Here we go again with another sketchbook video. Sean is an intense guy. His life drawings are pretty incredible. They have so much form and movement. His life drawings in his big 18 x 24 pad are even more impressive.
Sean has a definitive style. He likes to push and pull his characters exaggerating certain character traits. Sean is very creative working mainly from life as well as his imagination. It’s certainly safe to say that he hates drawing from photographs. Sean dislikes anything that involves copying. He thrives on bringing diverse characters to life all from his mind.
I love having Sean in class. He goes big with every page in his 18 x 24 pad. He draws big creating very interesting compositions through overlap. He provides the other students with lot’s a great ideas.
Plus he has a great sense of humor. I hope you enjoy his sketchbook video.
Always seek out and refine what makes your art unique. Be different and draw what you love.
My favorite part of having Ron as a student is teasing her about not liking Chocolate. Every once it a while I’ll purchase fun snacks for my students. Sometimes it’s candy while on other days it could be donuts. One day I noticed Ron didn’t touch any of it, she told me she hated chocolate. So I started buying her fruit, it gave us both a good laugh.
Maybe it’s best that Ron doesn’t get that sugar low. The sheer volume of drawing’s in her sketchbook is pretty inspiring. The craziest thing about Ron, she primarily drew digitally before enrolling in my class. No pencil. When you look at the improvement it has got to push you to draw more.
I hope you enjoy browsing through Ron’s sketchbook. She flipped through it at a pretty fast rate. There is so much to see. The more detail Ron puts in her art the more it pulls me in. I love that about her work. What do you like about Ron’s sketchbook?
Have you ever looked at your portrait drawings and wonder why they don’t look realistic? Part of the reason they do not look realistic is because the edges within and around the portrait are too simplistic. Specifically the edges of the eyes, edges of the hair and the edges of the face in relationship to the background.
When it gets down to brass tacks, there aren’t enough angles within the drawing. There are too many macro angles and not enough micro angles. Think of Macro angles as broad strokes. Think of micro angles as detailed rendering with a fine brush.
One definitely needs to look more at the subject they are drawing. In this case a portrait of a male model drawn from life. You definitely want to get into the habit of looking at what you are drawing at least 50 to 60 percent of the time. A lot of artists have unintentionally developed the very bad habit of looking down at their pad too much.
Another contributing factor to overly simplistic edges, sitting too far away from the subject. In this case once again a male model drawn from life. When drawing someone’s portrait from life you want to be no further than six to eight feet away from the model.
Think about it, if you are trying to draw an iris which is a half an inch wide, sitting ten to fourteen feet away is not going to help you.
So the next time you analyze your drawings ask yourself the question, do I have enough angles? Are my edges too simplistic looking? Do I need to make my drawings more complicated by adding more angles to my edges?
Let us know what you think. Leave us a comment below.
If you need a helping hand analyzing your own artwork take a peek at our One Time Coaching. We can help you figure out how to take your drawings up to higher level of quality today!
As I relaunch the Drawing Tutorials Online Blog it felt totally appropriate to have Julia’s sketchbook be our first post.
Julia epitomizes what DTO is all about. A passion to have drawing be the center of one’s lifestyle. What do I mean? As you can see Julia loves to draw. Drawing is at the center of her lifestyle.
She is embarking on her journey as a visual artist and drawing is how she is manifesting her vision. From stop motion to jewelry creation every concept is drawn in her sketchbook first.
Julia’s Sketchbook is pretty amazing. Julia is a young multi-talented artist with a bright future ahead of her. It’s students like Julia that inspire me to teach students of all levels.
Grab your sketchbook, turn off your phone and start drawing. You will find yourself more relaxed.
