Dynamic Figure Drawing

Dynamic Figure Drawing

“Now we have reached the end of this course. I hope that everything you've learned from these videos has taught you a lot about the academic side of figure drawing: the practical side of figure drawing (and also a bit about the philosophy of working from life.) As you now embark on creating your own Dynamic Figure Drawing for your Final Project, let’s review the different steps you’ll go through. Once you have your studio all set up with your materials ready to go, the lighting prepared, and the model present, remember that you are beginning a 4-hour journey with specific goals along the way. Take care to set and choose a pose that the model can hold, and one that appeals to you, too. Now let me break down into 23-minute Rounds my step-by-step process: ROUND 1:Let’s begin! It’s all about gestures and placement... During the first block of model time of 23 minutes, the main goal is the big block-in of the pose: good gesture and placement on the page (this is your composition you are making!), and big anatomical structures. Avoid getting caught up in details like the portrait, hands, feet, and small-scale anatomy. You’re after the BIG picture here. TECH NOTE: only 2B pencils here ROUND 2: Bring on the shadows and the darkest darks. Once the darkest darks are captured, you need to key all of your shadows accordingly: how much contrast is there between the figure in shadow and the darkest dark? Remember from the third lesson in the second unit that 100% of the shadows occupy a very small part of the value scale. Thus your overall shadow value, when compared to your darkest darks, will be just slightly lighter. Keep these shadows nice and “flat” and simple: avoid the temptation to draw the slight value shifts within the shadow masses. That may (or may not) come later. Again, SIMPLE is the key right now! ROUND 3: Dancing in the lights... Even though you have only dealt with the shadows thus far, you now have your full value range present: the darkest darks to the lightest lights (which are just your plain paper). Now for this next block of 23 minutes let’s dance uniquely in the lights. ROUND 4: And the dance continues...towards the finish line! Continue to fine-tune the masses and relationships in the lights. Remember not to worry about anything in the shadows at this point. Your shadows should be of a stable value and accurate shapes from Round 2. There is MUCH more value range to cover in the lights, so this is where we stay for quite some time (hint: remember what we saw in the third lesson of the second unit). ROUND 5, etc: On to the finish line! For the very first time in the drawing, you are going to concern yourself with all of those wonderful DETAILS you’ve been so patiently waiting to tackle! One of the most important keys to rendering is to always remember the context in which you are working. That means to respect for all the setup work you did in Rounds 2, 3 & 4: if your values from these rounds are correct (and they certainly should be), then everything you add in this final rendering phase should only be slight deviations and variants of those values. If you find yourself making dramatic value changes, then you are likely exaggerating and thus fracturing the harmony of the forms.

So there you have it! I really hope that you enjoyed this voyage we did together and that you now have at your disposal several ways that you can continue your learning and improvement of working from life. It is a richly rewarding art that—after many years of doing it myself—only keeps revealing itself in new and fascinating ways. Be sure to share both your progress and your finished drawing in the forum, and please provide feedback to your fellow students and their projects. This is how we all learn, by providing constructive criticism to our peers. I will of course be chiming in to answer questions, but please remember I am a professional artist behind my easels most of the time, and not behind a computer screen all that much (I don’t even own a smartphone!). So please be patient with me as time seems to move a bit more slowly in my world than in most. Now let’s see some Final Projects! ”

Partial transcription of the video

“Final Project That's it, we have reached the end of this Domestika course. Let's look at what we went through to learn the figure-drawing process. I showed you the materials you need, and also the fundamentals of light and shadow. Then you learned how to improve your visual accuracy and to measure something in space. I also taught you how to welcome a model into your own studio. You learned important aspects about anatomy and some things to keep in mind when working with the live figure. I sketched different poses and also taught you how to manage your time efficiently. Finally, I showed yo...”

This transcript is automatically generated, so it may contain mistakes.

Course summary for: Dynamic Figure Drawing

• Level: Beginner
• 98% positive reviews (603)
• 19575 students
• 5 units
• 29 lessons (6h 33m)
• 9 downloads

• Category

  Illustration

• Areas

  Drawing, Fine Arts, Pencil Drawing, Realistic Drawing, Sketching