Hatching Light and shadow

This assignments was a review on indicating shadow and light by a method of directional hatching and building forms by following the contours of the figure, each study was roughly 45min. The biggest challenge was getting the strokes to describe the direction of the structure of the plane and hatching with consistency as well as with confidence and intent without loosing any of the underlying foundation. I thoroughly enjoyed this assignment and would definitely come back to doing these exercises again in the future as a warm up. It has been a different experience as this method of building form and light has been new to me and something that i wish to continue perhaps implementing in future pieces. Further more continue to develop and build on as i experiment more with this kind of technique and approach.

Hatching Gradients

Practising hatching gradients on these figure silhouette was a great exercise that i would recommend both beginner and seasoned artist try and attempt. It requires paying great attention to how you control the lines and thickness of your strokes whilst attempting to achieve a soft and calm transition of values from dark to light or vice versa. The biggest challenge for me was achieving a smooth gradient with no overlapping dark lines or indecisive stokes without having rough edges. If I was to tackle this assignment again in the future, I would possibly tell myself to be more conscious about the way I apply my strokes and take into account of the direction of the strokes and the density of the lines. I particularly noticed that i struggle doing these digitally and that pencil would be a much easier tool to get the lightness i wanted. 

Hatching_Figures

This exercise was from a class on schoolism on deconstructing figures and anatomy. The aim and goal of the task is to practice hatching strokes to build form and volume with certain directional mark making to describe shapes and simplify the figure to its simplest and clear silhouette. I found it fairly challenging and difficult on what direction of the marks should chosen as intention of what should be defined and essential to communicate. Next is to practice building values through hatching and building form with density of strokes, which something i have never tried tackling before and is out of my comfort zone. The best thing i took away from these assignments was the importance of observation and the skill to visualise any subject to its most basic forms.

Mark making and setting new goals in Art

Mark making with pen and pencil has always been an interesting exercise and worth exploring. The act of making certain decisions when describing form and texture holds its very own challenges even without getting to thought of shadow and rendering light.These six 45 minuet studies are the result of an in depth analysis of old masters and observation of various hatching techniques. They were great fun however sufficiently challenging in order to help me develop my hand eye co-ordination and create marks across the page with intent and confidence.

Drawing from the same reference image six times each with time limit of 45min was a great way to study the structure of the face and where the planes of the faces are. The main things we discovered  was that  observation and the way you interpenetrate certain subject matter can aid the development of a personal style. Direct hatching from the get go has proven to be a great exercise in building confidence for visualising shapes and silhouettes. Portraits were a great way to experiment with shapes and mark making and making varied strokes with alternating direction to build and describe form and value. Certain marks can convey certain material and textures with very decisive strokes ranging from thin to broad with also a rang of overlapping lines to make unique qualities in the surfaces of an object. Personally i find describing the material of fabrics and cloth easier than metal something more hard surface or subtle like jelly or bubble. I feel that practising these digitally are equally important to maintain a sufficient muscle memory when transferring to tablet and a cintiq.

Lock Down

Hello everyone

The last time I made a post was the 16th March 2020. A lot has happened since then, we currently undergoing and facing a unexpected pandemic and have been put down on a lock down for sometime now no way of knowing when it might be lifted. Anyway my hopes right now is to get back on the roller coaster and get back to documenting my art and my artistic development. I've been considering getting back to the basics and the fundamentals of colour and light through traditional painting.
Here is a image of that study with the use of a limited colour pallet. I've tried my best to capture the subtleties of the blue tints in the cast shadows and contrast with warm saturated light with a strong emphasis on the values to show clarity and that is appeasing to the viewers eye.
I tend to find Gouache a challenging medium to paint with but very enjoyable especially when using the alla prima techniques inspired by many of the master artists and Richard Schmit. Which reminds me i still have yet to read through. Another book that I want to read again would be Andrew Loomis Creative illustration and get to grips about the mindset of creating an illustration with a sufficient and yet creative process, being able to tackle new problems with the right mindset is something I've been striving to get better at recently and improve effectively.

Traditional painting is something I've been wanting to get back to doing again properly and now is a great opportunity to do so with the current ongoing situation. Learning again to paint with a physical brush with limited strokes has been a very useful learning experience and eye opening to me because of the restriction. I've realised to get most out of these studies I should set my self a goal of what I really want to achieve from them and really try to apply them to my personal work as much as possible. I noticed the main benefits of working with traditional media is the fact that I now often try to limit the number of layers I make down to at least 3-5 when working digitally and try to be more efficient with every decision I make. I have decided to implement this study as part of my uni work and too use the maximum amount of time more sensibly, and prioritise the work so its the thing i can get out the way so I can start learning new things that will help benefit me in the long run. 

Tonko House and observing realism

This week I have been trying to get back into observing the complexities of colour and light from life. The big challenge of painting objects in diffused light is being able to accurately separate each value structure with its own distinct local value. Limiting to roughly 3-5 values has been a thought process and way of thinking for many acclaimed illustrators and seasoned painters throughout history in order to achieve clarity and to communicate a message in their pieces.

Reflectivity and the start of studying Old Masters.

For this post I wanted to share my studies of leyendecker portraits and the challenge of rendering reflectivity of materials and objects. I feel i learned a lot doing both of these exercises and feel i'm making gradual progress. The next month i will be studying more environments from masters and compositions.