Class Reflection

Throughout this semester, Life Drawing class has allowed me to gain a variety of skills.  The combination of hand drawn pieces, creating the muscles with clay and using the internet as a digital sketchbook have all played important roles in succeeding in this class. Using the blog keeps everything very organized and professional.  Oral critiques in class would be beneficial rather than just leaving comments on each others blogs.  I feel that their is a lot of potential for the blogs yet I learn better seeing my drawing and gaining an in person critique.  

My drawing skill seems to be improving. The whole process has become somewhat involuntary.  Without thinking about drawing value or weight, I automatically see this on the figure and translate it onto my paper.  Another issue I have is composing the figure on the page.  I tend to draw large and almost to the edge of the paper.  I've shrank down the size a bit and can now have room around the figure that I've created.  This space is needed for adjustments and just to have white space in the composition. 

Adding the lower leg

Seeing muscle addition from top to bottom has made me really appreciate the time and work that has been put into building this model.  I feel that the leg is built too large and near and ankle and knee the muscles shouldn't be coming out so far.  I'm having trouble with separating muscles and defining them.  I seem to overlap everything and then lose track of what was what.  I will need to return to the book and online images to redefine each area. 

The foot was challenging for me as well.  In the same way, the tiny muscles going to each toe seem like they should be about 1/3 as large.  Building pieces at this minute scale require patience.  They clay usually sticks fairly well and can be shaved down to remove thickness.  Yet, on the foot, every time I tried to reduce the height the pieces would just come off.  

The overall model building has been frustrating, time consuming, yet very beneficial to understanding the figure in relation to our drawings. 

Best Muscles

Click to Enlarge

Longest Poses

The problem here was the torso and abdominal region.  I tend to add in about 6 inches to an extra foot of space between the chest and pelvis.  Amy showed me where her view of the lines would go in the darker line on the pelvic crest area.  It's difficult to see this large extension until the whole piece has been drawn and you step back to see.  It did feel too long though.   

This pose was one of my more successful drawings because I feel that I composed the model properly.  I feel that the foreshortening of her right arm and abdomonial region was handled well.

This was about a half hour and focussed on foreshortening.  I struggled with the area of the body that was invisible to my view yet I learned to work with lining different body parts up. 

This was about an hour long pose.  The muscles were very defined and tight so it made the drawing process easier. 

Longer Drawings

Gestures of Importance

Building the Leg