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4:20 PM, Sunday March 5th 2023

Congrats on completing lesson 3! I'll do my best to give you useful feedback so that you can improve.

Starting with your arrows, the first thing I notice is that they tend to be a bit wobbly especially the hatching marks for the shadows. For this I suggest focusing more on line confidence exercises for warmups (ghosted planes + superimposed lines) while drawing from the shoulder and taking the time to ghost before hand to ensure a confident mark. This comic by uncomfortable helped me understand ghosting and confident mark execution so it might help you too. This advice also applies to the line weight you've added on overlaps, however those lines seem more chicken-scratchy probably due to the increased pressure for accuracy. Even if the line is harder to draw you should avoid chicken scratching at all costs as they ruin the linework. Chicken scratching can also be avoided by ghosting and drawing confidently from the shoulder so really make sure to practice that. Another thing I wanted to point out was the width of the arrows is sometimes inconsistent which breaks the illusion of the arrow "coming in" from a direction. You always want the arrow to get bigger as it moves closer to the viewer as it looks like it moves through 3d space towards the viewer.The final thing I wanted point out was to make sure the edges of the arrows overlap. If we take a look at the top left arrow (which I've redrawn here) and the end of the bottom right arrow the edges don't overlap which makes the arrows look flat which is what we're trying to avoid.

Moving on to your leaves, you have some with really nice fluidity while others ended up looking flat. The main issue I see with your leaves is that some tend to skip constructional steps. For example, the middle two leaves look like they've been constructed based on guesswork rather than following a set of steps. You want to make sure you draw flow lines for each aspect of the leaf before hand so that you can construct on top of it. One final thing I wanted to mention is that the bottom left leaf doesn't fill up the whole space you've designated for the construction which can undermine it's solidity in 3d space so just be careful of that. Other than that your other leaves are very fluid so keep it up.

Your branches, other than the linework issues previously mentioned, look good. I can see you've tried your best to make sure to shoot the line past the ellipse and have for the most part done a good job at it so keep it up.

Finally your plant constructions, for the most part they turned out pretty good. The first thing I want to point out is on page number 6, the plant on the right has leaves that have zigzagging and look carelessly rushed while the plant on the left had some missing branches and some of the flow lines on the leaves ended up stiff. This also happens on some other plants but not to the same extent and usually only on a couple of leaves but it wasn't that uncommon for it be just an outlier case so make sure you focus on flow lines and the zigzagging issue. For the potted plant on the next page, make sure you construct the pot around a minor axis to ensure the ellipses line up like you've done on other plants.

Other than those issues, your plants are sort of a mixed bag with some being really good (pages 1, 2, 3) and others being what is to be expected at this stage of the course. Before I end this critique I wanted to discuss your use of cast shadows. Areas of solid black should only be reserved for cast shadows which typically require us to design a new shape (as seen here and here). From what I can see you've used black inside potted plants as to maybe colour the soil which should be avoided as that is akin to form shading.

Overall this was a good submission which showed a good deal of growth in your understanding of 3d space which is why I won't assign revisions to the arrows even though they had a number of issues. I strongly recommend you focus on your linework during warmups as that is the biggest issue, then focus on the issues I pointed out on specific exercises. I don't normally critique earlier lessons so if anything was unclear or if you have any questions don't hesitate to ask. Good luck in lesson 4!

Next Steps:

Lesson 4

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1:30 PM, Tuesday March 7th 2023

Hi thank you so much for the critique, I'm a bit busy at the moment but will reply properly asap, I've read through though and you make really great points.

Thank you

5:32 PM, Tuesday March 7th 2023

Your critique was great and clear.

I see what you mean by my wobbly lines

With the overlaps. I was using my wrist from fear of fking up, so I will switch to my shoulder for future exercises.

"I've only just realised you're not meant to use your wrist for line weight:("

I wasnt sure whether I should be making thin branches using the same method as thicker ones. after reviewing other people's work and the critique they received, I have realised I was meant to be applying this method no matter the size.

I have been constructing my elipses around a minor axis and outside of drawabox I usually don't end up to far off. But I always get nervous when putting down elipses as large as the ones I used for pots and botch it. I'm hoping this will just lessen with time but any advice would be welcome.

Also I will start taking more care with my line work.

I was hoping you might have some advice. I think as you picked up on, I tend to lost patience and rush things. I do have ADHD and tend to fight with it during drawabox. I'm mainly wondering if you have any tips for staying patient and not rushing.

I am not assuming you are an expert on adhd, but as your alot farther ahead then me, I thought you might have picked up things.

Thank you again for your critique, it's a massive help.

1:11 AM, Wednesday March 8th 2023
edited at 1:13 AM, Mar 8th 2023

No worries!

As for the stuff about patience and ADHD all I can recommend is to take it slow. Stuff in lesson 6 and 7 can take up to 10 hours so all you can really do is take your time and just focus on the task at hand. This may be harder for you but it's still possible. 1 last bit of advice I can give is to practice mindfulness meditation as I've seen that help for people with ADHD

edited at 1:13 AM, Mar 8th 2023
11:06 AM, Wednesday March 8th 2023

I've never heard of that I will see if it helps.

I definitely have zoned in moments where I do great, just a shame i can't get into the zone on command

Thanks again for the critique

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These are what I use when doing these exercises. They usually run somewhere in the middle of the price/quality range, and are often sold in sets of different line weights - remember that for the Drawabox lessons, we only really use the 0.5s, so try and find sets that sell only one size.

Alternatively, if at all possible, going to an art supply store and buying the pens in person is often better because they'll generally sell them individually and allow you to test them out before you buy (to weed out any duds).

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