Self-reflective essay

Looking back to this, I can’t say if it was easier or more difficult than the first one. My goals were to focus less on details, increase the speed of my drawing, get better with sketching and mostly be more confident with my own work. Comparing the exercises during this semester to those from the first semester, the tasks were certainly more challenging. We did not only focus on the model herself but we started to pay attention to the environment, atmosphere and shading, too. However, they were not only challenging I found them also more interesting and creative. When I reflect on my work during this semester, I can capture them much faster, although I am still much focused on details. I am trying to be quick but precise at the same time. In my opinion, I am starting to develop my own sketching style which still is not what I want it to be, but I am able to work with it without feeling frustrated.

I really would like to develop my drawing style to a uniform art style but I need to work really hard for very long time to achieve that. I am aware that a consistent art style is something which takes many years to develop and working on it will never end. In the past months, I have become fond of combining drawings and sketches with handwriting. When I look at sketchbook pages of Melanie Ford Wilson, her drawings are something that I would like to achieve in the future. Her semi-realistic style combined with handwriting is very precise and there is a story behind every piece of her work, which shows her creativity. I plan to buy a new sketchbook for summer to practise loose sketching or semi-realistic drawing combined with hand-written text or independent words which can improve my drawing skills as well as my illustration ideas, which is very important to me as an illustration student.

I need to start sketching with different media. For my sketches, I usually use a mechanical pencil with 4B graphite lead but I want to try working with a variety of dry media such as charcoal, Gioconda, soft and oil pastels, pen and markers, or wet media like watercolours, acrylic paint or gouache. Gay Kraeger’s or Cathy Johnson’s watercolour sketches mixed with black line marker inspire me to work more on using wet media more than I do.

Picture no.2: Cathy Johnson’s sketchbook

                                  Picture no.1: Gay Kraeger’s sketchbook                                                                                               

I know that I usually go with my mechanical pencil because I feel like I have more control in what I am doing, although I am not erasing my sketches anymore, but with watercolours I am not able to erase light parts of the picture and I have to work on the picture as a whole, which is exactly the thing I need to do. It would make my drawings more expressive and looser. In my sketches from the Hive I can see that the more comfortable I was, the better and looser my sketches were. I can compare my three sketches of my classmate Kristina. It is obvious that I was quite tense during the first one where she is sitting next to a bookshelf, drawing. The other two sketches of her lying on a sofa and where she is drawing in an armchair are definitely looser and more accurate. But I don’t want to improve only in drawing people. One of the lessons reminded me that I need to start drawing animals, which is one of my biggest struggles, even bigger than human anatomy. I should probably start with the anatomy of different animals and their skeletons because I think it’s the best way to understand how they move and then naturally sketch as much as possible. I will probably visit a zoo during

the summer holidays to sketch animals in their natural environment and their movements, which may be very useful for me as an animation student.

                                   

                                                                            Pictures no. 3,4,5: Sketches of Kristina

                                 

When I compare my charcoal drawings from the first semester and from the second semester, I think I can say there is a definite improvement. My favourite charcoal technique is erasing charcoal to make dramatic light and I am happy with those four homework drawings of dark, spooky compositions. I think the subtle lights in the darkness make the drawings mysterious and a little scary. On the other hand, I still struggle to make tonal drawings using charcoal. Someday I would like to achieve a result like a Slovak artist Lukáš “Lukéro” Krč, whose charcoal, graphite pencil and soft pastel artworks are mesmerising. Everything is smooth, realistically shaded but also textured and expressive at the same time. I still can’t achieve a tonal variety of many different shades with charcoal, but I am doing my best and I am sure that with more practice I will be able to shade with charcoal and make realistic yet textured drawings.

Picture no.6: Lukáš Krč’s drawing

Although I wanted to use more coloured media, I didn’t have many chances to use colour this semester. We usually worked with charcoal or graphite pencil, however, I made few drawings/paintings using colour, for example, a portrait of my favourite singer or two drawings from the lecture, which are done with coloured pencils, or drawings of architecture are mixed media combined with watercolour. Although I use coloured media quite often, so I am usually confident with them, these times it was a challenge for me. When I work with coloured pencils it always takes many hours to finish a drawing because I focus on details and I want to make it as realistic as possible, while this semester I focused on the speed and I made it as simple but as three-dimensional as possible.  My watercolour paintings are mixed with lines drawn with charcoal (the cathedral) or line marker (polish crooked house). I used watercolours to set the mood of those pictures. In the picture with the crooked house, I used vibrant colours to make it “fevered”, like a hallucination, where nothing looks normal. In the picture with the cathedral, I used more realistic, earthy tones to show real colours of the majestic building to show how transcendent it really is and I also wanted to add an “old” sepia look like we can see in old paintings.

Picture no.7: Crooked house

Picture no.8: The Cathedral

                                                                                        

When I look at my other portraits from the sketchbook or from the lessons and compare them to my self-portrait from the first semester I can’t really say what else I have improved, because I used a different style and I was drawing from photos, not a mirror. However, when I compare them to my previous portraits I had drawn from photos, I can say that my speed clearly increased, because a year ago I wouldn’t have been able to draw a portrait on A3 sized paper in less than an hour. Of course, it is not as detailed as I would usually draw from a photo but details weren’t the main point of this task. I am quite happy with the proportions although they are not completely accurate and now I can see which angles and proportions are wrong. I am satisfied with shading on the portrait of my friend because he looks three-dimensional and his face is coming out of the picture. It does not work very well in the drawing of an old photo of David Bowie and I think it’s because of the white background which does not match with shadows on his face.

Picture no.9: Portrait of a friend

Trying to capture movement was very challenging for me because it was my first attempt. I can say that my homework drawings are clearly better than my drawings from the lecture. Nevertheless, when I compare them to Patricia Hannaway’s drawings of movement my sketches are still not loose enough and I need to improve my anatomy drawing skills. As an animation student, I know this is the main thing which I need to practise a lot and I plan to do it during the summer break. I should try to draw movement with the action line which is, according to Patricia Hannaway, the best way to start drawing a human figure in action. Again, I have focused too much on the realistic portrayal of the figure, which makes me slower and unable to capture the movement quickly enough but I try to do it quickly which makes it more anatomically incorrect.

Picture no.10: Patricia Hannaway’s drawing

Picture no.11: My drawing of movement

In the conclusion, I think I am more aware of my mistakes; I just need to be brave and go out of my drawing comfort zone, which I do more and more, especially in sketching and observational life drawing. My drawing and painting skills have certainly improved during this year and so have my observational skills. My most appreciated improvement is definitely sketching human body anatomy and proportions because before I started with life drawing lessons I couldn’t draw figure at all. This module also improved my reflecting, evaluating and criticising skills which I can use on my own work to enhance my drawing skills. Overall, I am happy with my progress and I hope that next year I will be much better than I am now.

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Bibliography

Bahr, B. (2008). American Artist: Drawing. 1^st ed. [pdf] pp 62-63. Available at: http://www.utdallas.edu/~melacy/pages/Drawing/Patricia-Hannaway.pdf [Accessed 19 Apr. 2017]

Gregory, D. (2017). An Illustrated Life. 1^st ed. Cincinnati, Ohio: HOW Books, pp. 104-109, 138-143, 250-255.

Lesson 9 - Location drawing The Hive

The last drawing lesson was location drawing in The Hive. I was worried again because I am still not confident with my sketching and my first sketches only confirmed my worries - I wasn't satisfied with them at all. I was nervous so I couldn't draw properly and it wasn't loose enough. But as I continued drawing, I could see how my sketches look better and better as I started sketching with mechanical pencil. Drawing with my mechanical pencil makes me more confident because I feel like I have control in what I am doing and I tried to draw as loose and relaxed as possible. As I wrote in my essay, when I compare the first sketch of Kristina drawing next to bookshelves to the other two sketches of Kristina (lying on a sofa and drawing in an armchair), I can see that in the first sketch I was nervous and the other two sketches are much better than the first one. I am aware of that I need to be able to sketch with different media but I am happy that I made such a big progress at sketching with at least one medium and motivates me to continue doing it.

Lesson 8 - Riverside walk

This lesson we did location drawing around the river Severn. I met friend Addison and he joined me, so I sketched him looking at the river and sitting on a bench and I also did few sketches of ideas I wanted to draw.

Then I tried to draw the one with bridge and river but after two attempts with charcoal and Gioconda, I wasn't satisfied with it at all. Now, looking at it, I don't think it's that bad, but back then I felt desperately again, so I left it for another day.

When I came back to the riverside, I decided to start with the house in the docks but I put in next to the river because I though it will look more aesthetically pleasing. I also added few trees in the background. I still wasn't really happy with my drawing skills so I changed charcoal for Gioconda and I tried to draw something else. I liked those old crooked willows so I drew them, except I removed people and a bench. I was happy with this drawing and I think it's the most successful one. Then I tried to draw the bridge again, using a continuous line technique and although I am not very happy about it and I also forgot to draw Addison there, I finished it and moved to the last drawing. I wanted to draw people as well so I added a couple walking next to the river. I tried to draw sky with clouds again and I think it looks better than in the drawing of an amusement park from the Christmas break homework.

Lesson 7 - Life drawing

In this lesson, we again started with quick sketches. The less time we had, the more complicated it was and I found out that I have to do this exercise more, although I think the one-minute sketch is quite successful and I also think the 30-seconds one isn't really bad. Those shorter ones were very difficult to capture, because I just started drawing and I had to finish, I didn't even had time to think about how to start it.

The next exercise was fun but a bit confusing, because we drew the same pose three times from a different angle but on the same sheet of paper, covering the last one. Although we used a different media for each drawing, the more lines I had there, the less I could see what I am drawing. However, I think the drawing is quite good and proportions are almost correct. I also think it was a good exercise to try different media and colours.

I am happy with my last two drawings from this lesson. I think I can say that proportions in this first one are drawn almost correctly, although Mel's head was falling lower and lower during the drawing. I didn't have enough time to do the shading but I think the shaded part is three-dimensional and it's coming out of the paper properly. In the second one I tried to use coloured pencils and this time I did all shading except the head, which is also a bit incorrect to the body. But I think the body looks good, it's also coming out of the picture and the proportions look okay to me. Unfortunately, I forgot to sketch the space around her and the scarf she was lying on is sketched only with yellow pencil, which makes it not very visible and then I didn't have enough time to draw it so she looks like floating in the white space.

Homework - movement

For the homework, we were supposed to draw 4 drawings of movement. First two drawings are from a primary reference, which is life drawing. I think I did much better than in the lecture because I knew what I am going to do and also it was a smaller format or paper.

For drawings from secondary reference, I found videos on youtube. The first is a girl dancing contemporary dance. In the video, there were tow girls but I decided to draw only one of them and I took approximately one minute part of the video (LINK HERE). At first, I drew a small thumbnail to see how she moves and plan how to lay out space on the paper. I think it looks quite well and I found it challenging because she was moving very quickly and she did so many different movements. Especially the first part (on the left side) was difficult to capture.

For the second one I wanted to try something slower, so I took approximately 40 seconds of the intro from the official music video of The 1975 - Somebody else which was easier to draw than the dancing one but I still had to plan how to draw him walking in the room to the sofa. I also started with a small thumbnail in the corner to plan it and then I drew the sink, the sofa and a line of his movement. Overall I am quite happy with this homework because I can see the progress from the drawings I did in the lesson.

Lesson 6 - Movement

This lesson we started with quick sketches again. They are not really bad, although the proportions are still not perfect. Then we continued sketching Mel constantly moving between 3 different poses, which was really difficult because she was moving and the poses were not easy to capture, especially from that angle. I can see that the upper half of Mel's body looks like it is drawn from a totally different angle than her legs, which makes it really wrong.

Then we moved to another exercise, which was even more difficult. I have never tried to capture movement like this before, so I struggled a lot, trying to draw someone who is moving, especially when my anatomy drawing skills aren't really good. I need to find out how to draw quicker so I will be able to capture a moving person better.

After drawing movement, we did exercises where we could choose what do we want to focus on. I tried to do different drawings of the whole body with and without shading where I focused on the foreshortening and proportions, I did a hand detail and feet details because drawing hands and feets is one of my biggest struggles. I also tried to sketch a classmate with an easel. My favourite drawings from this exercise are those two with the whole body and the hand, I think they are the most successful ones and I think I am much better at drawing human body than I used to be.

On another paper, when Mel changed pose, I tried to focus on her face and I drew two portraits, one with shading and one without it. I think they are both quite good, I like the shading on the first one, Then I tried to draw a hand and a foot again, the foot from this angle looks definitely better than the one before. I also like how the tonal figure without sketching and lines turned out. The last two drawings of the whole model were drawn with different media, the charcoal one took only a few minutes, the one drawn with a graphite pencil looks proportionally better.

Homework - Three-dimensional drawing

For the homework, we were supposed to create two pictures with techniques we did in the lesson. For the continuous line I drew my room in the halls and I still find a bit difficult to draw space around me without measuring it at first, although it was easier on A3 format than on A1.

For the tonal drawing, I chose to draw outdoor, because I am not as confident with drawing natural objects as I am with man-made objects. The place with rocks next to Charles Darwin building looked nice so I found a good composition with rocks in the foreground and also background and I took a picture of me. I used it as a reference for the drawing, Unfortunately, I didn't have sugar paper, so I used my sketchbook and I tried to shade with charcoal, which is one of my struggles, to make a variety of grey shades with charcoal. I think it worked quite nicely.

Lesson 5 - Three-dimensional drawing

This lesson's warming up exercises were drawing the space around us in a continuous line. I found it quite difficult because I couldn't stop drawing and measure distance, perspective and proportions of all objects in the classroom. However, I find my first sketch quite successful. The second one isn't as good as the first one. We exchanged places with my classmates, to draw it from another angle and the first angle was probably better for me. Maybe I shouldn't draw so much empty space on the left side, although there are those white blocks.

Then we continued with drawing Mel. This time we focused on space, three-dimensionality, light and shadow. We were drawing on sugar paper of much smaller size than we usually draw. I am not used to drawing on paper of different colour than white so it was interesting to try a new technique with white chalk. I think my drawings are all quite successful, although I can see my mistakes. I like how the model's body looks in the first drawing but the blocks behind her could have been shaded a bit differently because they aren't as three-dimensional as they should be. Tops of the blocks should be definitely darker on the furthest side. In the second picture, I think the model is too dark and shadows on the walls don't make so much sense. Especially the wall on right shouldn't be as white as it is. In the third picture Mel's body looks three-dimensional. This time I tried to smudge it together a bit and I quite like how it worked. I could work more in the background because it looks rushed and unfinished.

Homework - Animals

For the homework, we were supposed to create another composition with Mel and animals using textures from the lecture. I decided to be a bit playful with it and I created a picture with Mel sitting in the bottom corner in front of straight lines which represents today's strict world full of stereotypes. There is an owl sitting on a branch growing from the texture which means that there is a way, a connection from the mainstream, where you can find wisdom, which symbol is the owl. Flying birds show freedom from today's conservative society. I wasn't sure if it's exactly what we were supposed to do, so I tried to do my best and add the story behind it.