Life Drawing I: Week Seven: Midterm Portfolio

PHOTOBUCKET ALBUM:
Term 1

WHAT I'VE LEARNED
So far I can definitely say that Ive improved and learned a lot from the beginning of the semester. I've enjoyed learning about the human skeleton and the muscles that line each bone and allow our bodies to move. I've noticed that as the semester continues, each lecture and additional information we are given is really helping my human form come together. By being able to watch Amy draw and sketch during the lectures, it allows me some insight about how my arm and hand should be moving with each individual part of the body. I have also truly come to appreciate the skeletons hanging around the classroom. I have quite frequently noticed myself looking at them to be able to get my proportions correct or the underlying shape of the bones correct.

STRENGTHS AND WEAKNESSES
My manikin is definitely a weakness of mine. Normally pretty patient, I have noticed that I tend to get frustrated very quickly when I work with my skeleton. I feel like our skeletons are very different from those in the book and at times its really hard to interpret where exactly each muscle should be connecting and ending on each bone in accordance to other muscles. I would have to say that a strength of my manikin more recently is that I have been trying harder to focus on pushing the muscles together so that they seem to morph together as the muscles on the human body do. At the beginning of our muscles assignment I wasn't giving my muscles nearly as much volume as they should have had so I have also been working to give my muscles more volume and structure so that they lay correctly on my skeleton.

As far as my drawings are concerned, I feel that my weakness is definitely that I need to have more confidence in each line that I'm making. At times I feel as though I'm relying on my eraser way more then I should be. I would also like to improve upon my line weight. Ive noticed that in a drawing if I start to become confident in my line it tends to get super dark and heavy. I would like to keep my line weight on the lighter side of things even when I am gaining confidence in my form. I feel that a strength of my drawing is my waistline. Initially I was having difficultly understanding where the waist should lie between the rib cage and the pelvis. As I am continuing to draw I feel that I have gotten a better grasp on where this thin part of the waist lies.

FUTURE IMPROVEMENTS
As far as my improvements go for the rest of the semester, the biggest thing I hope to accomplish and nail down is more confidence in my strokes when I put them down and when doing this, to also keep my line weight light. I also hope to improve upon my patience with my manikin. In addition I would like to improve upon my relation between my drawings and the model. I feel that at times I tend to look too much at my drawing and little at the model. I hope that by studying the model more and really focusing on each curve of the body as I draw I will be able to create more successful proportions and overall drawings.

Life Drawing I: Week Six: Reflection

GENERAL BLOG
So due to Advisement day on Tuesday of this week, and missing class due to illness on Thursday of this week, I'm not going to have much of a blog.

I forgot last week to talk about my skeleton. I've decided to name him Francis. Overall, I'm not very keen on my skeleton. I feel like I have run into a lot more problems then I had anticipated. The one thing that I am having the most difficulty with is making the muscles with enough volume. After our very first muscles assignment I ended up taking off everything that I had made and re-doing it. I also feel like I am having some trouble with making the muscles look some what realistic. Since I wasn't able to make it to class this week I am hoping to get in this weekend sometime to work on a few drawings.

This semester has definitely been a pretty stressful one for me and this cold has really come at a bad time. Between classes and work, at times I feel like I haven't been able to sit down in days! But that's the life of a college student right? Recently I have been preparing to register for my last semester of classes, get my student teaching squared out, and preparing for Senior Show. I can definitely say that I am getting to the point where I'm ready to get into the schools and apply what I have been learning over the past five years.

Life Drawing I: Week Five: Reflection

THE PELVIS
This week we learned about the pelvis. Due to Amy having a cold, instead of listening and taking notes on her lecture we got to watch a video on the pelvis. Needless to say the video was a bit outdated and hard to watch. I feel like it was much harder for me to both retain and understand the pelvis by watching the video. During Amy's lectures I feel like she is really able to give us information and examples that we will be able to relate to and incorporate into our drawings. With the video breaking the body down into squares did seem to be helpful in my drawings as well though.

By breaking the body into squares it made me more aware of placement of the ribcage verses the pelvis. I quickly noticed that I had been putting the pelvis way to far away from the bottom of the rib cage. After I had adjusted my pelvis distance from the rib cage, at first it looked really awkward. After a few quick drawings though I was really able to see that my body proportions looked much better.

Another thing that I have been having difficulty with is the shape of the pelvis when viewing the body from the side. I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on how the lower back moves into the gluts, but since Amy would like us to draw in our pelvis bones first I've been struggling to get them to look right from the side view.

Overall I'm getting excited to learn more of the body and how the legs and arms will hang and extend from the torso. The torso is such a key part of the body and I know that it is key to have it down before we even try to add any appendages on, but its exciting to think that soon we will be able to proportionally draw the entire human body.

Life Drawing I: Week Four: Reflection

THE RIB CAGE AND THE ABDOMINALS
So this week in Life Drawing we took notes on the rib cage, the abdomen muscles, and the various ways that the body can be visually interpreted as we're drawing. It helped a ton to be able to learn the various angles and how everything looks from these angles. One of the biggest things that I had noticed I was having difficulty with was transitioning my drawing and how they should be looking from the front, back, and side views.

I have noticed that the single most effective thought with the rib cage is that it is shaped like an egg. An egg is a shape that just about everyone knows and because it is spherical no matter what the angle you are looking at the body from, it basically stays the same.

By creating an egg shape for the beginning of my body, I can pretty easily construct the rest of the abdominal area. Since where the rib cage ends is considered the narrowest part of the body, making the transition from stomach to waist to hips has been relatively smooth sailing. The biggest hang up I have noticed as I am drawing the rest of the body core is the placement of the pelvis. On some of my drawings I feel like the body looks pretty well proportioned while other times my body looks way too long.

During class, I have noticed that our initial quick 30 second- one minute gesture drawings are very beneficial to me. Being able to do quick full arm length drawings like that really give me the opportunity to loosen and warm up. I feel like this part of class benefits me by allowing me to make more fluent lines in my longer drawings towards the end of the period.

Life Drawing I: Week Three: Reflection

No Class Held This Week.