Life Drawing - Using background elements to create an atmosphere

For todays life drawing class we focused on the matter of perspective and tones in order to establish a clearer idea of how to draw our cities. We also learnt how adding different light sources and tones to different objects influence their significance and structure.

Our first drawing was a 20 minute detailed sketch that involved using background elements to create an atmosphere and establish an environment-like space. I chose to not use pencil in this session due to wanting to develop my drawing skills using other materials, and due to wanting to use a more realistic colour on our life model, I used a skin toned Pro Marker pen.




Our second drawing was a 15 minute sketch, and due to wanting to draw with colour, I decided to draw with different variations of blue chalks to evaluate how blending various tones stylises my work. I also did this due to the fact that digital painting requires a lot of tone blending of the same colour, and I thought that blue would help emphasise shadow and light sources well.










Our final set of drawings were several 1 minute sketches, and we were required to use different sets of colours to determine how the aspect of colour changes the impression of the drawing - something we would need to consider when producing our digital paintings. I used a red marker pen, charcoal, pink and blue chalk and a skin tone Pro Marker pen to complete this

At the end of our lesson we looked into the work of Artist Rachel Whitehead, whose use of the same object of white cardboard boxes allowed her environment to appear to have many different kinds of shapes. It also demonstrated how the positioning of these boxes made her work stand out and appear to have a wide perspective due to the different lighting and shadows that were projected.

Life Drawing - lesson 3

For today's life drawing class, we drew another model whom we hadn't drawn before and we were required to focus on the tones displayed rather than simply do liner line drawings. I found it to be quite challenging as I have learnt to draw in a more realistic way. However, I am glad that I experimented with the different ways of drawing as it has helped to branch out on my tonal skills as well as my time planning skills.

Our first sets off drawings were based around doing one highly realistic one, then sketching multiple different poses in short spaces of time, whilst focusing on balancing light and dark sources. Our final drawing involved drawing the tones of our model in before our lines to allow us to focus on the different light and dark sources

Life Drawing session 2

Our second life drawing session involved sketching more drawings in a more limited amount of time in order to improve our time management when drawing. Our session also revolved around determining different light and dark sources by dimming the lights in the room and using a portable heater to reflect light on the life model.

I tried to outline and highlight the light sources and shade in the shadows displayed with a mixture of pencil and charcoal. I also tried to use a wider range of drawing materials for this session to add more variety to my work. A drawing material that I hadn't used yet in our life drawing sessions was a fine liner pen, in which I used to complete sketches of the remaining poses that our model did. Although I had done life drawings using a fine liner pen before, I found the task of using it to be harder than I anticipated because it had a thinner nib than I was used to, which meant that I had to make my sketches more rough and less precise.

1st Life Drawing Lesson

Exercise 1

Exercise 2

Exercise 3

For our first life drawing lesson, we worked on experimenting with drawing at different sizes and scales, along with drawing with different materials such as charcoal and pencils.

Exercise 1 was to simply demonstrate our drawing skills
Exercise 2 was to demonstrate our ability to produce multiple drawings using a range of materials in limited time
Exercise 3 was to create a drawing that displayed detail and light and dark sources

I wanted to create a realistic set of drawings that displayed a good understanding of light and dark sources detail and precision. I also wanted to produce work using the technique of line drawing in relation to Artist Gosia Wlodarczak. Overall I am happy with the work that I produced because it shows a variety of skills. If I were to improve any of my pieces I would try to work with using less severe outlines so I could try and improve my perception of shape.