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Pencil drawing

wow! Great work!

I'd post my zebras drawing. But, you'd know me for the fraud I am!

And that is true about ships....

I'm not going to mention the whole Hitler thing. He could draw buildings, but not people. (psycho music please):D
 
I agree--the second is my favorite, B S, but they are all very good.

I used to work retail with a guy who stood at the counter working on pointillist drawings. The "click click click" of his pen on paper got a little old after a while. Then, whenever he started working on it, I would watch him and mutter, "dotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotodotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdotdot" as he drew, until he either laughed or got angry.
 
You have to be careful when you taunt an artist. I think someone once said "the pen is mightier than the sword" and at the very least it hurts when a pen (or pencil, I have suffered both) is driven into your flesh. This was NOT done by my wife though, she is very nice.
 
Not that anyone seems to care either way, but for the record I do think JK's work is good. Certainly several orders of magnitude better than anything I could do.
 
Bless thee in all the work of thy hand

TragicMonkey said:
. . . don't be afraid to experiment with different mediums. . . . you don't have to please anyone but yourself.
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Now that is the best advice this month.

We live in a blessed age of artistic latitude, maybe the freest it's ever been. Most people, whether they realize it or not, can look at almost any species of visual art and appreciate what it offers, and on its own terms. Yes, by god, we should all try our hands at as many different media as we can - and if somebody manages to invent a new one (unlikely, but worth a try), then we should all give that one a whirl. (Yeah, I know, I'm saying should as if we had a stern duty. Well, maybe we do.)

As for only pleasing yourself: If you can do that much, you've done a great deal. The wider worth of the things we create won't be apparent for hundreds of years.
 
I once tried switching mediums in an attempt to improve my art, but she ended up channeling the spirit of some dude who lived in France 30,000 years ago. We ended up with bison and horses smeared all over the dining room walls. Nice art, but sheesh, what a mess. My wife ended up yelling at the medium, who's a petite little thing named Jenny, "Get your hairy Cro-Magnon ass outta my house!" as I looked on, guiltily, with big clay pots of powdered ochre and charcoal in my hands.
 
Re: Bless thee in all the work of thy hand

sackett said:
The wider worth of the things we create won't be apparent for hundreds of years.
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You mean the world must wait until 2205 to appreciate Cap'n Bloodbucket and the Monkeys of Doom, my novel in progress? I mourn for the intellectual void that will engulf the planet until then.

It's a tender coming-of-age tale about a reclusive art school girl who decides to take revenge upon her overbearing parents by becoming a pirate, with the aid of some demonic monkeys she won at a carnival booth.

If I take out all the sex, I can market it as a children's book and it'll be a shoo-in for the Newberry Medal, if they still give that thing out. Johnny Tremain, eat your heart out.
 
It might be years before you're truly appreciated for your brilliance, Tragic Monkey, but in the meantime you might be able to make a little money by turning it into a Lifetime Original Movie.
 
Bluegill said:
It might be years before you're truly appreciated for your brilliance, Tragic Monkey, but in the meantime you might be able to make a little money by turning it into a Lifetime Original Movie.
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Hmm. That means either Nancy McKean or Judith Light would play the Cap'n. I guess the other could play the lead monkey.
 
TragicMonkey said:
Hmm. That means either Nancy McKean or Judith Light would play the Cap'n. I guess the other could play the lead monkey.
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Don't forget about Patty Duke.
 
Joshua Korosi said:
I have many talents you don't know about...yet. :cool:
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I could ask for it in private but somehow I have this strange feeling that it wouldn't be appropriate...so I am doing this in public.

May I have one of your drawings? A tiny one! Sketch a pyramid in the desert, that will do fine!
 
Cleopatra said:
I could ask for it in private but somehow I have this strange feeling that it wouldn't be appropriate...so I am doing this in public.

May I have one of your drawings? A tiny one! Sketch a pyramid in the desert, that will do fine!
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Absolutely not. I only use tiny sketches (thumbnails) to plan large drawings.

However, I will make a larger drawing of a pyramid (etc. :D ) for you. Since the paper I use for real drawing is too big to scan, I can only post a photo of it here. I'll mail the original to you when it's finished.

Unlike the ships I posted, this will be a complete project, so it will take some time. And unfortunately for you, as of this post I've already begun working, so it's too late to say "nevermind".
 
:)

My flame, how shall I be able to thank you for that? I am not that talented. I only know how to cook and write cooking erotica for Playboy. Maybe the title of my next story will be " The bee-keeper"( but honey creates such a mess in cooking....) :)

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmouts
 
Cleopatra said:
:)

My flame, how shall I be able to thank you for that?
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I'm sure I'll be able to think of something.


Meanwhile, in case those of you tuning in are interested at all, let me give you a rundown of the tools I use.

Paper

Yes, of course there's the paper. For finished projects I use 100% cotton fiber sheets with a medium finish. Sketching and practice is done on lighter-weight (and cheaper) drawing pads. I use all-white paper.

Pencils

I use graphite, and occasionally charcoal. Drawing pencils come in several grades, ranging from soft, dark 8B to hard, light 8H. I have personally never needed or used anything harder than 2H. Here's a little chart I made to help you out:

pencilchart1.jpg


The softer, smudgier stuff is on the left, the harder stuff is on the right. Graphite hardness is controlled by the amount of clay mixed with it - the more clay, the harder and less smudgy the graphite. When drawing, I typically start the "wireframes" with a 2H and move left from there as the work develops.

Erasers

I have three. My "working eraser", which I consider as much a drawing tool as my pencils, is kneaded rubber. It's pliable, like modeling clay, and it can be shaped as necessary. It's easy to keep clean - just knead it. My "mistake eraser" is a small Artgum cube, and I have a plain white vinyl eraser for finishing and cleanup.

Blenders

There are three kinds - tortillons (rolled-up paper, more or less) for precision blending; thick, sandable paper "stumps" for medium-sized areas; and chamois cloth for large areas like skies and clouds.

My drawing "kit" is rounded out by a small metal pencil sharpener and a "pad" of sandpaper for the stumps and tortillons. All of this, by the way (except for the paper, of course) fits into a little 8 x 2 x 2 inch pouch which fits in my coat pocket and can be carried anywhere.

...


When starting a big project, like Cleopatra's "pyramid in the desert" (yeah, just a pyramid? Don't think so...), I work in stages. The very first thing I do is create what's called a "thumbnail" - a 5-by-5-inch miniature version of what the finished drawing will look like it. It is a very rough sketch with no blending values. In it, I decide what elements I want in the finished drawing, and proportion and scale them correctly. Doing this in the thumbnail helps resolve conflicts that might later arise in your drawing. Nothing sucks like spending hours on a project only to find out near the end that nothing is working together right because you have no frame of reference.

Next, and possibly the longest step, is the study, or practice, period. That's where I'm at now. In this step, you look through your thumbnail, seperate the individual elements, and practice each one over and over. If you're not sure exactly what something looks like, go get your books and photos and find out, and then start practicing it. For this project, I'm practicing things like columns...

column.jpg


and river boats...

rboat1.jpg


...and other things, of course. I'll practice until I'm comfortable and confident at drawing all these objects from every angle. Doing this cuts down the amount of "mistake erasing" on your final project dramatically. Earlier in my life, as I was learning to draw, I'd conjure up a picture in my head and start trying to draw it, only to give up in frustration when I couldn't draw something perfectly. Back then I didn't understand the concept of "sketching study" as opposed to actual drawing. Now I do, and it makes a difference.

And the last step, naturally, is the finished drawing. It might be a few days or even a couple of weeks before you get to this step, but the hard work pays off.

Well, there's a long-winded heads-up for all of you. I can't wait to see what the final result looks like. I'll wager Cleo can't wait, either...but, I won't cheat by showing you the thumbnail; you'll just have to tough it out. :D
 
Joshua
Awesome!

I find myself sketching simple little ordinary things, very relaxing.

I enjoy political cartoons and satire too but I'm not very good. Photoshop is definitely a bad influence on me.

The pine tree outside my kitchen window. This was a light pencil sketch before I inked it.
 
One of my first pencil sketches. Can't remember if it's a real person or not... old age...
 
Those are very cool drawings, you clearly have some talent there.

Ten or fifteen years ago I took some figure drawing classes at the local art academy and really enjoyed it. The nude models were always a wide variety of people from both sexes: young, old, heavy, thin, you never knew who was going to show up. I finally figured out that I could phone the school and ask who the model was going to be, and if they gave me a guy's name I'd skip class that night (I'm just not interested in drawing men).

If anyone here enjoys drawing even a little, I'd recommend taking a figure drawing class class once or twice a week at night. And if you like the drawing class you might want to try a painting or clay sculpting class next. One of the things I like about drawing or painting is that it's a good escape, when I'm working on something I totally forget about everything else for a couple hours.

It's been a while since I've taken a class, I might have to see what's being offered for the next term.
 
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