Scrupules Session #04 - 10 and 20 minute charcoal sketches, plus 1 still life with drum and clock.

10 minute exercise not lifting the charcoal from the page. This was a good exercise to emphasize the fact that everything is connected and elements of light and shade join together and flow into each other. I think I went a bit overboard with the shading. Next time I'll focus more on the use of line.

Here's a close up of the drawing from the continuous-line exercise. I admit, I retouched a bit after the exercise.

I had a bit of fun with this 10 minute sketch. The light source was below the model and created a decapitated monster shaddow on the ceiling. It would have been great if the model had done a more interestig pose though.
I used some hightlights with white conté to bring up the under lit aspect.

This was a 15 or 20 minute sketch. I tried to be a bit bolder in the marks but as a whole it ended up looking a bit heavy-handed. We were listening to Daft Punk at the time of this drawing... I think I got a bit carried away :)

Here's a close up on of the 15/20 minute drawing. The marks are bolder than my normal technique for a 20 minute drawing and it didn't really work the way I had hoped. Meh, live and learn!

This weeks still life with a bongo drum, clock, 2 old lamps, beer bottle, wine bottle, log of wood and chunk of rock... I'm kinda getting into the still life exercises. It's funny, at the beginning of the course I just saw the still life exercises as a warm up before the model, but it's actually great to have subject matter that doesn't need to move after 20 minutes! And there are so many textures and proportions to consider! I think we spent over 30 minutes on this one. I'm still figuring out how to describe the fabric. The elements are floating too much in this one.

Just a few drawings this week. We didn't do any quick sketches. I tried out some highlights with white conté. I have to get some coloured paper to really make the highlights pop a bit more. We're mostly working with newsprint at the moment.

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Montpellier Creative

http://www.meetup.com/Montpellier-Creative/

I recently started a Meet Up group on www.meetup.com to organize creative events in Montpellier.

The aim is to organize events for artists to meet up and colloborate on creative projects in Montpellier.

Come check it out!

www.meetup.com/Montpellier-Creative

Scrupules Session #03 - Charcoal sketches 1 minute, 3 minute and 20 minute (including 1 still life)

Quick pose where we were encouraged to look only at the model and not the page. 1 minute drawing without looking and 1 minute to correct. A very fun exercise.

Three 1-minute poses.

I think this was a 5 minute pose. I spent time finding the darkest areas of the composition, then ran out of time.

Twenty minute pose. Reworked slightly at home. Something happened between the head and the body though, she looks as if her head isn't attached properly! Oh well!

Still life with watering can and leaves.

Here are some of the sketches from the session yesterday. We did a still life to warm up. This is more interesting than I thought because I have to be much more diciplined about proportion and contrast which then transfers over to the drawing exercises with the model. 

We finished the session with a 20 minute pose which I'm fairly happy with, although I did do some retouching when I got home.

Scrupules Session #02 - Charcoal sketches 1 minute, 3 minute and 20 minute (including 1 still life)

FIrst session in Montpellier

After a long break I am back at the drawing board.
These sketches are a little rusty, but I'm hoping to begin work developing my drawing style over the coming months.