Lesson 2: Contour Lines, Texture and Construction
5:53 AM, Friday March 8th 2024
My back phone camera got broken halfway the lesson so some of them I use the front cam :'(. I can retake the pictures if needed.
Hi Meapro! I'll be giving feedback for your lesson 2 homework. Here and there I've included links to text sections on the website, please have a look at those as well.
Now onto the critique:
Thinking in 3D
Your organic arrows flow nicely accross the page and have clean linework on the edges. I did notice that your lines become more timid when adding lineweight. Remember to put confidence over accuracy, your lines might not complete overlap at first when using dynamic strokes, but this will improve with milage.
For the hatching lines do make sure that these follow the right direction. (see this example: https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/4/step4). Adding shading, hatching or details that don't align with the surface area of your construction will flatten out the drawing.
I'd also recommend to push your perspective more. Let the arrows grow larger and wider as they travel towards you and thinner + more compressed as the arrows moves away. (see https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/4/step2)
The organic forms exercise was completed well. You kept your forms simple and aligned the contour ellipses and curves correctly to the centre line. On the first page, some ellipses look a bit uneven. Ghosting and experimenting with drawing speeds may help with making smoother marks. Don't be afraid to overlap your ellipses more so you can create more dynamic/dramatic orientations (see https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/5/ellipses). No remarks on the contour curves, good job.
Texture and detail
You did great on the texture analysis exercise. Your work shows that you took your time to observe your reference and carefully recreate it using cast shadows. I do have one remark regarding the black bars in the 3rd column of the page. Make sure you create a gradual transition from dark to light across the rectangle. The shadows for the crumpled paper and ice cream texture don't blend seamlessly into the black bar. (see https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/6/step5)
For the dissection again you made good use of cast shadows to imply textural forms and shifting lighting. Two remarks for this one: first try to rely less on outlining forms (f. ex. turtle shell & fish scale texture). Leave your outlines open and focus on the cast shadows (see https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/6/drawingforms). Second, don't draw local/surface color (salmon texture). Only observe the forms present in your reference.
Construction
Moving on the the form intersections. You did well on this challenging exercise. The forms look solid and feel like they belong in the same space. The intersection points are convincing and you made clever use of hatching to make these areas stand out. No remarks for this one, thumbs up.
Lasty, the organic intersections. You kept the sausage forms simple and evenly shaped which makes them easier to work with and the forms are stacked perpendicular to form a stable whole. The contour curves are correctly aligned to centre line but have no/minimal degree changes. Remember that as the form turns in space it will either turn towards you and make the contour ellipse appear wider, or it wil turn away making the ellipse thinner. Also try to think more on how gravity affects the forms when they are stacked on eachother. The form being placed on top should wrap around the one below, following its contours. (see https://drawabox.com/lesson/2/9/step3)
Overall this is solid submission. You've shown you have a good grasp on the concepts of lesson 2.
Next Steps:
I'll send you off to lesson 3, good luck!
Thank you, really appreciate the critique! Helpful insights on every point (especially for the ellipses).
Glad my critique was useful to you.
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When starting on a project, I'll often open it up and start dragging reference images off the internet onto the board. When I'm done, I'll save out a '.pur' file, which embeds all the images. They can get pretty big, but are way more convenient than hauling around folders full of separate images.
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