My Journey so Far

After completing the great course by David, I picked up cross hatching as my way of defining form and value.
It started with basic sketches and later on I made some of my favourites including my school SJS Baramulla, where I spent more than 12 years. While sketching that, I felt like I was there. And i relived those moments. My school life.
My other favourite is a local mosque Masjid Bilal, nearby my college. I had the most peaceful time here. Whenever college stressed me out, this mosque was where I was to be found. And in order to keep it closer to me, I had to draw it.

Thanks to David for this unique course. I will surely purchase the next course he creates.

0.05mm and 0.4 mm fineliners, pencils, erasers, sketchbook

Yes it's bad. But things get better.

I felt the need of deliberate practice. So I started with the smallest things possible. The leaves are directly from the course.

This one built my confidence and gave me immense satisfaction. For the first time I was creating from an actual image rather than a sketch. I mapped the values myself for the first time. Still can be better but for now, it's the most cherished piece I have.

Sketching something closer to me. Enjoyed the process more than the result. One thing I realised that the values need to be deleberate. I started with something in mind, but darkened some areas I didn't want to. Later on to balance had to darken other areas. This taught me values and planning.

This is my laptop. I had got some colored fineliners and was trying something new, I did some areas well but overall it's ok ok.

Swift Dzire VXI 2013. I love it. Since I live away from home for my studies, I miss the drive.

I realised that best pieces are often ones that are closer to ones heart. And ones made in absolute peace. I wanted to focus on engine but didn't plan values, so it's dark everywhere and engine compartment is not even the highlight. Still I love some areas like headlights and front bumper. But overall it didn't end up what I planned to.

The direction and width of lines can be used to create complex forms.

On the bright side, I used 0.05mm fineliner and on the shadow side 0.4 mm.
Instead of using a single angled lines, i utilized the angle of the surface.

This helped me in defining shape as well as lighting. To get more dynamic values i can cross hatch. But for simplicity, I didn't.

It's tempting to keep on adding details. But the best state is somewhere in the middle, where you should have stopped and called it done. I had such in this project. But I kept on adding.
Its Ok because after weeks now I see some unintended effects I can learn from. The roof in this images gives a plywood texture. When I did that, it was just fixing a message I had made.
The random lines in sky could have easily been a flock of birds flying together, if I made the lines shorter and in a '<' pattern. The mountains could have been done with .05 mm instead of .4 mm. The roof of the boat, I could have made better if I had referred to original shikara rather than what I had in my reference or I could have improvised. Still I am happy with it. I know I am critical here, but that leads to opportunities to do better and places of improvement. I study my own pieces, and I learn something new, something unintentionally.