Sketchbook Thread of AndyO - 2D/3D

#1

Hello there! I’ve just started a life drawing course at my local college, and thought that I’d start up a thread here in the hope of getting some extra feedback
I plan to share a couple of pieces from each session, and would welcome any crits and suggestions that will help me improve this output!

As it’s an evening class we have no homework as such, so I will try and supplement this work with other sketches – a kind of motivation for myself to keep drawing (and with a bit of luck, improving
) in the intervening period between sessions.

Thanks for reading,

Andy

#2

This series of sketches was from my first week in the class. We were given three different poses and a decreasing timeframe to complete each
from left to right - five minutes for the first, three minutes for the second and 30 seconds for the last. It also acts as a marker of the level I am at now, at the beginning of the course.

#3

My second week in the class involved (trying) to produce twenty sketches over an hour and a half - I managed about 16/17 I think. The model held a pose for ten minutes and we had to decide how to divvy up the time, whether to do one long drawing or to try and fit in several quicker sketches.

These examples all took between three and five minutes

#4

In the most recent session, our lecturer introduced some more technical approaches to drawing. This included copying the figure exactly as she appeared in front of us using clear acetate sheets
a lot harder than it sounds, my attempts were woeful!

The other approach was to use a viewfinder tacked onto the side of our drawing boards. Both the following drawings used this method, the first is pencil, and the second is charcoal. I spent about 15-20 minutes on each:

#5

AndyO,

Welcome. :slight_smile: I really like the direction you’re being pushed in by your teachers - they seem to know what they’re doing. :wink: You seem to already have a nice facility for drawing, and it will be interesting to see how you develop your approach here.

You might be interested in this book:

Drawing from Life: A High-Focus Approach to Drawing the Figure (Hardcover)

The author seems to take a similar approach as you are learning.

There are lots of other book recommendations here:

Anatomy Resources : BOOKS

Also I would encourage you to participate in this ongoing Workshop:

Anatomy Lesson Series: Body Part 2 - The Torso

Lots of great work going on there!

I look forward to seeing more of your work. :slight_smile:

Cheers,

-Rebeccak

#6

Rebeccak

Thanks for your kind words - I guess I should divulge the following: this isn’t the first time that I have taken a life drawing class… During my first stint at college, and then again at university, I had intermitant sessions as a part of various drawing modules. Still, it’s good to refresh the grey cells with a back to basics approach!

I’ll have a look into those resources, and I consider myself encouraged to investigate that torso workshop - may even try and find the time to participate

Thanks again,

Andy

#7

Thought i’d have a go at this torso thing…(it’s the…erm, torso…from Michelangelo’s Study for the Libyan Sibyl)

I think the back area to the right of the spine is a bit too wide, not to sure I really did the shoulder area on that side much justice either. Let me know if you have any thoughts or suggestions?

Andy

#8

Hi there AndyO
nice thread start.
hope to see more soon :thumbsup:

#9

Hello everyone. Another evening at life drawing class, and a couple more drawings to post. This week we went over measurements - using the pencil to ascertain the size of the models head and working out how many times the height/width of it goes make up other parts of the body… I’ve been in classes where the tutor has told us we should be doing this before, but never one where we’ve spent the whole session being ‘taught’ it… I guess that’s why it’s taken 'til now to convince me just how useful it can be!

Anyway, onto the drawings - the first was a twenty minute pose, the second a ten minute pose and both were done in pencil. I struggled a bit with the foreshortening on the models right leg with this first one, the tutor suggested working with muscle shapes around the shin and calf rather than drawing my ‘expectation of the lower leg’

#10

A second attempt at the torso challenge… I decided to try and ‘copy’ a statue this time, rather than a drawing as I did before. With the last one I did I found myself focusing on replicating the marks on the page rather than the actual figure. I thought choosing a statue for this attempt would remove this temptation to just try and copy the pre-existing pattern of marks, so that I might better concentrate on the figure itself.

/ramble over

008:
MICHELANGELO Buonarroti
Christ Carrying the Cross (detail)
1521
Marble
Santa Maria sopra Minerva, Rome

After half an hour…

And after an hour…

#11

Here are a couple of drawings from this weeks life class. We were asked to make several sketches on each page, putting some thought into how the positioning of each would affect the balance of the composition…

Each pose in the first image lasted 10 minutes, and those in the second image lasted 5 minutes:

#12

Welcome to the forums. You have a very nice start here. It is great that your in a life drawing class, I wish I was in one this semester but I have to wait till next. You have some very fluid lines in your drawings. Very nice grasp of foreshortning limbs as well. keep them coming, look forward to seeing more of your work.

Matt

#13

Here are a couple of drawings from this weeks life class.

Oh man I still have to wait 2 years before I can… I’m so jealous :smiley:
But the good thing is it’ll be 2 years drawing from life constantly.

Anyway,
looks like these life sessions are a good thing for you… wonderful sketches Andy

#14

Nice start on your thread here, Andy. It will be great to review your thread in a few months. That’s what’s great about these sketchbooks…they remain a record of your progress. I look forward to seeing more.

Cris

#15

Matt: Thanks for the comments! My uni had a similar on/off approach to life drawing - so it’s good to be doing some every week on a dedicated course.

NR43: Why the long wait? Although two years solid life drawing is an exciting prospect! Wish i’d had that kind of opportunity - we did about six weeks or so in each of my first two years of uni, with a few optional ‘extra’ sessions (of which I probably should have gone to a few more than I actually did…)

Cris: That’s the idea! It’s encouraging me to draw regularly, which is better than the “two steps forward, one step back” progress I was getting through my intermitant bursts of skethcing in the past.

Andy

#16

Why the long wait?

I’m in my first year of a 4 year course. First 2 years will focus on drawing plaster models, heads in 1st year, body parts in 2nd year. From 3rd year on the plaster statues will be replaced by real models… I guess it’s good to have a solid base on which to build. A couple of years of drawing experience won’t hurt… I just have to temper that feeling of impatience :smiley:

Looking forward to see more studies Andy

Take care,
Johan

#17

Ok, so there has been a little delay in posting my latest efforts from last weeks life drawing class - I went up to London at the weekend to see the Da Vinci exhibition! (and then get dragged up and down Oxford Street as some kind of pennance…) It wasn’t quite as focused on his ‘art’ sketches as i’d hoped, but still well worth the visit.

We again looked at composition, but this time were asked to introduce some tone. The left hand pose on the first sheet lasted 10 minutes, while the others took about 20 minutes. I struggled a bit with the second sheet, these were slightly shorter poses (about 7 minutes) - anyone got any tips for using chalk to pick out highlights on a black background like this?

Well that’s it for a couple of weeks - it’s half term this week, and i’m off to a gig next week. I’ll have to try and keep my hand in in the meantime…it’s a shame the weather’s turning, as it would have been nice to sit in the park and draw people on their lunchbreaks!

#18

A week and a half through my life drawing hiatus and not much in the way of fresh work… These are couple of torso studies I did a week or so ago:

080:
VITTORIA, Alessandro
St Sebastian
c. 1600
Marble, height 170 cm
S. Salvatore, Venice

081:
ALGARDI, Alessandro
Beheading of St Paul
c. 1650
Marble, height: 286 cm
San Paolo Maggiore, Bologna

Actually the statement at the top isn’t entirely true - I bought Hogarth’s Dynamic Anatomy recently so i’ve been going through that, making notes and doing a few studies. I’ll try and get some of these up at some stage.

Andy

#19

AndyO,

Good to see your progress here. :slight_smile: If you’d like, I can do a paintover for some of your gestural pieces, to just point a few things out.

Cheers,

-Rebeccak

#20

Rebecca,

Thanks for the offer, that would be a great help! I can usually pull my work to pieces in terms of what looks wrong - but I find it quite difficult to pin-point the why…It’ll be cool if you can shed some light.

Cheers,

Andy