to line weight is that it is best used in limited places, usually right where we need to clarify how one form overlaps another. You are doing that, but you're stretching your line weight along too much of the given stroke. Try limiting it to just where it's going to be of most use, and keep it subtle, as shown here. It's worth mentioning that I feel your use of line weight elsewhere is much more subtle already.
Lastly, along the stalk of this mushroom, you chose to outline the little nodules along it fully - unless they're breaking the silhouette, focus on the shadows they cast, rather than outlining them so explicitly.
So! Your work is looking fantastic. I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete.
Next Steps:
Feel free to move onto lesson 4.
Like the Staedtlers, these also come in a set of multiple weights - the ones we use are F. One useful thing in these sets however (if you can't find the pens individually) is that some of the sets come with a brush pen (the B size). These can be helpful in filling out big black areas.
Still, I'd recommend buying these in person if you can, at a proper art supply store. They'll generally let you buy them individually, and also test them out beforehand to weed out any duds.
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