Lesson 2: Contour Lines, Texture and Construction

While we've had some exposure to texture now with the texture analysis exercise, we're not really expected to have any kind of mastery or even comfort with it. All the same, we're going to jump into the next step - unwrapping a texture from a reference image and then applying it to a completely different object.

Many of the same challenges as the previous exercise come into play, but now we also have to deal with the curvature of these simple sausage forms, as well as an opportunity to make use of the form's silhouette to convey information.

You start off with an organic form with contour lines. It's important that you don't start off with any particular design or object in mind.

You can go ahead and use your pages of organic forms with contour ellipses/curves for this, just make sure you take pictures or scans of them first for the purpose of having others review it.

Alternatively, you can create new pages of them, but I want you to construct the forms without any changes. No trying to hide your contour lines or be extra clean - the textures are going to go right over these construction lines.

Pick a section of your organic form, between two contour lines. This section will be your point of dissection - imagine that you've cut it out and removed it, and add a bit of line weight/thickness to the edges to emphasize that they are the edges of the forms, and that the section between them has been cut away.

Every texture follows a rhythm - randomness does not exist. At its surface, something may appear random, but if you look deep enough, you'll always find some manner of organization and structure. Never scribble or draw randomly. It simply won't look good or capture the texture you're after. Furthermore, refrain from using hatching lines, as they generally aren't present in most natural materials. More often than not, people just use hatching lines as a shorthand for "I have no idea what goes here and I don't really want to take the time to find out."

Lastly, draw your textures to various parts of the organic form. Remember that you're transferring texture only - leave any form information behind.

A lot of students make this mistake at first - they'll get so caught up in the texture they're trying to draw that they'll forget about how the surface they're covering actually turns in space. These organic forms are indeed curved, so you need to ensure that the texture gets compressed and warped along the sides as the surface turns away from the viewer.

Students are also sometimes afraid to break past the silhouette, so they'll do lovely work within the simple sausage form, but they'll miss the opportunity to push past it and really bring their texture into its own.

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.