LateIfEverAtAll in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"
2017-01-16 19:52
Hello Uncomfortable,
I just pledged to your patreon today, so I may not be on your list yet. Here is the complete lesson 1 for your critique. The number in the upper right of the images is the page number of practices\homework I did since November 25, which is a bit "excessive" I'll admit. Some of the gaps are due to me struggling hard with finding a process to ghost both lines and ellipses that didn't drive me mad. The rest is because I'm stubborn. I plan on not going through NEARLY that volume in the next lessons, because I don't think I got nearly the improvement for the time spent.
Since you've expressed before you don't want student's pre-critiques, I'll just ask a hard question:
- Ghosting Ellipses: My technique for getting pretty reasonable results for ghosting straight lines (its just a matter of focusing on using them when I'm dealing with perspective, too many draw through lines, or employing them with small or large lines), but I'm really stuck with ghosting for ellipses. Primarily (and this will sound strange) what do I actually "look at" when ghosting an ellipse? I found that for straight lines that focusing on the endpoint almost doubles my accuracy, but I'm really not sure what I should be looking at with Ellipses. Should I be leading the pen? Should I try and visualize the ellipse? Should I pay attention to the end point of the major and minor axis? I feel that without something to do with my eyes (like an end point) my brain starts shouting "Wait! WHAT ARE YOU DOING!", and my ellipses get distorted. Advice would be appreciated.
Thank you for all of the work on these tutorials and offering your critiques to the community. Its been the first time I have attempted sketching in over a decade and certainly the first time I've put this much effort into a single lesson.
LateIfEverAtAll in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"
2017-01-18 13:58
Thanks Uncomfortable.
I know that there are a few things that I need to sure up with my boxes (ghosting with small boxes, eye-balling the correct position of the last vertices), but I am kind of brain drained on drawing straight lines. I think going on to Lesson 2 and getting started on the organic line work might give me enough of a rest before returning to fix my box issues. I may do a page of boxes from time to time though, just to keep my skill fresh for the intersection exercise (so don't be surprise if you get a 250 box submission from one of these months).
As for the 20 minutes of lesson 1 before each session, that may be difficult as most times I only get 15 - 20 minute chunks to do drawing (except at the end of the day where I might get a whole 45 minutes). So I have to treat my warms-ups as warm-ups (a couple of minutes to get my eye, wrist, arm and brain prepped for an exercise), and just establish 1 of my chunks each day to a previous exercise. I guess we'll see how that works out when I hand in lesson 2.