Lesson 2: Contour Lines, Texture and Construction

1:09 AM, Thursday August 20th 2020

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Finally finished Lesson 2!! :D

Felt like quite a step up, but I feel like these exercises have really improved my art skills, so I'm very happy i completed them.

I found Organic Intersections an especially difficult exercise, notably I didn't feel that confident doing it, so I appreciate any particular critique or pointers on that task immensely.

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4:03 PM, Monday October 12th 2020
edited at 4:03 PM, Oct 12th 2020

Arrows

Arrows are looking pretty good in general good job! There are still a few places places where the arrow should have grown but it didn't, like on the last 2 folds on this arrow, which are of similar size. But overall they give a pretty good sense of depth.

The main thing I notice about them is their lineweight. When adding lineweight to the overlaps, do it with a superimposed confident line. Yours are a bit wobbly, so don't forget that here as well you should be focusing on confidence. Shading looks a little bit rushed too, so don't forget to take your time with each line there as well.

Organic forms

Organic forms are almost there, but they are mostly not the forms we're aiming for. If you take a look at this image, you'll find most of the forms you've drawn on the picture to be on the mistake labelled as "continually widens like an ellipse".

Here are some examples over your work to make it a bit more clear.

You're focusing on confidence on them, which is great, but the linework itself hints me you might be rushing them a bit. Take care to make each one of those as best as you can, don't forget to ghost as much as you need to do so.

Contour curves are a little bit too shallow, take a look at this to see what I'm talking about.

And the ellipses on your sausages are a bit misalligned, it's pretty hard, but remember the ellipse exercise and do your best!

Textures

Good job on textures overall, but it looks like you might be rushing them a bit. Remember that you should be looking 90% of the time at the reference¡ and only the other 10% drawing. This exercise is very hard and boring so don't hesitate to take a break if you feel you're starting to rush, take it easy.

On the dissections, make sure you're following the form where adding the texture. Here's an example where you made the texture a bit flat.

Lastly, in general to help you with the observation thing, you can use this approach with all the shadows on these exercises. This will make you stop relying on lines and will make the exercise easier.

Form intersections

Here you have a few issues. You fixed some of them through the set, but some are still there:

-First is repeating lines. You started doing it less by the end of the set, but you're still doing it. Don't forget that no matter how off a line is you shouldn't repeat it. Keep going as if it had been correct.

-Second is that the boxes have pretty similar orientations. Try to play a bit more with them. Take a look at this to see all the orientations you can make with a box.

-Lines are overshooting a bit too much in general, check you're ghosting as much as you need on each line, don't rush it.

And same with the hatching. It has fraying on both ends in some instances, be careful with that as well.

Organic intersections

Here you're in the right track, but a few things to comment on as well:

-Main problem is that you got some sausages that are floating. Every sausage on this exercise should be solid, and shouldn't look like it's about to fall .

To help you with it, you can approach the sausages like this.

Here's a demo I made to hopefully make it a bit more clear. I recommend rewatching uncomfortable's demo as well.

-In some instances your sausages are a little bit squished. Don't forget that the sausages on this exercise should still be the simple forms of the previous exercises. Some examples.

-And lastly, the shadows are a little bit jagged. You can use the approach I mentioned on the texture section for this exercise as well. First draw the shadow shape, then fill it.

Before moving on I wanna make sure you understood the stuff I mentioned, because it's a lot to take in. So i'm going to ask you to do:

-2 pages of organic forms, one with contour ellipses and other with contour curves.

-1 page of organic intersections.

And before doing the organic intersections page I want you to follow along uncomfortable's demo. Good luck and keep up the good work!

Next Steps:

-2 pages of organic forms, one with contour ellipses and other with contour curves.

-1 page of organic intersections.

When finished, reply to this critique with your revisions.
edited at 4:03 PM, Oct 12th 2020
12:10 PM, Thursday October 15th 2020

https://imgur.com/a/0bThWWu

Did my best following along to the advice you've given.

I found Organic forms with contour curves really difficult, I did try to get my forms more sausage like (using ghosting of course) but I just kept messing up the shape. I also found it much more difficult to control the accuracy of the curve than with ellipses, hence why some of them dont wrap around properly.

I know I didn't do a very good job with the organic intersections, I don't feel like I really understand how they work in 3d space yet.

In any case, I really appreciate you taking the time to review my work, it means a lot to me :)

10:31 PM, Thursday October 15th 2020

Hi there!

Firstly, about organic forms. Main issue is that you're still doing mainly stretched ellipses instead of sausages.

To help to get this shape more right, you can use dots to help you ghost the sausage form. Give it a try as it might help.

Lastly, the contour ellipses are still not accelerating enough. I recommend ghosting the complete ellipses, not just the curve when drawing them to make it easier.

About organic intersections your forms are still not going across the other sides of the forms. If you look at a side view of the drawing you did you'd see something like this. As you can see 4 is stable, but 3 and 2 are only on one side of the organic form 1, so gravity would make them fall with time.

The thing I showed you before should help with it. Try to think about how the organic forms would fall over the other side and how they fall on top of the other sausages, as if they were water balloons.

So, just to make sure you understand these concepts, I want you to do:

1 page of organic forms with contour curves

1 page of following along uncomfortable's video demo of organic intersections

1 page of following along the demo I posted.

and after it one page of organic intersections on your own.

Feel free to apply the dot thingy to those pages as well. Good luck and keep it up!

Next Steps:

1 page of organic forms with contour curves

1 page of following along uncomfortable's video demo of organic intersections

1 page of following along the demo I posted.

and after it one page of organic intersections on your own.

When finished, reply to this critique with your revisions.
9:33 PM, Friday October 16th 2020

Hi! Did my revisions: https://imgur.com/a/yYFEKCI

Spent some time trying to get my sausage shapes and contour ellipses right. I think they came out a little better, but I'm still not entirely confident with them yet.

I feel like I understand organic forms a little bit better, I'm now thinking about making sure they're supported and not going to slip. Not entirely sure that I've hit the nail on the head with this exercise yet though given what I've managed to produce. Tried my best at any rate! :)

Thanks a lot for all of the feedback ^>^

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