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Wildweasel339 — Figure Drawing
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#charcoal #drawing #figurative #figure #nude #sketch #figuredrawing
Published: 2016-05-05 20:35:37 +0000 UTC; Views: 16573; Favourites: 547; Downloads: 187
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Description
Figure drawing from life. 20 minute pose.Charcoal pencil on newsprint paper, with a few digital touch-ups.
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Comments: 29
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I love this drawing! Beautiful pose and your treatment of shadows is really sensitive
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You've inspired me to post more of my life drawings up on DA. Unfortunately, I haven't done any in awhile, so most of my drawings are old. I wish it inspired me to GO TO figure drawing, but TV deadlines suck and I'm struggling with burnout as it is. After drawing furiously all day, the last thing I feel like doing is going and drawing furiously some more.
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Ohh, cool! I will have a look.
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Dude! Thanks for the watch! Now I'm scared to post anything because you're such an amazing artist.
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How often are you drawing the figure from life?
I usually go about twice a week, but since I've heard teacher's say it's best to go every day I'm not sure if I should throw other things out of my life to make time for more.
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Usually twice a week. That's as often as my group meets. I wish I could do it more frequently, but it's just not possible right now in my small town.
I wouldn't say figure drawing everyday is necessary, but if you want to improve fast, that would be a great way to do it. Just make sure that you're constantly trying new techniques, and approaching drawing with a fresh and open mind. Sometimes it's easy to fall into a rut when you're doing something everyday, because it just become a mindless routine. It's probably good to take breaks every few days to focus on other things like outdoor painting or sculpting, to really switch things up and keep it fresh.
Here's a book that is full of great techniques and advice. I usually have it opened by my side while I'm drawing: www.amazon.com/Henry-Yans-Figu…
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Thanks for the info, good to know. I still need to get the "trying new techniques" part down, since I've been studying so much anatomy, that most of my life-drawings are basically skeletal structures and muscles - which is great for learning but visually not very appealing. ^^
I'm a great fan of Henry Yan, that book is already on my wishlist - now you gave me another reason to finally go for it.
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Yeah, anatomy studies are great and necessary, but personally I think gesture and abstract design (image composition) are a higher priority. Often, if you focus too much on anatomy and construction, you'll have figures that are stiff and mechanical looking.
If you can capture the gesture of a subject first, you can then hang the anatomy on top of that. Gesture tells the story, anatomy gives it structure. Without gesture you have a pile of parts with no direction.
I think you will find that with a greater focus on gesture, the anatomical work actually becomes a lot easier. This is because the gesture guides and influences every mark. It's like trying to drive around a dense city without knowing where to go, compared to having a clear direction.
I see you have a lot of animal drawings. Maybe you are familiar with Joe Weatherly? He has a really great book on the subject He does an amazing job of establishing gesture and liveliness, while also going into anatomy and construction. It's a great book for learning to draw anything in my opinion, not just animals. amzn.com/097103141X
Lastly, studying composition allows you immerse your subjects into an environment. For that, I would study great paintings, movie frames, and certainly Framed Ink: amzn.com/1933492953
With these skills you will be capable of anything!
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I'm beginning to get the same feeling and your comment confirms it once again, that diversifying areas of study is more helpful than focusing like crazy on only one topic (such as anatomy in my case).
But I'm actually quite happy with where I'm at right now - thanks to the intense learning I can now more or less comfortably deal with the figure, it's volumes and structures, and as a result am able to direct all my focus towards expression, gesture and composition. Things are starting to come together.
Most of the animal drawings are from the CGMA animal drawing course I took. I've actually got two Weatherly books on my shelf, including the one you linked, but I'm so lagging behind on working through all my books and tutorials. There's also quite a few anatomy ones, the two Scott Robertsons, Loomis, etc. - one day I'll get through them all.
One day...
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Something that I find particularly fascinating about this sketch is that the boldest, heaviest lines are where the light hits. Often times, artists use heavy lines to indicate "dark"/shadow, and thin/"invisible" lines to indicate light. In this case, the sharp lines kind of help show where we can see the figure most clearly (because of the light), and the non-existent lines enforce where we can't really see clearly (the shadows.)
Just something I noticed and would like to experiment with. 
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Thanks, and great observation!
That's actually an aspect I was struggling with in this drawing. I wasn't sure if I should make those lines in the light as thick and bold as I did. In reality those lines do not exist, and perhaps it would been more accurate to make them very light and thin. Alternatively, I could have given the background a darker value, so that there would be no need for lines at all to indicate the edge of the figure. That probably would have been the best option, had there been time. However, drawings don't always have to follow reality, and in this case I do think the thick lines are appealing in and of themselves.
One artist who inspires me greatly, often uses lines in this manner. Steve Huston:
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Those are beautiful drawings! Thank you so much for sharing
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I remember when I first saw this style of figure drawing. I like it for SHORT POSES because it's so hard to get a full drawing done in such a short time, and this style implies more detail than you really are drawing, allowing the viewers mind to fill in the detail and it feels like a more complete drawing. But for LONGER poses, a lot of times it just seems like the artist is being lazy and "wants" the viewer to finish the art for them. Sometimes it seems more of a gimmicy style. I think part of what bothers me about this style is that the figure doesn't seem as solid. It doesn't seem like it's an accurate or complete description of a 3D object. Still, it's a really nice piece of abstract art. My tastes keep changing over the years, so who knows... several years from now, this may be the style I end up adapting to my figure drawing.
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That's a very fair and valid critique. I actually read a near identical comment on the WetCanvas.com figure drawing forum not too long ago, so it seems a common sentiment, though perhaps rarely shared aloud. There are definitely a lot of shortcuts taken with this style, and for the most part I simply blame the time limit. I could spend time rendering in the shadow side, but it almost always seems more effective to spend that time refining the focal area. Yet if I had been more on the ball, I would have found some way to make the form feel more unified and solid.
While finishing up this drawing, the person sitting next to me commented that the figure looked like it was made of chrome! I reduced that a little bit afterwords, but that is another unwanted side effect of focusing on the contrast of light and dark, rather than the unity between them. My heavy handedness in that area needs to be resolved.
I like that you call it abstract, because that really gets to the heart of the matter. An abstraction is any departure from reality. In the case of drawings like this, the main departure is the way the shadows are treated. Likely if I had simply taken the time to fill in the shadows with appropriate value, the image would not seem so abstract. There wouldn't be any more detail than there is here, but the rendering would appear much more natural.
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I figured time was a factor as well. I have plenty of figure drawings without unfinished faces, or missing feet , or half rendered. No matter how long the pose, seems like there's never enough time to finish.
Love your art, by the way.
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