Exercise 2: Essential elements

6 different poses at 10 minutes each:

Started with a line drawing to get shape and then used charcoal pencils for finer tone and then thin charcoal sticks for bigger parts of the tone – trying to get looser. The model axis moves away to the top left so I had to the get size and angle of the feet right to capture this.

This was more front on though with foreshortening of the head and getting the feet and hands the right size was a focus for me. Tried to only use charcoal stick again to get looser and not use pencils so I could go quicker also.

Directly tried using charcoal sticks with no outline first and started with main chunks of tone using the side the charcoal stick and then the end for finer detail. The dog was a nice plus and actually works well with the model in terms of placing her in the frame. Had to use sweep quick lines for the arms and legs etc and was less worried abbot the detail of the hands and feet etc.

Then I tried just a more stick man like basic pencil line with joints connected and then directly apply tone with charcoal again. Legs perhaps too thin.

Went back to pencil drawing and then tried colour paper and sanguine conte pencils including a tiny bit of white for highlights. Nice colours and like using a coloured paper to start with a mid-tone.

Really like this pose and had to make the front leg the same length of the torso and head to get the foreshortening (fore lengthening?!) Tired to be looser again and went back to charcoal sticks and a tiny bit of white highlight. Sometimes struggling good proportion size of the head. Getting the hand on the right the right size also took some tries.

Reflections:

• I think I work better in tone with more difficult poses as it forces me more to get the 3d approach. When its more straight on I feel like the tone is more neutral
• Looser drawing and using sticks helps me be more natural and less ‘tight’
• I sometimes tended to create a bigger torso than proportionate to the limbs but managed to correct. Sometimes making the arms too thin
• Tend to add context/background after the drawing – note to self to try to do that when doing the basic line drawings and think more about placement on the paper
• I also could perhaps use more of the paper but when the person is taller/bigger/standing I tend to make it smaller
• I think the ones that work best are the first and last ones. The angles and foreshortening I find interesting and I like the rhythm with the charcoal sticks. It also gives more 3D approach and shows axes well.