Hello!

Congratulations on completing all the exercises in lesson 2! I'm here to offer you some feedback today.

Arrows Starting with your arrows, these are flowing smoothly through space. Your lines are reasonably confident, your hatching is neat, and your additional lineweight is placed correctly and used subtly, well done! While you do appear to understand that the arrow gets wider as it gets closer to the viewer, there are places where your arrows narrow unexpectedly and it breaks the illusion of depth. I've marked one such instance of this on your work here https://i.imgur.com/pfq7Lpt.jpg

And there are other arrows with even width all the way along. As explained in this image https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/0f7c806c.jpg this is seen as a mistake in this exercise.

Organic Forms You've mostly done a very nice job of keeping your sausage forms simple. There's just a couple of times where you draw one end much wider than the other, as I've noted on your work here https://i.imgur.com/IdTTJjH.jpg You've done well drawing through your contour ellipses and aligning them on your central flow line. I can see you varying the degree of your contour ellipses, and that is great! But make sure that the degree of the contour ellipse communicates the angle that you're viewing the form sometimes they seem a bit random. I’ve tried to show an example of this on your work- The degree of the ellipse nearest the viewer should be smaller than the one furthest away. You can also exaggerate the degree change much more. For your contour curves you've done a great job of hooking them around the form, well done. Remember you should change the degree of your contour curves too.

Texture Analysis You had a question about this, and additional resources. Have you read all the pinned messages in the lesson 2 channel on Discord? There’s a fairly detailed lecture from Comfy explaining the aims of the exercise. For difficulties with the gradient, I’ve found it very, very helpful to start in the middle, and work a section of texture that looks very similar to my direct study. Once I have that established I know that everything on the left of that middle patch must have larger shadows, and everything on the right must have smaller shadows. As for how to think about my shadows getting larger or smaller, I think about the left side of the gradient being drawn as sunset, the light is coming from low in the sky and all the shadows are long. At the right of the gradient, it is mid-day, all the shadows are very short or disappear completely. Comfy has explained this visually here https://i.imgur.com/SCnATRK.png It is normal to find textures difficult, these exercises serve as an introduction to the concept. On your direct studies on the left it looks like you’ve done a good effort at observing your reference and extracting information from it. I can see you’ve attempted to identify shadow shapes and draw implicitly, and tried to avoid outlining everything. You’ve resorted to outlining sections of your bell pepper, but that’s a really tricky one and perhaps not a texture I would recommend for this exercise, as a beginner. You’ve done a good job of avoiding any kind of scribbling or hatching, your marks show clear intent, and that is great. For your smaller finer shadows it looks like your are drawing a single line of even width, this image shows a better solution https://i.imgur.com/M9JJfr4.png

Dissections Looking at your textured sausages, you are drawing your textures as if they exist on a flat surface https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/e58b7887.jpg you should be wrapping them around the curvature of your sausage forms. While there are a few places where you break the silhouette, there are plenty of places where you don’t https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/4dd5336a.jpg Remember that punching through the silhouette and providing information there at the edge is going to have the biggest impact. You could fill the whole silhouette in with black and it'll still communicate a great deal - that's how important this kind of technique is.

You have managed to capture and communicate a great deal of detail and information on the textures you have drawn for this exercise, I can see you must have taken a lot of care and effort with them. This observational training will filter through and improve your drawings over time, you’re doing good work. Before I move on I want to note that you have a mix of strategies going on with these, there are some where you’re on the right track to drawing implicitly and focusing on shadow shapes, and others where you’re relying on outlining things and drawing them explicitly. For this exercise you should only outline forms where they break the silhouette of the sausage.

Form Intersections This exercise serves as an introduction to the concept at this stage. Mostly I’m checking that your forms are solid and look like they all exist in the same space. Don’t worry if you don’t fully understand the intersections at this stage, as long as you’ve made an attempt, it’s fine. You were asking for further resources and examples of this as well. Again, check the pinned messages in the lesson 2 channel. Optimus’ form intersections first aid pack has many examples. You can also look at completed lesson 6 home works https://drawabox.com/community/homework/0DTUN4FS/01001/1 as form intersections are repeated in this lesson, and at this stage most students do a good job with them. Looking at your work, your forms are pretty solidly constructed, and your foreshortening is reasonably consistent, good job! For cylinders the further ellipse should be proportionally wider than the nearest one, as well as smaller. There is a lot of blank space on your form intersection pages where you could have drawn more forms.

Organic intersections Your sausage forms are coming along nicely. You’re drawing them confidently and keeping them simple, good work! I’m not convinced that you’re really understanding how your forms sit in 3d space, or how they wrap around each other as they are pulled down by gravity. Looking at your work I’m having a hard time understanding which forms are on top, and which ones are behind or underneath, especially in the second page. Your forms should wrap around each other https://d15v304a6xpq4b.cloudfront.net/lesson_images/5de674b5.jpg

Your cast shadows must have a consistent direction for your image to make sense. I’ve tried to establish more consistent shadows on one of your pages here https://i.imgur.com/Msiq1iq.jpg and don’t forget that the forms also cast a shadow on the surface they are sitting on (the ground plane) I’ve drawn a little sunshine to indicate the light source, you can do this too if it helps you remember where it is. All the shadows are going away from it.

Conclusion Overall you’ve done a nice job with these exercises. I know you’ve struggled a lot with textures and form intersections, but these exercises serve as an introduction to them, you’re not expected to do them well, just to follow the instructions and try your best. With time and practice it will get easier. Hopefully I’ve pointed you to enough resources to answer your questions. If not, it is better to ask on the Discord. You will get a response faster, and somebody else may be able to explain things in a way you can more easily understand.

I’m going to ask you for another page of the organic intersections before moving on. I want you to stick to just 3 or 4 organic forms. Really think about how they have weight and sag with gravity. Keep it clear in your own mind when you’re drawing, what part is in front, what part is behind? Once you have all your sausages drawn, you’ll need to add cast shadows. Decide where your light source is. You can mark it on the page if it helps. All the cast shadows will go away from the light source. Only draw cast shadows on the parts that are visible (you should remember what is in front from earlier) Don’t forget to draw shadows on the ground plane too. It may help you to re-read the exercise instructions and or re watch the video. If you’re confused feel free to ask for further explanation on the Discord. Others may be better able to help, but if you want to talk to me specifically you may ping me (I’m DIO) good luck!