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6:54 PM, Monday January 25th 2021

These are definitely much better. Just a couple things to keep in mind:

Firstly, do not cut back into the silhouette of a form you've already placed in the world, as you've done here. For the most part you have avoided this, but since it is something you need to be keenly aware of, I called it out in the once place I noticed it. Don't forget this explanation as to why cutting back like this, or redrawing the silhouette of established forms in this manner, flattens out your drawing.

Secondly, I noticed that you seem to have employed a lot of different strategies for capturing the legs of your insects. It's not uncommon for students to be aware of the sausage method as introduced here, but to decide that the legs they're looking at don't actually seem to look like a chain of sausages, so they use some other strategy. The key to keep in mind here is that the sausage method is not about capturing the legs precisely as they are - it is about laying in a base structure or armature that captures both the solidity and the gestural flow of a limb in equal measure, where the majority of other techniques lean too far to one side, either looking solid and stiff or gestural but flat. Once in place, we can then build on top of this base structure with more additional forms as shown here, here, this ant leg, and even here in the context of a dog's leg (because this technique is still to be used throughout the next lesson as well). Just make sure you start out with the sausages, precisely as the steps are laid out in that diagram - don't throw the technique out just because it doesn't immediately look like what you're trying to construct.

This is something you can practice throughout the next lesson, so I am going to mark this lesson as complete. Just be sure to use the sausage method for all the legs you construct, whether insect or animal.

Next Steps:

Move onto lesson 5.

This critique marks this lesson as complete.
5:59 AM, Tuesday January 26th 2021

Hi

Thank you. This is invaluable.

I'll try to keep all that in mind in lesson 5.

The ant and dog leg construction diagrams are really good. I suppose I completely missed the point with the leg construction. But I now understand how the sausage form is good for laying down the base form of the leg while still keeping the gesture interesting and not too stiff. And don't cut into the silhouette! Need to remember that one as well.

Thanks again.

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