Rebecca Kimmel's Anatomy Review 001: GESTURE

#361

Move along, move along, this post has been killed.

#362

I think it would also be benifitial for everyone if each thread is compiled into a PDF afterwards and made available for download. I’d be happy to do this for everyone.

#363

I hope its not too late to post a new one :slight_smile:

I think its a bit better than i had before.

(tell me if it doesnt load)

#364

crypticghost,

Finally had time to review your post :slight_smile: ~

I really like the style you have come up with ~ the stark black and white lines are really interesting, and seem to suggest that you have a well-developed sketch style already.

As I’ve mentioned in other posts, try to SIMPLIFY so that you can see the basic proportions of the head, neck, torso, limbs, and legs, BEFORE you start to render and get caught in a corner.

Base the features of the face NOT AROUND DETAILED FEATURES but around the basic axes of the head, eyes, nose, and lips. If you begin to draw axes before forms, you will begin to elongate your forms ~ many people tend to make forms too short ~ if you exaggerate and lenghten forms, you will have more room for expression with calligraphic lines, etc.

This is a nice, well-formed drawing, but it needs to be based more on structure than on style.

Good work, and I hope you continue to post! :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak

#365

WyattHarris,

Word.

#366

Zurak,

Thanks for your post ~ here is your review, finally:

In the revised drawing, I am attempting to demonstrate that gesture drawings entail loose, interconnected lines which delineate form. I think you have grasped the concept of establishing the basic axes of the body ~ now I would focus on creating more expressive lines which are calligraphic in nature ~ in other words, more expressive.

Hope this helps :slight_smile:

~Rebeccak

#367

scorpion007,

I won’t be able to do a draw-over of your new post, but let me just say that I think your post really shows a lot of great effort and potential ~ the drawing you’ve labeled as “bad” I actually think is quite good ~ and what I particularly like is the relaxed approach you’ve taken toward these drawings ~ and how the brush/pen-strokes all go in the same direction, which contributes toward the success of any drawing in my opinion.

Thank you for posting these :slight_smile:

For EVERYONE who is interested:

THE NEW TOPIC, OPPOSING CURVES, WILL BE POSTED ON TUESDAY.

[left]I WON’T be reviewing any more GESTURE drawings that are submitted tonight ~ but please post them so that we may see them, and anyone else is free to critique these, provided it is ok with the artist.[/left]
[left] [/left]
[left]Thank you, and I hope to see your NEW posts next week! Thanks for helping to make this first week so exciting, and in my opinion, such a success! :)[/left]

~Rebeccak

#368

Gesture drawing is def. not my strong suit…:slight_smile: Awaiting the next lesson with anticipation. Rebekka, you have so much work ahead of you… bless you for teaching.

#369

[font=Arial Black]-Just a general thought on gesture drawings-[/font]
[font=Arial]When I start gesture drawings I usually want to have the forms be fluid and curved. This makes the gesture look natural. I always start with the back bone with a simple line from that I make a triangle from the pubic area to the shoulders with about the same curve of the back bone. The back bone or the peanut which ever method works best if the form is or line is fluid (I end up using a peanut structure also but it is mostly broken lined peanut but the back bone has always worked to keep my drawing guide for the rest of the body) :slight_smile: . Even when standing straight like in military stance you still have a natural bend of your back bone. So the idea of gestures is to firstly sketch out as quickly as possible the idea of the forms in a position. To make a natural pose the thought of bends and weight has to be applied. It is a hard thing to get use to when starting. I am still pretty new to gesture drawings but this is kind of how I go at it.[/font]

[font=Arial][/font]
[font=Arial]Gestures really should not go into much detail like eyes, ears, mouth, and etc. (my first drawings I posted were just for fun and they had more detail but I do not make my gesture drawings with that much detail I do them more like the drawings I am posting now with some suggestions made by [color=#fffffe]rebeccak). Hands can be done simply with a semi cubic round shape. It is mostly just about placement of the forms.[/font][/color]

[font=Arial][/font]
[font=Arial Black]-Things to do when doing imagined gesture drawings-[/font]

[font=Arial][/font]
[font=Arial]If you are able to take the pose your drawing it will end up looking natural. Start with your own body structure later with more experience you will see that other people have more flexibility. If you have a leg bent and the body is leaning make sure to put the other leg to support the weight of the body as much as possible, arms also help for balance. [/font]

[font=Arial][/font]
[font=Arial]Exercises you can do is grabbing on to something with your two hands and leaning back. Of course make sure the thing you’re grabbing is strong enough. You will see how naturally your body will balance it self. Remember your pose and try to reproduce that feeling. Sometimes if you reproduce more of the feeling instead of an accurate proportioned drawing you will have more impact. Exaggeration is a big part of gesture drawing. That is one of the things my teachers taught, is to exaggerate parts of poses to give it more feeling with logical limits.[/font]

Not posting a gesture today :expressionless:

But I thought I should give a little take on my thoughts on it.

#370

Desp#2/Rog ~

Great post! Thanks for sharing that! With that, I’m heading off to sleep :slight_smile:

Happy 4th of July to the Yankees in the crowd :wink:

~Rebeccak

#371

I have never posted any work on this site. Two college degrees and I was about to throw in the towel. Went to a contemporary art school with little traditional teaching. I have tried for years to play catch up…but I am reaching 30 and growing tired of playing the catchup game. I thought that perhaps i was tied to a life as a motion graphics designer. Which i do not want at all!
Then you have to come along, post this kick butt thread, and inspire me to perhaps give it one last shot. Darn you Rebeccak! Darn you cgtalk! Why cant you let a grown man alone! In all honestly, i appreciate everyhting and here are a couple of gesture drawings… this is the first time in many years…please be gentle. No wait, dont be gentle, rip me a new one! Thanks guys!

Shaun
#372

default.rol:

… (I) need to wait until the anatomy class begins in earnest to understand the “inside the body” bit you mentioned. I must confess I dont have a clue - I’ve never studied it.

I think it would be a good idea (in preperation at least) for those not well up on anatomy to download/scan front and profile human skeleton AND muscle images and overlay them in photoshop so that both are visible (ie: front/profile bones upon front/profile muscles, perhaps different colours?) and print and stick them on the wall in front of you.

That way, its;

  1. a good “fast” source of reference for when you are sketching, etc.
  2. a rest/focal point for your eyes to look at and away from your screen. (this way even when NOT drawing you are becoming more familar with the underlying anatomy AND giving your eyes a break).
  • Somhairle
#373

Thanks for reviewing these, although credit should be given where due…i understand that things can get a little confusing with a thread this size, but this is not one of my drawings…it belongs to dioxide in post 112 . And thank you once again for doing this! This is great!

#374

AdrielaSakamoto,

   A review...
   
   First, a critique of your piece [i]as a gesture.[/i] Try to use fewer lines, more economically...there are gestural styles that make use of many, many lines, but I think Rebeccak is trying to impress simplicity/economy. If you [i]are [/i]going to use lots of lines, try to make them longer (instead of broken) and fluid. Although your drawing might look busy superficially, you did a very good job of keeping the underlying forms simple and consistent.

Now, a critique of your piece in terms of pose and structure. I’m not exactly sure what’s happening there with his left arm, but I think it’s safe to assume that he’s leaning on something. If so, try to show the force on his torso, and maybe relax his right shoulder.[color=DeepSkyBlue] [/color][color=Plum][color=Yellow][color=DeepSkyBlue]You’ll probably want to lengthen his right arm.[/color][/color][/color][color=Plum] [/color][color=Plum]Acknowledging the very different orientations of the ribcage and pelvis.[/color][color=Plum][color=Yellow][color=DeepSkyBlue] [/color][/color][/color][color=Plum][color=Yellow]Be mindful of the lengths and widths of his legs.[color=Cyan] Looks like you continued onto another piece of paper when you hit the top,[color=Cyan] which is a great idea, but I think his head still ended up a little squashed…be aggressive when drawing over onto the second page. [color=Orange]Finally, finesse those contours.

EDIT: sorry if that was at all rushed/crappy...I lost it at first through some Firefox window juggling and quickly rewrote it.
  
  [/color][/color][/color][/color][/color]  [img]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/FromanylanD/gesture-sketch-copyEdit.jpg[/img]
  
  [img]http://i11.photobucket.com/albums/a157/FromanylanD/gesture-sketch-copy.jpg[/img]
  
  EDIT: I uploaded your original image to photobucket so I could post it alongside the draw-over. Hope that's ok...
#375

Rebecca, thanks a lot for you review! I will try that! :slight_smile:

#376

Does anyone know any good links to front and profile skeletons and muscle structures like mentioned by Somhairle in post #373?

He mentions printing them out for reference in hard copy so they will need to have some resolution to them. I just ran a google image search for high quality images but there didn’t appear much out there.

It will be of great help to a lot of us if anyone knows of any "free" :D URL's for this sort of information.   

Thx all - the work has been great to look at so far!
#377

I think that’s a great idea! Go for it. :thumbsup:

#378

default.rol wrote:

>Does anyone know any good links to front and profile skeletons and muscle structures like mentioned by Somhairle in post #373?

For anyone serious about drawing, I HIGHLY recommend “[color=orange]Albinus on Anatomy” [/color]by Robert Beverly Hale and Terence Coyle. It contains LABELED, CLEAR, and BEAUTIFUL etchings of the [color=orange]skeleton and muscle structures in the FRONT, BACK, and SIDE views.[/color]

A preview…

In truth, I don’t want to cover anatomy until we get some more generalized, basic topics squared away ~ I think a lot of drawings suffer from overthink and detail that kill them ~ so I want to take one topic at a time. That being said, Somhairle’s suggestion about having a reference available is GREAT ~ but I think BOOKS make the best reference. See my REFERENCE POST: #9
~Rebeccak

#379

A couple more from me…

#380

AdrielaSakamoto,

Thank you for posting! :slight_smile: Is the drawing which you posted a copy of a work by Pontormo? You can always tell by the eyes. I think FromanylanD did a really nice draw-over of your work and made some excellent comments ~ what do you think? :slight_smile:

stipick_S wrote:

>Darn you Rebeccak! Darn you cgtalk! Why cant you let a grown man alone!

Hahahahaha! Your drawings are: NICE, NICE, NICE, NICE, NICE. This is really great stuff which you posted. Work can be a grind, and art can be a WONDERFUL respite from it all. Great job, DEFINITELY KEEP POSTING. ~and I’m really honored that you’re posting your work for the first time on this thread ~that’s awesome!!!

Somhairle,

GREAT suggestion ~ however, I always think it’s best to have BOOKS. I really do, I’m not an agent for any bookseller ~ but you can’t go wrong by purchasing at least one really good anatomy book which for $10-20 you will have forever.

solarundies,

Whoops! Sorry!!! I know I have your drawings, I think I’ve reviewed them, pardon the confusion :wink:

anim_ziggy,

You are most welcome!!!

FromanylanD,

Thank you for doing a review! I think you did a really great job! :slight_smile: ~keep on postin’!

lutonomy,

Food for thought!

sphere,

I REALLY like the bottom right hand corner drawing. I like the pencil style, looseness, and economy of line, plus the axes really make the drawing work. It’s great that you are working from the Muybridge photos, I had not previously drawn from them, but it’s a GREAT suggestion of FromanylanD’s. Definitely keep going in this direction ~ when/if the sub-forum gets up, we definitely should have a thread dedicated only to GESTURES.

Thanks, guys! Keep it up!