(SEMESTER TWO) Week 2: Close Ups

WEEK 2: CLOSE UP WORK - EXPRESSIVE HANDS AND PORTRAITS

Unfortunately having missed week 1, semester 2 started with week 2 for me! We were starting by focusing on faces and hands as lots of people had requested specific skill sessions for the new semester.

I really enjoy drawing faces and hands but can sometimes find them challenging so I think this session was valuable in getting a more technical understanding in how to approach these subjects.

Series of quick experimental drawings - 20 secs x 3, 30 secs x 2, 1 min x 2.

More experimental quick drawings - 2 min x 2, 2 min blind x 2, and non dominant hand 5 min x 1.

These experimental drawings were a good exercise to kick off the session and get used to approaching the subject in a less conventional manner. I found that the quicker drawings (20 and 30 seconds) often turned out more realistic/better proportioned than my longer attempts, where I sometimes fell into my own drawing style and lost accuracy. The blind drawings had a similar outcome - despite looking more abstract the quality of line is a lot more fluid and interesting than the faces I tried to keep realistic.

5 min continuous line

This drawing used continuous line and we couldn't remove our pencil from the paper. I always find this technique useful as it makes you consider things in relation to one another, and you think about composition and quality of line more than you usually would. A successful element of this piece for me is the variation of line that I used to create tone and depth - for example around the edge of the face and nose where I used more pressure for a darker line to separate from the hair. This teaches me that you don't always need shading to create depth. I don't think my accuracy is brilliant, however, but in the time space of 5 minutes I am pleased with the outcome and found that working quickly is getting easier for me!

5 mins planning, 5 mins mark making - 5B pencil

5 mins planning, 5 mins mark making - charcoal

I found it especially interesting how switching between markmaking techniques could have such an effect on the emotion and quality of the final outcome. This is particularly obvious in these side by side images, where the left image hasd been drawn with 5B pencil and the right with charcoal. Despite both taking 10 minutes, and using 5 minutes for planning, 5 minutes for mark making each, the results are very different. The pencil piece came out quite soft, loose and gestural with a more tonal quality, while the charcoal and the varied mark making techniques gave the right hand image a harder, more linear and contrasting look.

15 mins varied mark making - 6B loose pencil

This drawing is my favourite of the session and in my opinion the strongest piece. Taking inspiration from the previous exercise I tried to bring a wide variety of marks into the piece and not use too many 'outlines'. As a result I think it gave the piece a dynamic and lively feel which works quite well with the interesting angle I was drawing from!

15 mins mark making - only 1cm marks allowed - 3B pencil

Although this piece has some proportion issues, I like the mark making technique we were using as I had not attempted it before. It was quite a challenge to limit myself to lines of 1cm or less, but meant that the end result was very different to my usual work and forced me out of my comfort zone with drawing style. I found it interesting to vary the direction of the marks to suggest tone and the direction of light and shadow, and learn that this could be used in place of solid lines to define certain shapes.

10 mins silhouette outline - 2B pencil

Looking just at the outline of the face and shoulders gave me the opportunity to focus more on proportion and negative space definition. In that respect I think this piece is more successful than some other drawings from this session. Once again directional lines were useful here, however the simplicity of the exercise meant that they had to be placed more carefully as there was no tone to bring the image to life. I found that some areas needed only a few lines to suggest the shapes which stopped overworking and heaviness.

10 mins silhouette negative space - 2B and 3B pencils

Again, this image was focused around negative space so required lots of focus and continuous looking and checking! It was challenging to just focus on the outline rather than adding any detail, but it gave a bold and contrasting result.

10 mins proportion study - charcoal

We then moved on to hands. My position made things a little tricky as I wasn't massively close to the model, however it meant I was forced to constantly be looking and staying focused, which is good practice for life drawing! For a quick study in charcoal I think this piece turned out okay, and I tried to remember the previous exercises when drawing my lines so they stayed loose and gestural. However, I do think I relied on my own imagery in this drawing, for example with the mug, which does look a little too stylised. I need to remember to not retreat into my own drawing style and what I think it should look like.

10 mins mark making tonal study - 4B pencil

In contrast this drawing is much more successful both in accuracy and style. The limitations of the technique meant I had to rely on what I could see and this meant it became more realistic and proportionally correct. I enjoyed bringing tone into the image, and experimenting with layering marks to build this up. Also, even though I did not finish in the 10 minutes, I find this half-finished effect somewhat effective as it lets the viewer's eye fill in the spaces.

20 mins line and tonal study - 4B pencil

This image is a longer version of the previous one and continues to improve with use of tone and line. I brought what I had learnt about variation of line, mark making and directional tone into the image, and I think it works well as a striking piece. The position of the hands could probably use some refining, for example, I should maybe have involved some measuring techniques to check the lengths of the fingers and the angles. Despite this, I think there's a lot I can take away from the image.

10 mins tonal studies (2 attempts) - 6B pencil

I am also pleased with this final image, which I had two attempts at. The shorter time allowance meant I was working more quickly which is reflected in the expressive lines. I find that as a result the hands look quite accurate and have a sense of freshness and life about them. 

I really enjoyed this session as a way to kick off the semester of drawing. Not only did it teach me lots of technical skills in general, that could be applied to a range of drawing tasks, it also refined my approach to specifically detailed drawing areas, such as facial features and hands.