Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 5: Drawing Animals"

2019-01-16 21:55

By and large you've demonstrated an excellent understanding of 3D space, construction and form, and have employed many of the concepts covered in the lesson to great effect. There are however a couple things that you've missed that are pretty important, so I'm going to outline them here.

There are two major issues. The first of them is how you draw the limbs of your animals. As covered fairly extensively through lesson 4, we talk about the "sausage" technique for constructing limbs (you can review it here). Sausages are great because they carry the flow and rhythm of that gestural quality you find in the limbs of living creatures, while still maintaining a strong sense of solidity.

In many of your constructions here, you've instead constructed many of your limbs using a series of ellipses that are stretched and squashed as needed. There is a key difference between an ellipse that has been stretched and a sausage - the ellipse spends half of its length getting wider, and the other half getting narrower. The sausage takes care of this early on, with a nice round sphere on either end, and spends the majority of its length at a consistent width. This consistent width is what allows us to give it a sense of flow and direction, whereas the stretched ball/ellipse will feel very stiff, unable to flex or bend.

Additionally, your components have no clearly defined intersections - that is, the contour lines that define the area where those two forms actually connect to one another. In this manner, you're skipping out on an important step that helps to reinforce the illusion of form, that you're dealing with solid, three dimensional components rather than just flat shapes.

And that leads is smoothly into the next major problem - while you do demonstrate a really fantastic grasp and understanding of 3D space in a number of areas of your drawings, the building blocks you use all tend to look quite flat. They're shapes, rather than forms.

The result is that certain parts of your drawing look really 3D and believable, while others fall short of this. It's important that you not move on from a given step of construction until you feel fully convinced of the solidity and three dimensional nature of all the components you've constructed. For example, the initial masses you construct must feel three dimensional, as depicted here.

This relates back to something relatively new that I've made a point of explaining at the beginning of lesson 2, on thinking in 3D - how we go through these additional steps in order to convince ourselves of the 3D nature of our constructions, as the most convincing lie is the one told by someone who believes it.

I have noticed that you have a tendency in certain cases, to construct parts of the body with flat shapes, and then draw more complex shapes around them with a darker line - as though you're creating a scaffolding and then wrapping it in cloth. Sometimes this "cloth" layer bridges certain gaps (like this elk's back knees) in a way that once again flattens things out, because it doesn't take into consideration the forms that would lay underneath it. In reality, those shapes are so complex because they're indicative of a lot of complexity occurring beneath them - the result of a myriad of forms that cannot simply be smoothed over in this manner. When doing your constructional drawings for these lessons, I'd like you to avoid this kind of approach - if you want to add an additional bridging of forms, do so with yet another form.

Now, it's worth mentioning that you are definitely fully capable of doing this - I can see throughout this set that you have an excellent mastery of the use of form to build up constructions, but you are getting ahead of yourself and perhaps letting that lead to an overconfidence.

As such, I want you to do three more pages of animal drawings. No detail, no texture, only pure form and construction for each of these. Focus on the use of the sausage technique for your limbs, as well as the establishing of solid, three dimensional forms at every stage of construction rather than simple 2D shapes.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-15 22:50

Looking at your work here, I'm not entirely sure just how much of my last critique you've tried to apply. You may have read what I wrote initially, and then over the course of a month or so, worked through the lesson without looking back to see what you should be adjusting in your approach.

Your arrows are alright - they flow nicely through space, though you've really rushed the arrow heads a great deal. Just slow down and think about what you're doing - you don't have to put down the first mark that crosses your mind. Draw less, think more.

I brought this to your attention last time: you have a tendency to rush your linework. I'm still seeing this, your lines seem largely unplanned. You draw wihth a lot of confidence, but not much control. As a result, your contour ellipses are extremely smooth and even, but they rarely fit snugly between the edges on either side of the form.

Your contour curves are better than before, in that you're hooking them around quite nicely, but you often have alignment issues (probably because you skipped the instruction about including central minor axis lines here to help align the curves properly. Also, it may help considerably to stick to simple sausage forms with no tapering or swelling through their lengths. Basically just two spheres connected with a tube of consistent width.

In your form intersections, you're still using stretched forms (mostly your cylinders) and incorporating a lot of needless foreshortening into this exercise, making it more difficult than it needs to be. Aside from this, your intersections are fine and you're doing okay as far as making the forms themselves feel consistent within the same scene. At least, aside from those highly foreshortened cylinders. You should also be drawing those around a minor axis to help with the alignment of your ellipses.

I did notice that you've drawn your form intersections as a single set on the page rather than many smaller groups - that's something I'd raised before, so I'm glad you corrected that issue.

For your dissections, you seem to have shifted focus more to patterns rather than textures. Textures are made up of smaller forms that sit along the surface of a given form, whereas pattern is more like someone's drawn on the surface with a marker. Like wallpaper, there's no additional dimension to it, it's just lines directly on the surface. The few cases where you did try to apply texture, you drew these largely as though they were sitting on a flat surface, rather than wrapping around a rounded sausage form.

Lastly, your organic intersections suggest to me that you're still perceiving this as though you're drawing flat shapes on a flat page, rather than thinking of these sausage forms as though they're actually interacting with one another in 3D space. We don't see any convincing sagging where the forms do or don't support each others' weight - it's all very flat and two dimensional.

So, I'm not going to mark this lesson as complete just yet, but I am going to cross certain exercises off for now.

• Arrows: We'll consider this finished.

• Organic Forms with Contour Ellipses: This is done, for now.

• Organic Forms with Contour Curves: I'd like to see a little extra work done on this.

• Dissections: We'll dig into this a little more, especially since there is new material on this subject in the lesson, since the website was rebuilt and the lessons were rewritten late last month.

• Form Intersections: Done.

• Organic Intersections: Needs work.

Here's what I want you to do. First, look at Lesson 2 and read through it in its entirety. Like I said, the lessons have been rewritten, so this should be new to you. Focus especially on the "Thinking in 3D" section, as I believe this is a point of weakness for you, especially when it comes to the dissections and organic intersections.

Then, I'd like you to do the assigned homework for the following exercises:

• Organic forms with contour curves (two pages, contour curves only). Take your time, don't rush these. Make sure they align to the central minor axis line.

• Texture analysis (1 filled page). This exercise is new.

• Dissections (2 filled pages). Focus on textures, not patterns, and think about how they wrap around the forms they're applied to.

• Organic Intersections (2 pages). Think about how these forms exist in 3D space - imagine that you're piling filled water balloons on top of each other, and think beyond the page you're drawing on. You are not drawing flat shapes on a page, you are creating solid forms in a three dimensional world to which the page is just a window.

Make sure that before any sitting spent working on these exercises, that you review the instructions for that exercise, rather than trusting what you remember. And most of all: TAKE YOUR TIME. Your work continually suggests that you're rushing through things, that you're not giving each mark the appropriate time to plan and prepare appropriately, and as such you're not demonstrating the kind of control you'll need in order to succeed as you move forwards.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-15 22:25

Since we're on reddit, let's stick to reddit usernames.

Overall, you're doing a pretty great job. Your arrows flow very nicely through 3D space and explore all three dimensions, including the depth of the scene. Don't be afraid to let your arrows overlap though (meaning, when they overlap, draw right through them as you see me do in this example page).

Your organic forms with contour ellipses are coming along well, though you do need to work on getting your ellipses to fit more snugly between the edges of the sausage form. Since we're trying to create the illusion that the lines run along the surface of the form, having it fall outside of its silhouette or float loosely within it tends to break this illusion.

Your organic forms with contour curves however are a little loose - you're definitely rushing through your curves here, and as a result have a tendency of having them hook around nicely on one side, but come out way too shallow on the other. In general, it does seem here that you're not applying the ghosting method (and are therefore not planning/preparing before each mark as you should be). This is a process that should be applied to each and every mark you put down, without exception.

You're breaking into textures with a good start in your texture analyses. Admittedly, I can see you struggling to break away from enclosing each form completely and to focus more on the shadows they cast, to varying degrees of success, especially when you work on the density gradient. This is something that will definitely improve with practice. That said, do take more care to pay closer attention to your reference image as you work on that gradient. Looking at your direct study for that first row, I can clearly see more specific nuance to the scales' shapes that isn't present in the gradient, where it's instead become somewhat oversimplified and loses some of its key characteristics.

Your dissections are really well done. You show a keen eye for observation, and do a great job of organizing your visual information. You're also clearly applying methodologies tailored to each texture, rather than relying on any one-size-fits-all solutions, and the results certainly speak to this, especially on the first page. Things get a little bit more lax on the second page, so make sure you're not letting yourself slide on this front.

Your form intersections demonstrate a solid grasp of 3D space, though your linework is at times a touch on the sketchy side. I can see cases where you've automatically reinforced a line you've drawn with another stroke, rather than ensuring that each mark you put down (outside of line weight) consists of only a single planned mark. This again suggests to me that you need to work on your use of the ghosting method, and fight against that urge to draw things quickly. It yields great results as far as confidence goes, but your overall control and general presentation does suffer for it.

Finally, your organic intersections are much the same. Demonstrating a solid grasp of space and form, but those contour curves are drawn somewhat sloppily, and without enough care.

Before I mark this lesson as complete, I'd like you to do two more pages of organic forms with contour curves. Take your time with each curve, and while I still want you to execute each mark with a confident, persistent pace, I want you to precede it with the appropriate amount of planning and preparation.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-15 22:14

If you go to the page for a given lesson and click the "Finished your homework? Get it critiqued" button at the bottom of the table of contents, it'll show you the variety of ways you can get your work reviewed. From there, just click the "Private Critiques, Patreon Only" button and it'll take you to the correct reddit thread for submitting your homework.

Anyway, by and large you've done a good job but the way you've jumped between following the instructions and not doing so really threw me a bit. In the challenge notes, I explain why it's important that you both draw through your boxes as well as apply the extension method - and you're clearly aware of that as you've applied the techniques - so I don't really understand why you didn't apply them all the way through.

You are showing considerable improvement in the confidence of your linework as well as the consistency of the convergences of your sets of parallel lines. Your attempts at the rotated boxes and organic perspective boxes there at the end are considerable improvements over your previous attempts, so the challenge has definitely helped a great deal and your overall understanding of 3D space and how forms can sit within it has grown a lot.

I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete, so feel free to move onto lesson 2. That said, please take greater care in following the instructions exactly as they have been written, and review them at the beginning of a sitting if you have to, or reread the instructions for a given exercise immediately before working on it. Aside from that, keep up the great work!

Uncomfortable in the post "100 Treasure Chest Challenge"

2019-01-15 22:00

Whew it's not too often that I get to critique one of these - it's definitely one of the more daunting and demanding challenges, so congratulations on getting all the way through it.

As a whole, your constructions are all very solid and demonstrate an excellent understanding of 3D space. Your designs, as you noted, vary in quality throughout, but I think I can pinpoint why.

It comes down to reference. Design is something that draws heavily on one's visual library - that is, the part of our brain where we store our understanding of all the things we've studied. This does include, to a degree, things we've seen and things we are vaguely familiar with, but not nearly in the kind of fidelity to which we grasp all the intricacies of the things we've really studied closely. So while we may think we are familiar with, say, a bicycle - given that we've ridden them since childhood - we still may not really know how all the pieces fit together.

That's what comes into play here, and the biggest way to work around this is to use a lot of reference. That isn't to say that everything we draw must be a reproduction of something that already exists - it simply means that we can use different pieces of reference to inform our decisions when drawing various parts of what we're designing.

Now, you definitely did use reference for various parts of these chests - so the other matter of discussion is just how you utilized that reference. This one stands out to me, for instance. The ornamentation and stylistic flare is fantastic - the brackets however do carry a certain degree of oversimplification and cartooniness that suggests to me that while you were working from reference here, that you may have equally relied a great deal on your memory. It's entirely possible to work from memory even when you've got reference open in front of you, and it's a pretty common mistake. Basically, you need to force yourself to look at your reference almost constantly, only looking away for a moment or two to transfer one or two very specific lines to your drawing before looking back. During this period of looking away, your memory of what you'd seen will immediately start getting simplified, and important chunks of information will be thrown away, making it necessary for us to look back almost instantly to refresh our memory.

To summarize, there are two critical things to remember:

• Your designs are your own - you come up with them and decide what kinds of elements are involved. Once you've decided, say, your chest has bars along the side for misbehaving children to look out from (this one made me laugh), then you go looking for reference of, say, prison bars and cages. Look closely at how those bars are welded together, whether there's any additional bolts or any other mechanism that holds it together. Always ask yourself questions about how what you're drawing works, how it all holds up when the universe is continually trying to break everything down in its eternal pursuit of entropy. A design is essentially a cohesive answer to a series of questions.

• When you do use reference, study it closely and don't rely on your ability to remember complicated things even for a few seconds. Constantly look back to your reference, and only take a moment or two to transfer some specific piece of information to your drawing. This is the process that will gradually build out your visual library.

Anyway, you've done some really excellent work here. Lots of great construction and clever design ideas - as you continue to practice using reference as a tool, your ability to communicate these interesting designs will continue to improve. You're already well on your way, but you should see plenty of growth as you continue to plough forwards. Keep it up and consider this challenge thoroughly complete.

Unfortunately there's no badge (because the flair system is just a hacked together piece of crap) but I'll add the a note that you've completed this so when we do eventually move off to a dedicated community platform on the drawabox website, you'll get a shiny achievement badge then.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 5: Drawing Animals"

2019-01-15 21:30

You've definitely got a wide variety of work here with varying results - there are definitely some issues I'd like to address, but you've also got a few drawings that come out quite well. One that stands out to me most is this one. Overall, it demonstrates a really excellent understanding of 3D space and how the various forms connect together and how they relate to one another.

Across your work, you do demonstrate this kind of understanding of how the 3D forms fit together to varying degrees, but often times you have a tendency to skip over steps and avoid drawing certain lines in ways that severely undermine your understanding of what you're drawing, or the illusion you're trying to create.

One thing that stands out to me is that when you're drawing ellipses or ellipsoid shapes - like the initial masses we draw for our constructions - you have a tendency, especially later in the set, to draw them in a single pass (rather than drawing through them so as to achieve a more confident, smooth, and evenly shaped ellipse), or you draw them to be quite faint. Our goal with these is not to hide them or keep them clean about all else, it is to establish in our scene forms that feel solid and convey that solidity both to us as we work with them, and to the viewer. As such, drawing them with confidence, drawing through them so as to keep them evenly shaped and further doing whatever is necessary in order to make them feel solid is key to a successful construction.

Let's look at one of the sections from the newly revised lesson 4 (I know you started this work not long before I released the rebuild website/lessons): Working with solid forms. Each form is drawn confidently, and I draw contour lines/ellipses wherever necessary in order to really solidify my belief that they exist in three dimensions. I'm not drawing flat shapes on a page - I am creating solid forms in a 3D world.

When you take one of those simple masses and attach another form to it, make sure to draw the line that defines their intersection. You do this sometimes, but as frequently you tend to leave it out. Take a look at this page, for example. Along the bottom, the dog's muzzle has no clear distinction between the cranial ball (the basic, preliminary mass) and its muzzle. Along the top of the page however, you have attempted to draw a clear intersection between them. This intersection helps you to better understand how they relate to one another in 3D space, further reinforcing your understanding of 3D space.

This understanding is important for the reasons I outline in this part of lesson 2 about "thinking in 3D".

Now, I don't see you doing this too often, but it is worth mentioning as it falls under the same vein. On the bottom of this page, we can see very clearly how the mass drawn for the tiger's ribcage falls entirely out of the animal's body. This essentially tells us that the forms you'd drawn previously were in fact not solid, that they were simply marks on a flat page, and that you're free to rearrange them as needed. This ultimately undermines the illusion you're trying to create - it tells the viewer that none of what they see is real. For this reason, it is critical that once you put a form down on the page, that you treat it as though it is a solid form existing in a 3D world, and if you need to build on top of it, you do so in a way that clearly demonstrates that you understand how those two forms relate to each other in space. And if you need to cut away from it - something that is quite difficult to do successfully - you need to demonstrate that you understand how the resulting pieces - the piece you're cutting from, and the piece that is cut away - both exist in 3D space and how they relate to each other. Here you can see that you've cut across this ribcage form.

Relating to how you've drawn the torsos on that page, I also recommend that you give the notes on the torso sausage a read. Specifically, we talk about how torsos should generally be drawn with this sort of a slightly sagging sausage. This doesn't necessarily always fit our reference images, but usually when it doesn't, it's because there are additional forms or features present that obscure this underlying form - additional muscle mass, or skin that is being stretched across different solid forms, etc. I expand on that here.

On this page you're showing the beginnings of a good use of the sausage method for the tiger's legs - something I talk about here in lesson 4 and here in lesson 5. The one thing you're missing here is that you weren't reinforcing the intersections at the overlaps/joints with contour lines, something that helps continue to establish the illusion of 3D form.

Now, that should be quite a bit to go through, so I'll stop my critique here. I want you to do the following:

• Take some time to read through what I've written here - it's a lot to absorb, so step through it slowly and take a look at the links provided carefully.

• Go back and read lesson 5 in its entirety - given that you started the work prior to the release of the rebuilt website, and based on your work here, I'm going to assume that you didn't read through the new material. Make sure you do.

• Do 5 pages of animal drawings, focusing only on construction - no texture, no stripes, none of that. Focus entirely on constructing solid forms and on understanding how they sit in 3D space, and how they relate to one another within it.

Uncomfortable in the post "100 Treasure Chest Challenge"

2019-01-15 19:17

AS WE TRANSITION TO THE NEW COMMUNITY PLATFORM (RELEASING FEBRUARY 1ST), ALL HOMEWORK CRITIQUES THREADS ARE BEING LOCKED. HOMEWORK SUBMISSIONS WILL REOPEN ON FEBRUARY 1ST.

Old thread got archived, those of you eligible for private critiques can submit your work for the 100 treasure chest challenge here.

Uncomfortable in the post "25 Wheel Challenge"

2019-01-15 03:13

Hot damn, great work! You've really done an excellent job of developing both the construction of each wheel as well as minding the various design characteristics of each one. I can see a few little hiccups here and there (4 and 6 have far ends of the cylinder that have a narrower degree than the closer ends), but by and large you demonstrate an excellent understanding of cylinders and a keen eye for detail and its organization.

That last page is definitely an interesting one as well - freehanding them was a worthwhile experiment. We can see that they're definitely not nearly as good as the others either in terms of construction (the ellipses do wobble - drawing through them would have been useful here to keep them evenly shaped) or in terms of design (the more overwhelming challenge definitely demanded a lot more thought and focus from you, leaving less for the processes of putting in the spokes in the hubs, the tire treads, etc. to the same kind of fidelity.

That said, as far as being able to jot down their essence without the mental drag of reaching for different tools, you are noting down the core elements of each wheel - a skill that is definitely important in design. We may not always be in a position to create a perfect drawing for whatever our idea is, but we do need to be able to communicate them all the same, even if only to have material to work from when we can sit down and do a "proper drawing".

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete! Unfortunately there's no badge for this, but I'll add a flair of some sort anyway to track your completion of it. Keep up the fantastic work!

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-15 03:07

Nice work! You've definitely demonstrated a great deal of patience and care in going through each box, drawing through it and applying the line extension method. It's also clear that your estimation of these convergences has improved steadily over the course of the set.

For where you do have some inconsistencies in your convergences, the following should help you continue to improve on them:

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

Anyway, keep it up. I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete. Feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-15 02:13

These are looking pretty good, though while you are definitely improving a fair bit, it is clear that there is still plenty of room to continue honing your convergences as you continue to move forwards. As such, make sure you work these into your regular warmup routine.

I did notice here and there that when you draw longer boxes, you have a tendency to have the pairs of parallel lines on either side of a stretched box to converge more quickly together. Here's a recommendation that will help you contend with that:

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

Anyway, you can consider this challenge completed. Feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-14 16:32

You shouldn't be moving onto the 250 box challenge until the rotated boxes are finished, so make sure you focus on completing that before moving forward.

As for the 250 boxes, when you say "the organic perspective boxes approach", do you mean you're drawing boxes exactly as you had in that exercise? You'll notice that the notes/video on the 250 box challenge page specifically outline a few techniques to be used that were not introduced in the organic perspective exercise - specifically drawing through your boxes, and extending your lines back after the drawing is complete to test their convergences.

Ultimately the exercise is about attempting to draw a page of freely rotated boxes, making a whole lot of mistakes, testing them (by extending your lines back in space to see how they're converging), and then applying what you learned from that page onto the next one. You're expected to make a great many mistakes, especially early on.

Your goal is to work towards getting each set of those extended lines to converge consistently towards the same single point.

This exercise has nothing to do with proportions, mind you - this isn't the 250 cube challenge.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 4: Drawing Insects and Arachnids"

2019-01-13 19:08

These are remarkably well done. You've definitely taken my previous critique to heart and really delved deeply into the methodologies we're covering with the drawabox lessons. You're demonstrating an excellent understanding of form and construction, and how to layer these various phases on top of one another to create objects that feel solid and convey a strong grasp of how everything fits together.

I have just one, very minor nitpick: on your last page, where the legs of your assassin bug go way off the page, instead of leaving those forms open-ended as you have, cap them off (in this case with an ellipse) as though they've been cut with a knife. Leaving them open has a tendency to flatten out the form, whereas capping it reinforces the illusion of its solidity.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. Keep up the great work, and I hope you continue to follow this methodology through the rest of the lessons.

Edit: Oh, I forgot to mention - you're correct, I don't get notified if the message is not in reply to something I've posted (either the post itself or one of my comments).

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-13 19:04

Your arrows are looking pretty good, and convey a good grasp of all three dimensions of space. I did notice however that they tend to flow in a very jagged, almost erratic manner - like a fish gliding in one direction, suddenly turning sharply and gliding in another, then repeating the act over and over. This isn't wrong for this exercise, but I did want to point out the difference between this and my examples where the turns are more gradual and fluid.

Your organic forms with contour ellipses are looking pretty good, though some are better than others. What stands out most to me are the shapes you've drawn prior to adding the contour lines to establish their volumes. Always aim for creating sausage forms that are essentially two equal spheres connected by a tube of consistent width - you've got some that pinch in their midsection, and others that don't quite round out enough towards their ends. Not a huge concern, but something to keep in mind as you continue to move forwards.

Towards the top of the page of organic forms with contour curves, you definitely do a visibly better job than the lower half. The lower section appears more rushed, like you're not ghosting through the marks you want to draw, and therefore are exhibiting much less control over getting them to fit snugly between the two edges. Getting them to fit snugly is important because we're trying to create the illusion that these lines run along the surface of the form. If they fall outside of the silhouette of the form, or float arbitrarily inside of it, that illusion will be broken.

Your texture analyses are a good start. One thing I noticed, especially in your leaf texture, is that right now you're treating it a great deal more like a pattern, rather than thinking about the actual shadows that are being cast by the forms that are present. For example, you've filled in all of your cells with solid black - this isn't really how light works, however. If a cell is a consistent dip in the surface, then you're going to have a shadow cast by the edges on one side, and it's only going to extend into the cell at a distance relative to the height of this depression. You've thought more about the depressions themselves, rather than the fact that they are caused by yet more veins that flow over the surface, casting shadows into the areas that are not raised up.

When tackling the brick wall texture, try and think about what texture you're really trying to convey. On one hand, you have all of the little pits and cracks and pores of the bricks themselves - something that can be varied in density or otherwise. On the other hand, the bricks themselves can be a texture as well, and depending on where the light hits hardest, you can vary their density as well. That isn't to say that there are more bricks in one area than another (since that's not how regular red bricks are laid out), but rather that despite being present, fewer of them will necessarily be visible when light is pounding on them so harshly that only a few shadows avoid being blasted away altogether. When it comes to creating your gradient, pick one level of texture to focus on. Of course, the pores and cracks are still useful and important even when focusing on the bricks themselves as your main level of detail, but in this case their density hasn't been adjusted much.

Very nice work on your dissections - I can see a much clearer awareness of how these cast shadows work here, and you've tried a great variety of textures. If I had to recommend one thing, it'd be to draw the sausages to be larger, putting fewer on a page and giving yourself more room to work on each individual texture.

Along with the awareness of shadow, I can see a clear awareness of how the surfaces turn over the form.

Very nice work on the form intersections. Your understanding of 3D space is coming along great. As to the point about line weight, the main reason I don't want people to get caught up in applying line weight to the entirety of a line is because I don't want them to draw that additional stroke slowly and carefully (resulting in the mark becoming very stiff and wobbly and losing its underlying flow). You didn't do that here, so what you did was fine. The key point is that we don't necessarily always need to cover the whole edge with extra weight, and emphasizing this helps people come to terms with applying weight with the same kind of confident stroke they'd have used when drawing the original line. Short story is, what you did was fine.

Your second page of organic intersections is quite well done - it coveys a good sense of how your forms pile onto one another, how they slump and sag against each other and so on. Your use of contour curves is also considerably more measured and better planned than the contour curve exercise, so you clearly have improved on this front.

Anyway! You've done quite well. Keep up the good work. I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete, so feel free to move onto lesson 3.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-13 18:36

Nice work! Your line quality and the consistency of your lines' convergences definitely improves over the set. The latter started out fairly well (the process of drawing through your boxes and applying the Y method must have helped bump you up right off the bat, but there was still more subtle improvement throughout the set).

I did notice however that you did have a common tendency to have the middle lines of a given set converge with one another too quickly - this is a common issue, and here's a way that you can think about the problem in order to help reduce their occurrence:

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete. Keep up the great work and feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-12 19:46

Pretty nice work overall. Your pens do seem to be a touch on the dry side even when you start out, but you're very clearly executing each of your marks with a good deal of confidence behind each stroke, which helps keep your lines smooth and your trajectories consistent. You carry this over into your ellipses as well, which helps to keep them evenly shaped and avoids any stiffness or wobbling. My only recommendation here is to continue working on your use of the ghosting method to keep developing your general control and accuracy (getting your ghosted lines to fall directly between the start/end points, and working on getting your ellipses to fit more snugly within the spaces you've allotted for them). This is completely normal however, and you've made the right call in focusing on your overall flow first.

Jumping ahead to your boxes, your plotted perspective is looking solid. Your rough perspective is also quite well done, and I'm glad to see that you're applying the double checking method here to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift. One minor issue I did notice however was that you do need to work on getting your horizontals to run more parallel to the horizon, and your verticals to run more perpendicular to it. You get this right in many areas, but there are a noticeable few that slant slightly.

You've done a great job of keeping your rotated boxes structured with narrow gaps between them so as to eliminate any unnecessary guesswork. The only issue here that I can see is that your boxes directly neighbouring the central box actually rotate too drastically. As a result, the boxes towards the outside of the set can only rotate so much relative to their neighbours, and so the shift in rotation is inconsistent. It's a big jump, followed by a very small turn. This gives us the impression that the outer boxes are running more parallel to their neighbours.

It is fair to say that both this exercise and the organic perspective boxes are about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered. They're expected to be difficult, and all things considered, you've still done a pretty great job with them.

Your organic perspective boxes are much the same - moving in the right direction, but with room for improvement. There's two major areas for this - firstly, in this step I do mention the importance of avoiding overly dramatic foreshortening - something you've used a fair bit of here. Secondly, as there is with everyone working through this exercise at this point, we can certainly work on getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points. That's what we'll be doing next.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-12 19:20

Congratulations on completing the challenge - sort of. By and large you've done a decent job, and have shown improvement on your box constructions. That said, you have however very clearly skipped an integral part of this exercise: checking your convergences by extending your lines. I can see hints of it here and there, but it's only ever for one set of lines at a time, and only on one box out of every handful, so while you clearly understand that it's a part of this exercise, I'm not sure why you've skipped over it.

This is a critical part of the exercise because it forces you to reflect directly upon the kinds of inconsistencies that are present in your boxes, so you know what to focus on next. This kind of reflection is at the core of the concept of failure being the vehicle by which we learn and grow. There is certainly value in simple iteration as you've done here, but you're missing such a critical part of the process and are as a result only getting a fraction as much out of the exercise as you otherwise could have.

Furthermore, as you continue to improve, the nature of your mistakes become less and less obvious. Extending the lines in this manner make clear mistakes that we may have otherwise not noticed, and it keeps us from plateauing.

So here's what I want you to do. Take your last two pages and apply the extension method to each and every box on them. Extend the ALL the lines - there's three sets of four parallel lines, I want to see them all extended, and I want you to study where they come together properly, and where they fail to.

Then I want you to do another 75 boxes, applying this same methodology upon the completion of each page. Submit that, and I'll mark the challenge as complete.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-12 19:13

Great work! Above all else, one thing that stands out is the fact that your linework demonstrates a considerable amount of confidence behind each stroke, which helps to maintain a certain degree of smoothness and consistency to each and every mark. This is true for both your lines as well as your ellipses, where it helps to keep those shapes even and circular.

I can also see that while you are making a concerted effort to be accurate and control your marks, you're not allowing that to supersede the main priority of smooth lines with consistent trajectories. Continued work with the ghosting method will take your marks that last mile and help improve your accuracy further, though as it stands you're doing very well.

Jumping ahead to your boxes, your plotted perspective and rough perspective boxes are solid, and I'm pleased to see that you applied the double checking method to the latter of them.

It is worth mentioning that the rotated boxes (and the organic perspective boxes) are more about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered, and they are expected to be challenging. Overall you did a pretty good job, and I'm glad to see that you kept the gaps between your boxes narrow and consistent so as to eliminate any unnecessary guesswork. Your rotations themselves were successful in many areas, though towards the top and left could certainly have been exaggerated further to fully cover the range of rotation on those axes. Still, it's clear that you have a good grasp of how this exercise works.

Your organic perspective boxes are also coming along well, and by and large you're showing a well developing grasp of 3D space. There's still room for improvement - of a subtler sort - when it comes to keeping the convergences of your lines consistent towards their shared vanishing points, but you're well on your way to achieving that and we'll continue to work on it next.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge as your next step.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-12 19:04

For the most part your linework is looking pretty good. There is just one minor concern that I want to address, though it's something to keep in the back of your mind rather than trying to make any concerted effort to modify your approach.

For the most part, you're drawing with a fair bit of confidence, and are applying the ghosting method pretty well (obviously investing most of your time into the preparation phases). I am however noticing a hint of stiffness/wavering in your lines that suggests to me that when you make your marks, you are hesitating slightly. Because of this, you're not pushing forwards with the full confidence you could be using, and as a result, your brain interferes just a little bit here and there and the line generally shakes.

This kind of wavering can also come from occasionally drawing more from the wrist or elbow than the shoulder, so make sure you're doing your best to be aware of which pivot is driving the motion of your arm.

I say that this is a minor thing because for the most part, you are following the processes properly - it's largely just a matter of getting used to accepting that the second the pen touches the page, any opportunity to avoid a mistake that may occur is over and all you can do from this point on is push forwards and move onto the next mark. This principle applies to all linework - straight lines, curves, and ellipses as well. All of them should be broken up into distinct steps as described for the ghosting method.

I should also mention that the instructions do state that you should be submitting your homework once the entire lesson is completed (in this case, the lines, ellipses and boxes sections). Every now and then people miss this requirement, (and you've gone through considerable difficulty getting your work submitted), so I've critiqued what's here anyway - just be sure to submit the whole thing next time.

I look forward to seeing the rest of your work when it is completed.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-12 02:03

Just responding to let you know that it did indeed work! :D I'll add this to my backlog, so you should receive a critique tomorrow.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-11 22:46

Nicely done! Your linework is looking quite confident and smooth - there's no real hesitation when you execute your marks, and you're clearly investing a good deal of time into the planning and preparation phases of the ghosting method, so you're demonstrating pretty good control. This applies to both your lines and your ellipses - the latter of which is being kept quite even and smooth.

One minor thing I noticed in regards to your funnels exercise is that here and there you have a tendency to tilt them slightly, causing them to become misaligned to the central minor axis line. Keep that in mind, as it's a major focus of this exercise. It's all about getting that central line to cut each ellipse into two equal, symmetrical halves down their narrower axis.

Your plotted and rough perspective boxes are looking great, and I'm very pleased to see that you're applying the double checking method to the latter to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

For the rotated and organic perspective boxes, it is important to mention that I don't actually expect students to turn in perfect work here - it's about exposing them to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered. That said, you've done a pretty great job. Your rotations along your major axes are looking pretty good - the corners tend to rotate a little less though, so you do need to get used to pushing and exaggerating their rotations a little more.

Your organic perspective boxes are also coming along well, though there is still room for improvement, mainly in getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points. This is what we'll focus on next.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-11 22:11

There are a few little concerns I'd like to raise, but by and large you're doing a pretty good job with this lesson.

I think your use of the ghosting method is a little inconsistent at times. You've clearly demonstrated in various parts of this lesson that you can apply it quite well, but there are definitely places where you're a little more relaxed or sloppy with it, resulting in lines that waver or wobble. Basically, sometimes you have a tendency to invest less time in the preparation/planning phases, and you offload it onto the execution phase (where you're actually drawing the mark). This execution phase should always be executed with a confident, persistent pace, you don't want to be drawing with any hesitation or being overly careful. All that care should be taken prior to this phase.

For the most part, you're actually doing fine with your straight lines (aside from when you've got some little stray marks). This problem that I'm raising is more of a problem when you're drawing your ellipses, which tend to come out a little more stiff and uneven than they ought to. Drawing with a confident pace will allow you to achieve a smoother, more consistent shape. This will in turn reduce your accuracy somewhat, but that's where the ghosting method helps to compensate.

Your plotted perspective work is looking solid. Spatially, your rough perspective is done well, though I think your first page of this exercise is where your linework takes a real dip. Second page is better again. Also, don't forget to go over your completed work for this exercise as described here to help identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

Your rotated boxes are really well done. Your linework is solid, your awareness of how these forms sit in 3D space is fantastic, and you're achieving a great range of rotation on each axis. Very well done, no complaints here. Also worth mentioning that this exercise really is more about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem they may not have otherwise considered, so the expectation is that they'll struggle a great deal. You've exceeded my expectations here.

This whole expectation of struggles applies to the organic perspective boxes as well. You've done a good job here too, but there is room for improvement (which is entirely normal), specifically in getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points.

So, I am going to go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next. Be sure to read the notes on that page as they go over a couple important techniques that'll help you make the most of the exercise.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-11 21:57

You've got a pretty good start here. There are a couple things that I want to address, but by and large you're moving in the right direction.

What I noticed is that when you execute your marks - be they straight, ellipses, or otherwise - you tend to draw with a little bit of hesitation. When we apply the ghosting method, we focus all of our time on the planning and preparation phases, so we can execute with full confidence, trusting in our arms and not holding ourselves back or trying to correct with our brains as we go. Your hesitation is a little minimal, but it is present enough to see a little wavering in your lines, and is more prominent in your ellipses where it results in some stiffness.

Always remember that once your pen touches the page, there is nothing you can do to avoid any mistakes that may occur - all you can do from this point is commit to your stroke and push forwards. This will ensure that your lines are smooth, that their trajectories are consistent, and that your ellipses remain evenly shaped.

Jumping ahead to the boxes, you've done a pretty good job through the plotted and rough perspective exercises. One thing about the latter - try placing your vanishing points in different locations along the horizon when doing your rough perspective. I noticed that you put them in the same place through both pages.

It's worth mentioning that the rotated boxes and organic perspective boxes exercises are expected to be extremely challenging for students at this stage. They're really about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered.

As such, you definitely did have quite a struggle with the rotated boxes, though this is entirely normal. Towards the left side of your middle row, you did a pretty decent job of getting your boxes to rotate, but towards the other sides you ended up keeping them more parallel, as shown here. You did however keep the gaps between the boxes nice and narrow, which helped you to eliminate a good deal of guesswork.

Your organic perspective boxes are similarly moving in the right direction, but there is room for improvement, especially on getting your sets of parallel lines to converge more consistently towards their shared vanishing points. We will be working on this next.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete, but I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-10 22:30

Nice work! I'm actually kind of surprised to see these submitted within 6 days, and expected them to be rushed, but I was pleasantly surprised. You've done a pretty good job with them - your linework is confident, your convergences are consistent and your lineweight goes a long way to help reinforce the illusion of solidity with each form.

You actually started off at a pretty strong position, so I figure some of the tips from the challenge were enough to help, but I can see your convergences improving in subtle ways over time, and the line extensions do help to reinforce that. I can generally see that you're also paying attention to how your lines leave the vanishing point - that is, those with smaller angles between them are visibly pretty parallel once they reach the box itself, and you seem to be demonstrating a good awareness of that.

Unfortunately I don't have much else to offer besides what you've already gained from the exercise - so keep up the great work and consider this challenge complete. Feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-10 22:24

• Your arrows are alright - they're generally showing the qualities I'm looking for (they're flowing through all 3 dimensions of space), though at times you definitely seem rather distracted with those fraying edges at the end, and getting too caught up in the hatching. The core of this exercise is about how your arrows flow through space, so make sure you're putting all your attention towards executing your lines smoothly and confidently so as to eliminate any wobbling.

• Your organic forms with contour ellipses are pretty good, though keep working on pushing the confidence of your execution here as well. I can see where your ellipses get a little stiff at times, due to you drawing a little too hesitantly. Also, your forms stray a little bit from the basic, simple sausage I'm looking for (you've got some tapering/pinching through the midsections of a couple of these).

• Your sausage forms get even more out there in your organic forms with contour curves - this exercise really is best done while focusing on dead simple forms that stay consistent in their widths all through their lengths, as though they're just two spheres connected with a simple tube. No tapering, no pinching, no swelling, just the same width all the way through.

• Your texture analyses are a good start, but you do rely a bit much on hatching on that first texture, and definitely didn't fill out that gradient enough to have a consistent shift from dark to light over the course of the whole rectangle. Generally stay away from hatching lines, as they tend to be used instead of paying closer attention to the textures that are actually present in your reference image. I think you may have used them here because of the little scratchy lines in your reference image, but overdid it and ended up drawing them on auto-pilot without thinking about how the scratches were arranged and how frequent they actually were.

• You've got a pretty nice variety of textures through your dissections, so that's good to see, and you've tackled most of them in a meaningfully different, case-by-case manner rather than applying a one-size-fits-all solution to them all. That's good to see. You do need to work on how you transition from dense texture to sparse (which is covered more in the previous exercise), but that's pretty normal. One thing to note - the porcupine quills definitely fall in the territory of being independent forms rather than just texture, as they're so large and protruding that they are no longer quite as submissive to the underlying form.

• Your form intersections are looking pretty good. Good demonstration of spatial sense, though you did include longer cylinders - something that I instructed you to stay away from (the instructions say to avoid any stretched forms and to stick to those that are more equilateral).

• Your organic intersections do suffer a great deal from being uneven and lumpy, rather than sticking to the simple kind of sausage forms I mentioned earlier. You are demonstrating a grasp of how these forms interact with one another and how they slump together where their weight is not supported, but please stick to simpler forms for this in the future.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. There's plenty of room for improvement, but you're headed in the right direction and should be ready to move on. Just be sure to read the instructions more carefully, and if you get impatient with things, take a break. Don't use it as an excuse not to complete an exercise in its entirety.

Lastly, as to your question, no I generally ignore those comments and prefer them not to be included. It's best to let me give my critique without balancing them against your own self-assessment, as that way I can speak more freely about what I see and how I perceive it.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-10 22:11

Very nice work! By and large you've done really well here, and have ticked all my boxes. There are a couple of minor hiccups we'll address, but by and large you're doing great.

To start with, your line quality is fantastic. You're executing those marks with the smooth confidence I expect from the use of the ghosting method - you're not hesitating or drawing too carefully, but you are investing your time wisely into the planning and preparation phases, and as such are achieving lines that are straight as well as well controlled.

This applies to your ellipses as well - the confidence with which you draw them is helping you to maintain smooth, even shapes, without any distortion or deformation. Ultimately, straight lines and even ellipses are the bedrock of solid construction, so this will help you as you move forwards.

Jumping ahead to the rough perspective boxes, you've done a great job with the spatial aspect of the exercise but it is worth mentioning that your line quality here is not quite as good as you demonstrated yourself capable of previously. It's not terrible or anything, but there are in places various signs of wavering or hesitation. It's quite normal to see students draw a little more carefully when drawing lines that belong to a larger form - it is however important to get used to focusing in on the mark you're making and ignore everything else. Once you set the start and end points, all there is to do is draw a line - a task you are definitely capable of.

Your line quality does improve again in your rotated boxes, so that's a good sign. As for the spatial aspects of this exercise, you did an okay job, but there is one major issue that held you back - you didn't keep the gaps between your boxes narrow as instructed to here, and as a result, had to rely a lot more on guesswork. I explain this issue in these notes (though your results weren't nearly as bad as that exaggerated example).

Now, to be clear, this exercise is meant to be very challenging. It's really about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered, rather than expecting them to do it perfectly.

The organic perspective boxes are much the same, in that it's more about how it makes you think. As such, you're doing pretty well, but there are definitely some inconsistencies in regards to how your lines converge towards their shared vanishing points. You can see this if you extend your lines back into space and study how they come together.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. Your next step will be to move onto the 250 box challenge. It's a little awkward assigning it to you considering that you have already completed it, but since that was nearly two years ago, I'm treating this as something of a clean slate. You'll definitely benefit from it, but be sure to read the notes and watch the video on that page before starting the work, as it's more than just drawing a bunch of boxes these days.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-10 21:37

Very nice work! There's a very obvious transition from your first boxes to your last, where your general line confidence has increased by leaps and bounds, as has the consistency of your convergences and the general sense that you know what you're doing. While variation amongst pages that are close together is common (so seeing your last boxes as being a little worse than the page before it - which admittedly I don't entirely agree with), the important thing are the large trends which denote a steadier increase in skill and understanding.

Now there's always room for improvement - one thing I noticed in a few places amongst your later boxes was a tendency to have sets of parallel lines that converge together in pairs rather than all together. This generally happens when we're focusing more on the lines that make up a given plane.

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete. Keep up the great work and feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 3: Drawing Plants"

2019-01-10 21:26

Fantastic work! These are vastly better and appear to correct every point I raised in my critique. There isn't much else to say - you've done very well, and I'm happily marking this lesson as complete. It's always nice to see my critiques implemented so thoroughly.

Keep up the great work.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-09 17:52

Pretty nice work overall! There are a couple little hitches that we'll address, but by and large you're demonstrating pretty good linework and a solid understanding of 3D space.

When drawing your lines, you're generally doing so with a fairly confident pace, which helps keep your lines from wobbling too much. There is a little bit of wavering here and there in your ghosted lines so this is something you can certainly improve upon, but you're heading down the right track. Just remember that when your pen touches the page, any opportunity to avoid any mistakes you may make has passed - all you can do is push through without hesitation and move onto the next mark. Ultimately that's what the ghosting method is all about, and why it's important to apply it stringently to every mark we make. It allows us to break the process down into planning/preparation, where we invest all of our time, and execution, where our only focus is trusting in our muscles and making the mark smoothly and consistently.

Your ellipses are quite similar. Relatively confidently drawn, they're pretty evenly shaped and maintaining a fair bit of control, so by and large they're coming along well. Keep pushing that confidence though, and applying the ghosting method. Also, I noticed that in your funnels you had a tendency to drop little gaps between your ellipses - this was likely unintentional, but it's still something worth being aware of. Try keeping those ellipses snugly against one another.

Your work on your boxes demonstrates that you're developing very well when it comes to your general grasp if 3D space. Your plotted perspective boxes are great (though that's entirely expected), but this carries over into your rough perspective boxes as well. The same slight wavering of your line quality applies here, but by and large you're demonstrating a solid grasp of the concepts and are able to estimate your convergences quite well. I'm glad that you're applying the double checking method however, as it shows us how that estimation drifts, so we know what to work on during our next attempt.

Your rotated boxes are really well done. You're keeping the boxes well structured with narrow gaps and eliminating any unnecessary guesswork. You're also covering the full range of rotation on each axis, which is great to see. Admittedly I fully expect students to struggle in this area - both this exercise and the organic perspective one are assigned here not with the expectation of receiving perfect work, but rather just to expose students to a kind of spatial problem they may not have otherwise considered.

Now your organic perspective boxes are more in line with this - they're moving in the right direction but have plenty of room for improvement, especially when it comes to getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points. We will work on this next, but this is completely normal and expected.

I'm going to go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge as your next step.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-09 17:34

Nice work! Your line quality is coming along well, as is the consistency of your constructions. I can definitely see ample signs that applying the line extension technique has made you generally much more aware of how your lines converge. Ultimately, while it's easy to get caught up in the whole 'back corner' conundrum, it's more of a distraction than anything else. It's the convergences within individual sets of parallel lines that matters - get that right, and the back corner will fall into place.

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

The only other recommendation I have is a minor one - as you continue to practice these, play a little more with your use of line weight. It will help kick your boxes up to the next level.

I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete, so feel free to move onto the next lesson.

Uncomfortable in the post "250 Box Challenge"

2019-01-09 17:29

It certainly is difficult, but most people generally find it to be quite worthwhile. In your case, I can definitely see that it has been. Though you held somewhat steady in the quality of your constructions through the first hundred and fifty or so, the last hundred definitely showed a considerable improvement. You clearly became much more aware of the convergences of your lines, and also demonstrated much more confidence in your linework.

There is one suggestion that I want to offer as you continue to move forwards, though you've done very well here. This will simply help you continue to progress on this front.

When going to draw a line as part of a box, some students will think about the other lines with which that one shares a corner, or the ones with which it shares a plane. Instead of doing this, always think instead about the lines with which it shares a vanishing point - all the other lines to which it is parallel, and ignore the rest. While doing this, think about the angles at which these lines leave the VP - that is, the angles between them. Those with very small angles separating them will end up running virtually parallel to one another once they reach the box, which makes for a very useful hint to keep in mind. I explain this further in these notes.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this challenge as complete. Keep up the good work and feel free to move onto lesson 2.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-08 20:03

You're definitely approaching your linework with a great deal of confidence, which certainly is good, but along with that there are several signs that you're definitely rushing through the work far faster than you should be. Drawing with a confident pace is great because it allows you to achieve a smooth, consistent stroke, but you absolutely need to get used to combining it with the ghosting method. That means planning and preparing beforehand to ensure that you can still maintain some degree of control. Just because we're separating the preparation out from the execution phase doesn't mean that we're throwing it aside altogether. Keep that in mind, above all else.

In your ghosted lines exercise, work on getting your lines to fall directly between the start and end points without shooting, all the while maintaining the confidence of your stroke.

In your ellipses, they're definitely getting pretty loose. Drawing through them is great, but you're taking it to a point where they're no longer holding together, so work on that as well. As with every other mark, the ghosting method will help you here, as the preparation phase will help increase your general control.

For your funnels, watch for their alignment - they tend to be slightly slanted, whereas the central minor axis line should cut each of them into two equal, symmetrical halves down their narrower dimension.

Your plotted and rough perspective boxes are both done pretty well. There is still a bit of wavering in your lines in the rough perspective one, but generally you are demonstrating better control than before. I'm also pleased that you're applying the double checking method here to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

Your rotated boxes were obviously a challenge - it is certainly meant to be, as I've mostly assigned this exercise with the intent of exposing students to a kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered. That said, there is one major issue that caused you trouble. As explained in this step, make sure you're keeping the gaps between your boxes narrow and consistent. By keeping things structured in this way, you can use neighbouring edges as hints when drawing new lines. When you don't follow this, you end up having to use a lot more unnecessary guesswork. In general it also doesn't look like you followed all the steps as closely as you could have - for instance, you seem to be missing this step.

Lastly, the organic perspective boxes are similar to the previous one. They're intended to be challenging, and it's about getting students to think about different kinds of spatial problems. As such, you do have a great deal of room for improvement - specifically getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points (right now you don't really seem to be entirely aware of where their vanishing points ought to be). This is something we'll be working on next.

Now, you do have a lot of room for improvement, but I am going to mark this lesson as complete. Your next step is going to be to move onto the 250 box challenge. There you can continue to practice your use of the ghosting method, getting used to taking more time with each stroke, while also further developing your understanding of 3D space. Make sure you read through the notes there - it's not just about drawing boxes, there are important steps to be applied to your boxes once they've been completed that will help you make the most of the exercise as well.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-08 14:30

Sorry, I meant boxes with shallower foreshortening. Basically make sure you have a good mix of both shallow and dramatic foreshortening, rather than focusing largely on dramatic convergences as you did in your first 250.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-08 00:03

I currently don't have you down as being eligible for private homework critiques - that is reserved for those who support drawabox through patreon. If you are a patron, then be sure to check your inbox there as I'll have sent a message to grab your reddit username.

If not, you're welcome to get a free critique from the community, by submitting your work directly to the subreddit or by posting it over on the discord chat server.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 3: Drawing Plants"

2019-01-07 20:35

Your work here is quite well done. There certainly is room for improvement, but you've already shown considerable growth and a good deal of understanding in regards to the subjects covered in the lesson. I'm also very pleased with the decision you made in regards to switching from more detailed drawings (which I will still address) to more construction-focused ones.

To start with, your leaves convey a well developing sense of how these flat, simple shapes flow through fully three dimensional space, and they carry that sense of flow on from the arrows. I don't get any sense of movement that feels unnatural, it all seems to match how these leaves would flow in response to currents of air and other external forces.

You're also making good headway with the branches - I can see you still struggling at times to get the individual segments that make up each edge to flow directly from one to the other, but I can also see improvement on this front. It really is a matter of practice, matching how these strokes flow and ensuring that they overlap smoothly. Keep at it, and you'll soon find that the'll become quite seamless.

One other thing worth mentioning here is that I want you to continue trying your best to maintain a consistent width for these branches - in a few places I can see where they get a little tapered through their midsection, mostly where you're trying to navigate curves and bends. I can see that this is not intentional, so it's par for the course as you learn to tackle this kind of construction, but it is something to keep in mind - that kind of pinching or tapering will undermine the underlying solidity of the form, so keep working to avoid it.

Now when you get into your plant constructions, you generally do apply the constructional method with a great deal of forethought. That said, I can see some hesitation in your linework, and signs that you're definitely stiffening up in the face of this additional challenge. No matter how daunting the task before you, once you've decided on a mark that you're going to add, focus on applying the ghosting method so as to ensure that you can invest all your time in the preparation of it, before executing with that smooth, confident stroke. That way you can separate yourself from the overall challenge and focus on what you know you can do well.

On this page, two things come to mind. Firstly, make sure you're not leaving any forms open ended, like you did on the bottom. It'll cause them to flatten out. Secondly, always try to adhere to your underlying construction as closely as possible. So when you put down the ellipses to flesh out the size of the top parts, you want to make sure that the forms you construct on top of that use it as a solid base, rather than treating it like a loose "suggestion". It's very similar to the concept covered for leaves here, where you're having your lines come off that underlying form and returning to it wherever possible.

Jumping ahead, I really like how you approached the base of this page, though I do feel it important to point out that the things coming off the top definitely felt very stiff in a way that really undermined their general sense of solidity. It seems that you got very cramped, and tried to make up for the insolidity with contour lines, but your contour lines were not drawn with a sense of confidence and instead exacerbated the problem.

Lastly, on the topic of detail, those drawings you did initially with all the heavy ink and texture, what's worth mentioning here is that your texture didn't actually convey what was present in your reference image. The marks I'm seeing instead tell me that you're working mostly from memory. That doesn't mean you haven't been looking at reference, but it does mean that you're allowing enough time to pass between glances that what you actually observed has been lost. Unfortunately "enough time" can be a matter of seconds.

When you're trying to capture detail, or really when you're drawing from reference in general, get in the habit of looking at your reference and identifying some specific mark or feature that you want to transfer onto your drawing. Once you've found it, you can draw one or two marks in attempting to capture it - ones that reflect exactly what you saw - before returning to your reference to refresh your memory. Don't attempt to loosely imply detail unless you're fully aware of what that detail is actually made up of. You can read about more of this in the new lesson 2 texture analysis exercise.

Anyway, I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. You're making great headway, though I do think you need to continue focusing on loosening up on your execution (allowing yourself to draw more confidently) once you've put in all the necessary preparation beforehand.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-07 20:10

Your ellipses are looking great - you've drawn each one with a confident, persistent pace, and have held true to the recommendation of drawing through your ellipses, and as a result they each come out looking quite evenly shaped. In addition to this, you're employing the ghosting method to great effect, to help keep them accurate while still maintaining that confident execution.

Admittedly I am a little disappointed to see the boxes section done on lined paper - in the future, avoid doing this, as it really does have an impact on the amount of care you're likely to use when going through the work. It's much easier to let yourself be sloppy on lined paper (or otherwise messy paper) than it is when working on a clear blank sheet.

That said, you're generally doing a good job. One small note about your plotted perspective boxes - when you're applying hatching lines to a surface, make sure your lines are straight, parallel and consistent, and that they stretch all the way across a given plane from edge to edge rather than floating sloppily in the middle.

I'm glad to see that you applied the extension method to your rough perspective boxes to check how your estimation of perspective tends to drift. Make sure you draw each of these in a frame however and draw out your explicit horizon line, as instructed in this step.

You did a pretty solid job with the rotated boxes - you've kept them well structured with narrow gaps between them. You also covered a good range of rotation on each axis - you could stand to push that rotation a little further from box to box so as to cover the full 180 degrees, but you've generally done a very good job all the same.

Lastly, your organic perspective boxes are about where I'd expect them to be for this lesson, though there is plenty of room for improvement here in terms of getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points.

Now, the normal thing I'd do based on this work is mark it complete and assign the 250 box challenge - that's where things get a little complicated, since you've already completed it. You did mention that your boxes for this lesson were done beforehand (i'm assuming before the 250 box challenge), so at this point I should be basing my assessment for your boxes (at least for this last exercise) on your box challenge work.

Based on that, I am going to mark this lesson as complete, but I want you to go to the box challenge, reread the material there in full (as well as my critique of your other box challenge work), and do another 50 boxes. You can number these from 251-300. I want to make sure that you have a good coverage of shallower boxes along with those with more dramatic foreshortening (as I mentioned in my critique of your box challenge).

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-07 03:55

No, you don't need to extend your warmup based on the length of your session. If you want to do more warmups, then that's up to you, but there isn't necessarily any need to.

You can tackle the 250 cylinder challenge whenever you want as long as it's prior to moving onto lesson 6 - so you're free to move onto lesson 3 right now if you like.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-06 23:32

You start off quite well - your lines are fairly smooth, and you're executing them with a good deal of confidence, which keeps hesitation and wobbling at a minimum. That isn't to say you don't waver at all, so there is still room for improvement, but that will continue to develop as you further practice your use of the ghosting method and strike that balance between investing all of your time in the planning and preparation phase, and executing with a confident, persistent pace.

Your ellipses do show a little bit more hesitation, which causes them to reflect a bit of stiffness in their linework. You're not far off, but you are putting more weight on accuracy. As a result, the smooth, even shape of the ellipses we want takes a bit of a hit. As always, continue applying the ghosting method here - which means putting all your time in the preparation, and executing with full awareness of the fact that any opportunity to avoid mistakes is over once your pen touches the page. All that can be done from there is to push through and complete the mark.

Admittedly this does actually improve as you get into the ellipses in planes - here they're looking much smoother, which is a little interesting because usually most students stiffen up when they're faced with the challenge of cramming their ellipses into these awkward shapes. So great work there.

Jumping ahead, your plotted and rough perspective boxes are pretty good - though in the latter, your freehanded lines still show some wavering as mentioned before. I am pleased to see that you're applying the double checking method there, to better identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

While your rotated boxes are a little squashed horizontally, and each box has quite a bit of depth to it, you've actually done a pretty fantastic job. You've nailed two of the main things I look for - firstly, you kept your boxes well structured, with narrow gaps between them to eliminate any unnecessary guesswork. Secondly, you covered the full 180 degree range of rotation on each axis and conveyed a good deal of rotation from box to box. Very well done.

It is worth mentioning that this exercise and the organic perspective boxes one are both intended to be more challenging than most students can manage at this point. Rather than looking for perfect work, I'm merely looking to expose students to a kind of spatial problem they may not have otherwise considered.

Now, your organic perspective boxes are more in line with my expectations - you're off to a good start, but have plenty of room for improvement, especially when it comes to getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points. This is something we'll continue to work on.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next. This will give you both an opportunity to work on your linework and use of the ghosting method, as well as a chance to further practice your free rotation of boxes in space.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-06 19:10

Pretty nice work! Your lines start off quite smooth and confidently drawn, so that's great to see. There isn't much wavering or hesitation in your execution, so they remain fairly consistent through their lengths. You're also employing the ghosting method to great effect, which is great to see. As you continue to work on this, keep pushing that confident, persistent execution, and you'll continue to see improvement, but as it stands you're heading down the right track.

Your ellipses are fairly well done, though I am noticing a bit of stiffness to their shapes, where it appears that you may be drawing them a little more slowly in order to achieve better accuracy. Remember that accuracy is important, but it comes second to achieving a smooth, even shape. Trust in your muscle memory and remember that once your pen touches the page, any opportunity to avoid any mistakes you might make have effectively passed - all you can do is push through with confidence. You might make a mistake, but it's better to have a smooth, even stroke that misses the mark slightly than a stuff ellipse that deforms here and there in order to maintain its accuracy.

Jumping through the plotted and rough perspective exercises, your line quality is looking great, as are your box constructions. I'm also pleased to see that you applied the line extension technique to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

For your rotated boxes, you definitely did a good job of keeping your boxes well structured, maintaining narrow, consistent gaps between them so as to avoid any unnecessary guesswork. I did notice however that you did stretch and deform some of these boxes a little as you rotated them, resulting in the corner boxes to compound these deformations. It's not an uncommon mistake, and you've done quite well for your first attempt here, but it is something to keep in mind as you move forwards.

All in all, it is important to understand that I don't by any means expect perfect work (or even anything resembling success) for this exercise, or the organic perspective one. These exercises are assigned here purely to expose students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered.

As such, your organic perspective boxes are coming along well, though there certainly is room for improvement - specifically in ensuring that your sets of parallel lines converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points. We'll continue working on that next.

I'm going to go ahead and mark this lesson as complete, but I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-06 18:59

At the beginning, your lines start out pretty good. Fairly confident, achieving reasonably smooth strokes, with a little bit of hesitation and wavering here and there that causes some of your lines to wobble a bit here and there, but nothing particularly abnormal or worrying.

Your ghosted lines are fairly well done, though again - keep pushing the confidence of your execution so as to eliminate any hesitation as you execute your marks. Once your pen touches the page, any chance of avoiding mistakes you might make goes out the window, so all you can do is push through and get the stroke finished, relying on the muscle memory you developed through ghosting. You may feel some benefit from putting more time into preparing/ghosting beforehand.

You've got a good start on your ellipses, but I do think you're maybe leaning a little hard into 'drawing through' them. Drawing through your ellipses is certainly a good thing, but from the looks of it you've got a number of these where you've gone around them four times. I'd recommend trying to aim for two full times around the elliptical shape before lifting your pen.

When you hit the funnels, your ellipses do start to get noticeably uneven - always remember that the flow, smoothness and evenness of your shape is your first priority, rather than accuracy. Again, make sure you're using the ghosting method, because this will allow you to plan and prepare beforehand, then execute the mark with a confident pace.

Jumping ahead to your rough perspective boxes, your line quality here definitely suffers a great deal. You're clearly not putting nearly as much time into ghosting your lines, and you're likely drawing a little more slowly to compensate - the result is that your lines wobble. It's not an uncommon problem, but it is one we'll have to deal with. Additionally, I'm glad you applied the error checking technique. It is pretty normal to see that your lines deviate from aligning to the vanishing point pretty frequently. One thing that helps is that when you ghost your lines going back into the distance, ghost them all the way back to the vanishing point (even though the line you draw will not extend that far back).

In your rotated boxes, I am pleased that you kept the boxes nicely structured, with narrow gaps between them so as to avoid any unnecessary guesswork. An issue that I did see however was that your rotation was very limited between boxes other than the central one. Sometimes there was no rotation at all (as demonstrated in these notes), and other times it was very slight. As a result, you definitely struggled to cover the full 180 degree range on each axis and found yourself having to add more boxes than were demonstrated in the example.

Now this exercise and the organic perspective one are meant to be challenging, so don't feel too bad about this. I don't expect students to have an easy time of this exercise, and I certainly don't expect it to be performed well on the first few attempts. The point is instead to expose students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered.

As such, the organic perspective boxes is similar - you're moving in the right direction, but there are definitely areas for improvement, specifically keeping your sets of parallel lines for each box converging consistently towards their shared vanishing point.

Now, all in all, there are plenty of things to work on. That said, I am going to mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next. This will help you develop your understanding of these arbitrarily rotated 3D forms further, while also giving you the opportunity to work on your line quality and basic usage of the ghosting method.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-06 06:22

Remember that which pivot you use depends on the nature of the line you're drawing. If you need a line that flows smoothly, then you draw from the shoulder (that's most lines, especially those we use for construction). If, however, you need a line that is more controlled and precise, like those we use for various parts of texture, then we might benefit from drawing from the wrist.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-05 21:24

To start with, your arrows are coming along pretty nicely, and you're clearly making an effort to push them through all three dimensions of space, so that's great. One recommendation I have is that while you're ensuring that the far side of the arrow gets smaller (following the basic rules of perspective), one additional thing to keep in mind is that space itself gets more compressed, the further back you go. This means that the space between each piece of the ribbon that gets folded back on itself will get smaller and smaller. I explain this in the diagram for this step.

You actually did have a few that captured this pretty nicely, such as this one from the second page.

Moving onto your organic forms with contour ellipses, you're generally doing a pretty good job. I can see a clear effort to stick to simple sausage forms (though some of their outlines are a bit wobbly, so work on drawing them with more confidence), and you're obviously showing an awareness of the degree shift that occurs through the length of the form.

Just one issue to raise on that front - continue working on getting your ellipses to fit snugly between the edges of the organic form. We're creating the illusion that these ellipses run along the surface of the form, so keeping them snug against those edges is pretty important to this end. It is also a bit tricky to do, so make sure you're employing the ghosting method as much as is needed to help you on this front.

The same applies to your contour curves. You're definitely making a good effort at hooking them back around to get that curvature right, so that's great. I do have one concern though - from the looks of it, these lines are drawn either very slowly, or you're pressing quite hard on your pen as you draw. In all likelihood, it's a combination of both. The reason I'm calling this out is that generally when we draw a line with confidence, our pen has already started to move before fully pressing against the page, resulting in a line that starts and ends with a slightly noticeable taper, which helps give our linework a sense of liveliness. When you draw too slowly, or press too hard, this taper is eliminated. That's something you'll want to keep in mind as you continue to move forwards.

You've made a solid attempt at both texture exercises - there is plenty of room for improvement, but that's completely normal and expected. I have no expectations of perfection here, I just want to get students to start thinking about how to break texture down into the simple little forms found on the surface of an object, and how to imply them with the shadows they cast. In these regards, you're moving in the right direction.

Keep working on observing your reference images carefully, and you'll continue to see improvement. I think you did a lot of great analyses in the first texture exercise, and while you still did lean quite a bit on a great deal of randomness here and there, you're clearly moving towards identifying more and more of the underlying rhythms and patterns of each texture.

For your dissections specifically, you do have quite a bit of variety, and you try to tackle each one on a case-by-case basis (rather than trying to apply the same tactics to each one), which is great. One thing I am noticing though is that compared to your texture analysis exercise, these are quite a bit more cartoony and simplified. This suggests to me that you may be working more from memory on these, relying on the bit of information your brain has retained rather than pulling information directly from your reference images. Remember, as explained in the lesson, our brains will start throwing important information aside the moment we look away from our reference, so we need to get in the habit of looking at our reference, picking one or two specific marks to carry over, drawing them, then looking back at our reference.

Jumping ahead to your form intersections, you're generally doing a pretty good job with your understanding of these forms and how they relate to one another in 3D space. The only major weakness here is more in regards to your linework - a lot of it tends to be a touch more loose than it should be. Work on applying the ghosting method more stringently, taking all the time you need to plan and prepare before each stroke so your muscle memory can maintain control while executing the strokes with confidence. Right now your forms are alright, but they do have a tendency to feel less solid either due to lines that leave gaps where they fail to connect, or lines that wobble a little too much.

Also, mind the fact that in the video for this exercise, I explained that you should not be trying to apply line weight to the entirety of an existing mark - we're not replacing our lines by adding a darker, cleaner stroke, we're merely accentuating and clarifying specific overlaps. This happens in local sections of a given line, rather than the whole thing, and also ensures that we can add this line weight with the same kind of confident, persistent pace (rather than drawing more slowly and carefully while trying to match the original line the whole way through, resulting in a wobbly line that further undermines the solidity of the form).

Last of all, your organic intersections are a good start - you are definitely demonstrating an understanding of how these forms sag and slump against one another, where their weight would be supported and where it wouldn't. My only concern right now is that the linework does feel a little stiff - so again, keep pushing yourself to draw with confident strokes, preceded by ample use of the ghosting method.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. There is plenty of room for improvement here, but you're moving in the right direction. Just be sure to continue working these exercises as well as those from the previous lesson into a regular warmup routine, picking two or three at the beginning of each sitting to do for 10-15 minutes.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-05 21:02

Your lines section is coming along great - you're drawing each stroke with a confident, persistent pace, and applying the ghosting method quite well so as to increase your overall control without sacrificing that smooth, consistent flow. There isn't much in the way of hesitation or wobbling, so you're definitely doing great on this front.

Your ellipses are coming along, but they do require some adjustment. For the most part, you're only drawing around your ellipse 1, maybe 1.25 times. In the instructions, I'm pretty adamant that you should be drawing through your ellipses 2 full times before lifting your pen. This is something I want you to do for each and every ellipse you draw for these lessons. It'll help you maintain a confident, persistent pace, to keep your ellipses evenly shaped, while also allowing you to maintain enough control for those ellipses to be usable in your usual drawing. When attempting to nail them in one go, we either lose control of them or draw too slowly, resulting in an uneven shape. As you continue to work on it, your ellipses will 'tighten up' - that is, the gaps between the two lines around the ellipse will shrink, until they overlap perfectly. This takes a great deal of practice and time however, and is your goal.

The ghosting method should also be applied here as a means to improve your overall control and work towards that tighter ellipse.

Your funnels are generally coming along pretty well - there are a couple where your ellipses are a little misaligned (including the one where you neglected to draw the minor axis), so keep working on that, but generally you're doing pretty well on this front.

Jumping ahead to your boxes, your plotted and rough perspective boxes exercises are done well. I'm glad to see that you're applying the double checking method to the latter, so as to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift.

If you do decide to add hatching lines to these boxes, or really to any exercise, make sure you're not rushed or sloppy about it - keep your lines consistent, parallel and stretch them all the way across the plane from edge to edge rather than letting some of them float arbitrarily.

Very nice work on the rotated boxes - you kept them structured with consistent, narrow gaps between them so as to limit unnecessary guesswork, and you did a fairly good job covering the full range of rotation on each axis. I did notice that you found yourself having to add an extra box to cover the full arc, so you probably may want to work on pushing and exaggerating your rotations a little further in the future in order to cover it with just the 5 boxes, but all in all you've done very well.

It's worth mentioning that both this exercise and the organic perspective boxes are intended to be challenging, and are more about exposing a student to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered. They're not expected to be done perfectly, so you've done very well with the rotated boxes.

The organic perspective boxes are coming along well, though there is plenty of room for improvement here, specifically in keeping your sets of parallel lines converging consistently towards their shared vanishing points.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge as your next step.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-05 20:39

Very nice work overall! To start with, your lines section is very well done - each stroke is executed with a confident, persistent pace, which helps you to maintain a smooth stroke with no signs of hesitation or wobbling. You're also applying the ghosting method very well, and achieving a good deal of control without sacrificing the flow of your marks.

Your ellipses are also pretty well done, mostly executed with that same confidence so as to achieve even shapes, but I did notice that some of them - especially in the table of ellipses exercise - have a slight tendency to get a little pointier towards their bottoms. This is something you'll want to keep an eye on, though you do improve on it through the rest of the lesson. If you find yourself doing this again, try and look at where you're moving your arm from - it's more common to see some deformation when you're drawing ellipses from your wrist, rather than your shoulder.

Your plotted perspective is looking great. Your rough perspective boxes are fairly well done, though I can see a (very slight) decrease in confidence with your linework, when I compare it to your earlier use of the ghosting method. It's not uncommon for students to falter a little when faced with drawing more complete forms with their lines, because they get caught up in the fact that they're trying to draw something more complex. When doing this, always focus on the individual stroke you're trying to draw. Once you've set out the points you're trying to draw between, don't worry about the rest of it, focus only on applying the ghosting method confidently and smoothly, without any hesitation. For the most part your lines are still well done here, I'm just remarking on a very small shift in confidence.

Your line quality is definitely improved again when you hit the rotated boxes. You definitely did struggle with the arrangement of the boxes here as well, and I noticed that you left out the four corners - these are usually the ones most find to be most difficult. No matter how daunting a challenge may be, you need to complete each exercise in its entirety. Don't stop early because you feel like trying for the hardest part might make you "ruin" the result. The final drawing doesn't actually matter - the only thing of value here is what you learn from doing it.

In truth, this exercise is meant to be challenging, and I don't expect students to succeed with it on their first few tries. It's really more about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered.

In addition to the missing corners, I did notice that your outermost boxes had a tendency of running fairly close to parallel with their neighbours, an issue I explain further in these notes.

Lastly, you're off to a great start with your organic perspective boxes. Like the previous exercise, this one is again more about getting students to try something that is beyond them, to get them to start thinking about different kinds of spatial challenges. That said, you're moving in the right direction. Next we'll focus on exercise that'll help you work on keeping your sets of parallel lines converging consistently towards their shared vanishing points, but for now you're doing fine.

Before I mark this lesson as complete, I want you to try the rotated boxes exercise once again. This is not because you made mistakes, as those are expected. It's because you didn't complete the exercise in your last attempt, so I want to see a single completed attempt.

Once you submit that, I'll mark this lesson as complete. At that point I'll want you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 2: Organic Forms, Contour Lines, Dissections and Form Intersections"

2019-01-05 20:26

Your arrows are very well done. They're extremely fluid in how they flow through space, and do so through all three dimensions with great confidence (rather than being restricted to just the 2D space of the page).

Your organic forms with contour ellipses and curves are coming along well, but I do want you to strive to stick to simple sausage forms - that is, specifically, forms that maintain a consistent width through their lengths without any pinching, tapering or swelling through their midsections. It's like two spheres connected by a tube of consistent width. You've mostly adhered to this, but there are a few where you start to stray, especially when you get into the contour curves.

Moving onto your texture analysis, you're generally approaching these quite well and are paying a good deal of attention to the nature of the shadows being cast by all of the small forms that make up each texture. I do however want to warn you away from the tendency to use hatching so heavily however. It's commonly used as a sort of shorthand to represent whatever other textures/patterns of light and shadow may actually be present there. By relying so heavily on it, you're avoiding having to look deeper and more carefully at what is actually there. Instead of simply shading your feathers, for example, play with the density - cram more feathers into the far left of the gradient so as to increase the number of shadows being cast. Similarly, for y our silk, you can concentrate more folds and wrinkles on that side.

As for your dissections, you generally did a good job (though again, try to find something other than hatching in those darker sections of your tree bark, bark is full of all kinds of nice, rough protrusions that cast little shadows). Your fabric, as you mentioned, was definitely the most challenging for you, and I think you got a little overwhelmed by it. From what I can see, you allowed the seemingly chaotic nature of the texture to overcome you, and in doing so, you failed to keep track of the general rhythms and patterns these folds and wrinkles generally follow. Remember that such features are all caused by physical force - tension, gravity, etc. As such, they're governed by a sense of order and harmony. When you draw them, don't draw them erratically. Don't approach them with a sense of randomness or chaos. Rather than drawing each fold independently, think instead about the forces themselves, and try and infer what kinds of wrinkles they might produce.

For your form intersections are looking good, though I do think that highlighting the intersections in red is pretty distracting. Instead, if you want to emphasize how one form, or part of a form sits in front of another, use simple line weight with the same pen you used to draw the other marks. By adding a little extra weight to part of an existing mark, you can clearly communicate how the lines of a form flow continuously, distinguishing and clarifying them where you end up with unclear junctions. I explain this further at the bottom of these notes.

Lastly, your organic intersections are coming along well (especially on the second page - the first, with that more complex form sitting on top is kind of unclear). On the second page, you're doing a good job of conveying how these forms slump against one another, where their weight is supported and where it is not.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. Feel free to move onto the next one.

Uncomfortable in the post "Drawabox 2.0 has been released - a full website rebuild, revisions of lessons up to 7 and 19 new videos"

2019-01-05 07:01

Sure, it certainly can. It definitely falls into that category, just make sure that you're not stressing yourself over the fact that "i want this to be part of my portfolio so I must deliver". The point of this whole thing is that not every moment spent drawing has to be done with the intention of getting something tangible out of it, be it a nice drawing or something that you've learned.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-05 00:59

Well done! Your lines section demonstrates a great deal of confidence behind every single stroke, allowing you to achieve smooth, consistent strokes without any signs of hesitation or wobbling. You generally maintain this as well through your ellipses, keeping to smooth, even shapes, though I did notice that when you hit the funnels exercise you may have been feeling a less sure of yourself here. There's a touch of stiffness to those lines, where you're drawing a little more slowly, being a little more careful as you execute the strokes, and as a result they come out a little less evenly shaped. Keep an eye on that.

Your work on the boxes section is generally very well done. Your plotted perspective and rough perspective are solid, and I'm pleased to see that you applied the double checking method to identify where your estimation of perspective tends to drift on the latter.

For your rotated boxes, you far surpassed my expectations - generally this exercise is more about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered, and is not really about expecting success of any real level. That said, you kept the boxes well structured, with narrow gaps between them to eliminate as much guesswork as you could. You also did a pretty good job of covering the full 180 degree arcs of rotation on either axis.

Worth mentioning, I noticed that towards the outermost boxes, while rotating them, you also stretched them back a little bit. This is a pretty normal response that happens when you rotate the form, but still feel compelled to expose more of that box's face than is necessary. Try tucking them in a little more, and allow yourself to show only a sliver of that box's face in the future.

Lastly, your organic perspective boxes are coming along well. I'm pleased to see that you applied the drawing-through technique here to better understand how each box sits in 3D space, and you definitely benefited from it. There is still room for improvement, which is as expected (this is again another one of those exercises where students aren't expected to produce perfect work), specifically in getting your sets of parallel lines to converge consistently towards their shared vanishing points.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next to get some more practice in on those freely rotated forms, and to take what you've already developed in terms of your understanding of 3D space and really cement it early on.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 7: Drawing Vehicles"

2019-01-05 00:51

Compared to your last attempt at this exercise, your work has improved by leaps and bounds. It's so much better, and I'm sure you can see that. It was much better even at the beginning, though the first two pages had some structural issues, after that point it was smooth sailing. Your forms were solid, and you did a great job of capturing the complex tread patterns without ending up with texture that came off as distracting. Fantastic work.

Getting back to the vehicles, I'd like you to do 4 more drawings, focusing on those that have wheels - so mainly cars and trucks. Take your time and try and apply what you've understood here about building up from the underlying solid forms and being aware of the elements that convey and capture the character of the vehicle.

Be sure to check out the latest 1967 Shelby Mustang demonstration, as it should go into greater detail than any of the demos that were made available previously. I think you're very close to the end here, and the shift between the two attempts of wheels is very promising.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 1: Lines, Ellipses and Boxes"

2019-01-05 00:27

Very nice work overall! Your linework is extremely confident, resulting in lines that are all very smooth and consistent. At the same time, you're demonstrating considerable control over each stroke, with no signs of hesitation or wobbling.

Your ellipses are quite similar in this regard, but with perhaps just a touch of stiffness to them, that comes from focusing too much on accuracy. Accuracy is definitely important, but first and foremost you want to make sure each mark you draw is executed confidently, focusing more on achieving a smooth, evenly shaped stroke. By and large you're still doing fine in this regard, it's just a slight adjustment that's needed.

Great work on the plotted and rough perspective boxes, and I'm glad to see that you're applying the double checking method to latter. Your accuracy is actually far better here than I'd generally expect, so great work there. One thing I noticed was that you seemed to keep all your boxes above and below the horizon line. Into the second page, you started to vary things up a bit, but don't be afraid to have boxes that fall right on the horizon line.

You've done a great job of keeping your rotated boxes well structured, with narrow gaps between them so as to eliminate as much guesswork as you could. One thing I did notice however was that your outermost boxes were pretty close to parallel to their neighbours (as explained here). Be sure to push those rotations further to cover the full 180 degree arc on each axis.

Lastly, your work on the organic perspective boxes is coming along great. Both this exercise and the rotated boxes one are intended to be particularly challenging, and I don't expect students to be able to do a great job with them just yet. Instead, it's more about exposing students to a different kind of spatial problem that they may not have otherwise considered.

Here you're doing really well, though there is still room for improvement - specifically on getting your sets of parallel lines to converge towards their shared vanishing points. We'll continue to work on this next.

I'll go ahead and mark this lesson as complete. I'd like you to move onto the 250 box challenge next.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 3: Drawing Plants"

2019-01-04 23:52

You're moving in the right direction, though there are some issues I want to address.

To start with, your leaves exercises are a good start. You're handling construction fairly well (you're not zigzagging around your previous phase of construction and are abiding by those previous phases properly), though keep working on thinking about how those leaves are meant to flow through 3D space. Try to think about the initial flow lines as carrying all the energy of the wind that drives the leaf, and draw it with a confidence befitting of that smooth, flowing force.

Also, I noticed that towards the right side of the page, you've got a leaf that arcs in a way that is unnatural, which compresses one side and expands the other as explained here.

Your branches are also coming along well - you're working on getting those segments to flow smoothly into one another, which is great, though in doing so you do seem to stiffen up a little bit. This may also be partially caused by the fact that your branches here have a tendency to be quite small - I'm glad you're trying to pack a lot into each page, but make sure you're giving yourself ample room to work through these spatial problems. Drawing smaller when we practice can cause us to cramp up and cause our drawings to come out more stiffly than they otherwise might.

When we get into your actual plant constructions, one major point I notice is that the issue I raised in regards to the flow of your leaves becomes quite a bit worse. Here, because you're focused on these larger, more complex constructions, you don't end up putting the same kind of consideration into each leaf or petal, and as a result they come out feeling stiff and flat, rather than giving the impression that they're flowing through space confidently. I explain this a little further here.

The point about drawing larger comes into play as well - you're cramming a lot of different drawings into each page. The sentiment behind that is great, but it is causing you to draw much smaller than you should.

Here and there where you've got ellipses, you do have a tendency in most cases not to draw through them. Make sure you're going around the elliptical shapes with a confident stroke that goes around two full times before lifting your pen.

Also, when it comes to line weight, you do appear to be quite liberal in its use. There are a lot of places where you're covering the entirety of drawings with additional weight. There are a few issues with this:

• First off, it often looks like you're drawing with different pens - I can't be certain of this, but the difference between your darker and lighter lines is significant enough to suggest that this is the case. Make sure you're working only with a single thickness of pen - the recommended ones for all these lessons is the 0.5mm. This will ensure that your lines don't have a jarring sense of separation with some lines that look vastly thicker than others. The changes in line weight should be subtle, only enough for one's subconscious to pick up on, rather than being so blatant that it's being shouted at the viewer.

• In lesson 2's form intersection video, I discuss that one should not follow a process of doing an underdrawing, followed by a clean-up pass. What this really means is that I don't want you to replace the entirety of a line with a heavier stroke after the fact. This ensures that you respect the underlying construction lines as being part of the drawing, and also avoids situations where you slow down and stiffen up in trying to match an existing line perfectly. Every mark we put down - including those we add for line weight - must be drawn with confidence, using the ghosting method. Line weight instead should only be applied in key limited areas, on portions of existing lines in order to emphasize and clarify certain overlaps of forms. Additionally, the mark should taper towards its beginning and end in order to blend back into the original stroke. I do see some places where you haven't entirely replaced an existing mark, but there is always a very jarring shift from light to heavy.

In general, drawing your marks with a confident, persistent pace (using the ghosting method) should result in line work that is much more fluid - one thing I'm noticing here is that your linework tends to stiffen up in a way that suggests that you're either drawing slowly, or pressing too hard. I say this because the marks tend to come out quite uniformly, without any tell-tale tapering towards either end of your strokes. When we draw with confidence, the pen already starts moving before we achieve our intended level of pressure, causing the line to start out skinnier, tapered, and expand into its full width. It's an effect that gives our lines a sense of liveliness and energy that is missing in your drawings. When we draw slower, this shift will likely happen over too limited a space to actually be noticeable, and when we press too hard, we ramp up that pressure far too quickly. Additionally, pressing hard is a common issue that also results in students damaging their pen tips and causing them to perform poorly well before they're actually running out of ink.

All in all you are moving in the right direction, but before I mark this lesson as complete I'd like you to do 4 more pages of plant drawings.

Try and stick to one drawing per page, give yourself all the room you can, draw with confident strokes and focus on how these forms flow through 3D space. Don't go to any lengths to make your construction lines faint or unnoticeable (I can see that somewhat especially in the last page) - any mark you put down should be weighed in terms of whether or not it contributes to your overall understanding of your construction, or communicating some key element to the viewer. If the stroke achieves one of these things, then it should be drawn with confidence. If it does not, or if another stroke would do it better (or another stroke already on the page accomplishes it), then it should not be drawn. Then when you back over, you can build up that sense of hierarchy with limited, strategic use of additional line weight.

Uncomfortable in the post "Lesson 3: Drawing Plants"

2019-01-04 17:48

Yup, that's totally fine. You should receive a critique of your work later today.