Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes

4:23 PM, Tuesday March 23rd 2021

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On a few of the exercises I may have struggled with ghosting my lines a bit (especially on the organic perspective exercise, all I can say is OOF) but overall I don't think I did too terribly, any feedback would be appreciated! Thank you in advance :)

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7:35 PM, Tuesday March 23rd 2021

hello GenericWhiteMale, welcome to drawbox.

some general ghosting method advice

I think major mistake people assume is that drawing their lines fast is equal to them being drawn confidently . Maybe over time this can become true, but at the beginning we don't want to ghost our lines too fast because we won't internalize the process and gain muscle memory effectively.

So for your warm ups, I want you to spend more time ghosting lines or ellipses at a speed that's not too fast or slow, where you can internalize what mark you are going to make before making it. That might mean ghosting a line 10 times or a even little longer before you commit to it. Also pay attention to how you rotate your page, you may find there a certain degree where you draw your lines more successfully and can help you ghost lines more accurately

lines

even with your ghosting issues, most of your lines and planes seem confident to me which is the primarly thing we want at this stage. You lay down your points and mostly hit them. Some of your ghosted lines do fall a little short sometimes so important to remember, that when ghosting to lift your pen off the page the second you hit that end point. Remember overshooting isn't a big problem at this stage.

ellipses.

Just a small reminder, because you mostly doing right this already, but alway strive to draw through your ellipses not once, but at least twice or 3 times. Drawing through your ellipses gives your arm the chance to familiarize itself with what's being asked of it in that first pass, and then firm it up in the second. It also helps build up muscle memory.

In the ellipse table exercise, each ellipse should touching each other without overlapping. In your work, there seems to be a mild amount of overlapping. This is area you might be working too fast when ghosting. Remember to ghost your lines at a speed where you can internalize what mark you are going to make before making it.

In you funnels exercise, I think you need to strive more to align your ellipses to the central minor axis line, such that each ellipse is cut into two equal, symmetrical halves. Once again this might be due to ghosting issues.

boxes

In your rough perspective exercise, your lines are looking wobbly. When people get to this stage of the lesson, their focus on making a boxes then making a good confident line. Try to face every line as it is a ghosted line exercise, without taking into account that it's part of a box. The logic is that by making confident looking lines, you can make confident looking boxes.

I also see that some of your width and height lines are skewed and do not align with either horizon line or the perpendicular line. Unlike the lines, You can put down the two points for making a line, check if they are parallel to the horizon line or the perpendicular line. If they are not, add another point to correct it . You can put down many points until you are satisfied, then you can commit to the actual line!

In your organic perspective exercises, I noticed that you may have tried to correct yourself by drawing additional lines. Try to fight the urge to correct yourself , it draws more attention to your mistakes and can make things more messier and harder to critique. My previous critique on making two point before making a line can apply here as well

The majority of your boxes have y shape with angles more than 90 degrees, which is good because it lead to more accurate boxes . Make sure you consistently strive for both of these in your future warm ups, as it is important for the 250 box exercise.

To sum up, for your warm up exercises , you should focus on ghosting your lines and ellipses more effectively. Don't get discouraged, with pratice you'll be able to get a hang of it. Ghosting helps makes your lines and ellipses more confident whcih is our main focus at this stage.

I am going to mark this complete.

Good luck on your draw box journey!

Next Steps:

The 250 box exercise

This community member feels the lesson should be marked as complete, and 2 others agree. The student has earned their completion badge for this lesson and should feel confident in moving onto the next lesson.
2:06 AM, Wednesday March 24th 2021

Hey LumpyHands, thank you very much for taking the time to go through and critique my work! After reading this and taking another look at what I've done I can see where I definitely should have taken more time to slow down and really focus on internalizing what I'm doing. Everything you mentioned makes sense and going forward I will certainly keep your tips for each section in mind during my regular warm ups. Thank you again and I wish you the best of luck on your journey as well :)

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