Week Eight

This weeks lecture took place at Leeds City Museum where we had the chance to draw non-human anatomy of taxidermy.

This is my drawing of the Tasmanian dog. The overall proportions and shape are all nearly correct, for example, the body of the dog is the right distance away from it's paws and the head isn't too big for the animal, the tail is possibly too small though as it looks slightly odd. The best part of this sketch is the head and face, it looks very life-like (even though it is dead). The overall shading isn't too bad, although you can tell it has been slightly rushed and the stripes could have been made longer and blended into the body better. This drawing (although a stationary object) has a good sense of movement and this picture clearly shows where the animals muscles and bone structure are. Overall, I am fairly happy with this 34 minute sketch, drawn with a 2B pencil.

This is my drawing of the badger. It demonstrates good form and uses correct proportions. The angles of the badger are mostly correct. Although the drawing does not look realistic, because a badger wouldn't usually be seen in this position, it still looks life-like as you can tell the drawing is a badger, and the shading very much helps with this. The shading going down the stomach of the badger is especially good as it follows the hair lines and flows nicely around the animal, adding dimension to the 2D plane. The arm underneath the face looks very odd and looks as though it comes straight across the badger, when really it doesn't start there. This in turn has made the bottom of the head look strange too. The tail doesn't looked attached to the body though has a nice texture to it. Overall this drawing took 23 minutes, using a 4B pencil.

This is my drawing of one of the skinny-legged long beaked birds. The angle the bird has been drawn at is very interesting and shows foreshortening as the beak looks the same size as the legs, when in reality it is smaller. The curvature of the lines are very effective and have created some very nice shapes that are pleasing on the eye. The curvature really makes you follow the bird along it's body. All the proportions are nearly correct, although the back leg and feet may be slightly off. The basic shading of the beak has worked well and only very partially shading in the body and around the wings has made a nice contrast. The overall composition of the bird is very pleasing to the eye and has been laid out on the page nicely. Overall it took 20 minutes using a 2B pencil.

Week Seven

This week was all about movement and action is dynamic poses and posture. Posture is all about balance and weight and pose is all about gesture, how we convey life through the drawing.

 

This is a series of quick 5 minute sketches, where the model started off in a very static pose, using a closed form and then ended up the opposite, in a dynamic pose, using open form. The first of the three images shows a good sense of balance and weight, you can see that the weight is mostly on the models back leg and she is leaning forwards slightly with her head in her hands. This sketch has a good use of line and shows good body proportions. The middle sketch doesn't use as good proportion as the first as the torso is too long for the legs. The angles of the body are fairly accurate and the slight tilt of the head has been done nicely. There isn't as good balance in this sketch as the last. The last sketch has been drawn too big for the page and as a result the legs have had to be shortened to fit on better, this again is not good proportion. The torso is a better size this time and the head is more upright, which you can see. Overall, as the pose got more dynamic and the form got more open the worse the standard of the quick sketch got, most probably due to the fact that the more open the form, the more lines there are to see.

This is a quick sketch of model lying down resting on her side. The pose that the model is doing is fairly static and her form is slightly more open than closed, as the arms are quite far apart showing you the models body and one leg is reached straight out opening the form up more. The overall posture of this picture is pretty good as you can see a good sense of balance, the picture doesn't make the model look as though she's about the topple over and you can see the weight that flows through arms and onto the models right hand and left arm. The proportions of the sketch are fairly accurate and for a 10 minute sketch a lot of information has been put down. The level of detail is nice as you can see the flattened breast and the slight tilt of the head as she was looking down. This picture was drawn using a 4B pencil.

This is a very quick sketch that lasted less than a minute. It shows movement. It shows the model sitting on a chair and gradually pushing herself up and moving slightly forward till she was in a standing position. The overall line quality is not very good as it is a very rushed piece of art, but the general idea of movement is there, as you can see several heads, bodies, arms and legs all at different stages of the movement.