PART 1
The results:
I call my first composition “Single male pulls things from a garage and end table”. Early on I would start the gesture drawings from random objects, but eventually I (generally) settled into a counter-clockwise pattern of drawing the rifle first, then yoga block, gas can, glove, books, and dagger. Since the rifle was a big straight (albeit foreshortened) object with a lot of angles coming off it I generally used it as the overall ruler to determine where things should be.
Ultimately I would chalk my results up as “OK”, but that’s primarily a result of my lack of observational drawing experience. As the drawings progressed it’s clear I was slowly refining my placement of objects in relation to one another, but I still had a ways to go. The glove was never truly properly scaled, and the perspective on the books specifically was never close to where it should have been. Drawing 10 was probably the cleanest as far as construction and proportion, but that's also not necessarily the primary goal of a gesture drawing (I also ran out of time for the dang watch on the books). The only big difference between 1 and 10 was the time available for details.
As far as gesture techniques I generally fall to line (and later on simple construction) by default, although during the shorter sessions I relied much more on continuous-ish line to a degree as there simply wasn’t time to be picking up the charcoal and measuring things out. I attempted a little bit of mass as well, but found drawing with the side of the charcoal and then smudging it to a proper shade was difficult to do quickly. Playing with scribbled line a bit was also a little awkward, probably just due to inexperience with it. I found slapping down basic construction forms with contour lines was where my head would continuously automatically lead.
If I did it again with a longer time allowance I might more properly “layer” my constructions over the true quick gesture drawings by creating a layout, then building forms on top of that general guide. I feel like once I hit the 6+ minute mark it was less gestural drawing and more diving straight into solid forms, which isn’t ideal.
The experience:
For my first time drawing with charcoal I felt it went reasonably well, and where it didn’t I certainly learned things. I did find that varying line quality was pretty difficult and it almost felt like drawing with a pen where it was on/off, but that’s probably just me not being used to it. It was also much more difficult to cleanly remove than I expected, which both worked for and against it (with more/unlimited time reaching for an eraser wouldn’t be a big deal).
Keeping my arm up and continuously moving for 10 minutes was also surprisingly strenuous, but that’s probably a clue that I need to do more push ups than anything else.
Also, fixative spray stinks.
I call my first composition “Single male pulls things from a garage and end table”. Early on I would start the gesture drawings from random objects, but eventually I (generally) settled into a counter-clockwise pattern of drawing the rifle first, then yoga block, gas can, glove, books, and dagger. Since the rifle was a big straight (albeit foreshortened) object with a lot of angles coming off it I generally used it as the overall ruler to determine where things should be.
Ultimately I would chalk my results up as “OK”, but that’s primarily a result of my lack of observational drawing experience. As the drawings progressed it’s clear I was slowly refining my placement of objects in relation to one another, but I still had a ways to go. The glove was never truly properly scaled, and the perspective on the books specifically was never close to where it should have been. Drawing 10 was probably the cleanest as far as construction and proportion, but that's also not necessarily the primary goal of a gesture drawing (I also ran out of time for the dang watch on the books). The only big difference between 1 and 10 was the time available for details.
As far as gesture techniques I generally fall to line (and later on simple construction) by default, although during the shorter sessions I relied much more on continuous-ish line to a degree as there simply wasn’t time to be picking up the charcoal and measuring things out. I attempted a little bit of mass as well, but found drawing with the side of the charcoal and then smudging it to a proper shade was difficult to do quickly. Playing with scribbled line a bit was also a little awkward, probably just due to inexperience with it. I found slapping down basic construction forms with contour lines was where my head would continuously automatically lead.
If I did it again with a longer time allowance I might more properly “layer” my constructions over the true quick gesture drawings by creating a layout, then building forms on top of that general guide. I feel like once I hit the 6+ minute mark it was less gestural drawing and more diving straight into solid forms, which isn’t ideal.
The experience:
For my first time drawing with charcoal I felt it went reasonably well, and where it didn’t I certainly learned things. I did find that varying line quality was pretty difficult and it almost felt like drawing with a pen where it was on/off, but that’s probably just me not being used to it. It was also much more difficult to cleanly remove than I expected, which both worked for and against it (with more/unlimited time reaching for an eraser wouldn’t be a big deal).
Keeping my arm up and continuously moving for 10 minutes was also surprisingly strenuous, but that’s probably a clue that I need to do more push ups than anything else.
Also, fixative spray stinks.
PART 2
Not sure how I felt about these two, a lot of the drawing session felt like I was fighting the charcoal and easel. I'm finding it's difficult to control what section of the willow I'm using to draw; it gets used up rapidly and the regions on the stick that make sharp and defined lines quickly change to very broad ones and vice versa. The second attempt was especially rough with a lot of my lines just not being placed well.
Oh well, it's still free observation practice.
Oh well, it's still free observation practice.