20 October 2005
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Your October, 2005
YouCanDraw.com Communiqué
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In this months ezine:
1) Drawing Tom Delay
2) Go all the way down to the PS -- see our latest project :-)
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Howdy all,
Well it's been awhile! We're still juggling
computers but everything is working. The only fallout
is that I haven't been drawing the way I'd like to. In fact I haven't been
drawing at all. But the
amazing thing is that once you learn it, it comes right back. Now this months
caricature is of
Tom Delay -- who seems like he ought to be an easy draw. There's ton's of great
pictures on the
web (check out Yahoo or Google images -- both a Boone's farm of images to draw).
Now with all
the resources out there, I was just shaking my head why I couldn't really get
him. And why not?
Well three tries apparently isn't enough :-) And
I'm not worried about it. It's a truism that
seems to go against the grain: in any art quantity comes before quality.
Let me repeat
that: quantity comes before quality. So, I might get back to doing several more
of him, and
I might not, but at least having to get out an e-zine forced me to face the
paper. Might you
be doing the same thing? Avoiding the drawing paper? The amazing thing is that
once you
just do a little drawing - even if it isn't all that great, when you look back
on the day you at
least feel good about trying. But then, hit it again the next day! Try this: shoot for
15-30 minutes
a day
four or five days in a row. Yea! Just go for it once and see if it isn't
easier to get back to it.
Here's the trio: the first picture on the
left, the 2nd on the right
and the third try in the middle:
OK. Here's a great shot of Mr. Delay (from the
Yahoo series of Delay Pics):
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Shadows
And here's a mini of my first rough
drawing of him. If you're going to look for anything in this photo, look
for the shadows. Specifically, squint
your eyes and seek out the areas of the deepest shadows. Now look
at my mini drawing and see if they don't capture at a least a little
of the
shadows in the photo above. I think, they do -- roughly.
The darkest most intense shadows are around the eye on the right, in the
nostrils, under the nose, on the inside edges of the cheeks where they
meet the nostrils, under the upper lip, under the highlight of
the lower lip, in a few of the folds that emanate off the edges of the mouth,
and then under the chin and in the neck folds. Squint until you
see them as distinct and separate shapes.
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My
attempt #1:
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Highlights
Now let's flip it around: Where are the
brightest whites? The brightest highlights?
The light is coming from the right -- is that clear? Convince yourself of that.
So, in
this picture, his face is lit up brightest on the right side of the face ( as
you look at
the picture). Now here's an expert level observation: where do you see secondary
highlights? (What's a secondary highlight? It's reflected light but it's light
that's bouncing
off something from the left - in this case - and hitting him on left side of the his face
(left
side as we
look at this picture). See them there? They're there :-)
Also scan for the overall shape of the head
Ask yourself if you see this pattern: start at
the the narrow forehead, widen too
the cheekbones, stays wide in that jowly part of the cheeks and then the neck
just
kind of tapers into the suit and tie.
Larger quick sketch #1:
Ok. Let's laser in a little closer:
the breakdown on individual parts...
Tom Delay
In retrospect, I think fell into my old habit of
always starting off with a small forehead (I
mean compared to the guy behind Delay -- this other guy has a big forehead
:-). But I think
Delay has such a good head of hair it somewhat obscures or dominates that broad forehead.
So it might work better to
go with
a wider forehead. And I'll add another reason for doing that
in a second. Also note
the heavy
upper eyelids -- you can see I added a little to those in the
smaller pic just
below:
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Mini of Try #2
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Note where the nose joins the forehead:
not a very strong shadow there.
In that case it might work to make a more square-like shape out of the
merging of nose and forehead.
In all pictures of Delay, you can see lots of puffiness under the eyes.
What could be making
this guy so tired? (I'll leave my opinions out of this :-)
So back to the eyes: his eyes really are
big and round -- and I think that's a point I missed
in these two first sketches. The lower lids are bending down and a away
from the actual eyeballs a little too
(look for the highlights
along the lower edge of the eyeballs). I caught that effect a little bit in
the second picture.
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The upper lip really is almost invisible
(especially in the shadow of the mouth), the teeth
in the lower jaw pop up in a subtle way. There's a large gap between the upper
lip and the
lower edge of the nose, which means he has a large "apron of the upper
lip". (Go look that
up in the search tool of your e-sourcebook...or click here
-- you'll need to scroll about half
way down the page and you'll see an example of the "apron of the upper
lip":-)
The mouth curves around to a full lower lip (look
for the highlight in the lip to give you more
hints of that. Also note how gravity is doing it's job on the lower lip and again the
lower lid
of the eyes.
Might seem cruel to look so close...but that's what observation is about.
Realistic or
caricature: it only behooves you to learn to look closer.
Rough sketch number 2
Heading on down to the chin and neck -- there's a
small round point to the chin hid
in those shadows - subtle shadows. Squint again until you start seeing those
shadows
and highlight shapes within the chin.
Take a step away from your drawing to get more
perspective (literally), and to
give
you a better overall view.
Okay. Here's my third try, followed by the
original photo:
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A mini of
My third attempt
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Getting closer :-) I think what I got into the most in this picture
to was drawing the edges
between harder
edges between shadow and highlights. Look close at all the shadows and
see if
you can't see the patterning and double and even triple edges / parallel lines within the
shadows. It's
a simple idea -- and accurate too.
Look for the double and even triple parallel
lines
in almost all the shadows
Lastly --oops I didn't finish the one ear there :-)
And I have to comment about the hair.
Scroll above and see if you can't see the spiral effect in the hair: especially
the one big
wave of hair right that forms almost a curtain over the forehead. Look for the
subtle highlights
and shadows hid within the hair -- and see them as shapes, not
individual hairs. His hair
is basically a series of tubular rolls when he's viewed from the front.
What are the common
patterns of highlight and shadow hid in a tube (a cylinder)? Do a search
of "primitive shapes"
in your sourcebook. Or Google "tube" or "cylinder"
and I'll bet you see those shadows and
highlights jump right off at you.
Oh, almost forgot the nose: make sure you
refer to the horizontal landmarks (see lesson
15). If you look close you'll notice the bottom of the nose falls well
above the "bottom-of-
the-nose-line". What's that tell you? Tells you you now have
permission to pull the nose up
a lot higher towards the eyes. You can still have a short nose, and a large
nose at the same
time. How? In this case, you could play up that bulbous tip.
Very lastly: the Dole on Dole
What? Dole? As in Bob Dole. Yes - exactly. Here's my point. Look at the
picture above. Do
you think it's starting to resemble Tom Delay? A little bit I think. But
also ask yourself this:
whom else does it begin to look like? To me I see a little bit of Robert
Dole. (Remember him?
He ran for awhile in the last presidential race? A stalwart of national
politics.) My point is, it's
always amazing to me how subtle the differences are between some people
whom at first
glance look very different. But as look closer it's their personality
that makes them look so
different. I'm babbling :-). I mention it because I went through this
same gestalt while drawing
the Minneapolis Sportscaster
Mark Rosen -- going through stages of the drawing where he
err, the drawing, appeared just like Randy Quaid to me. Ah the mind
:-)
OK! So you have your assignment:
1) where are the highlights and shadows in a cylinder?
2) If you haven't drawn in awhile, do 15 - 30 minutes of drawing
(drawing
anything! -- how about cylinders with shading and highlights?),
and...
3) if you think two people look alike, see if you can't pick out
what it is about them that
makes them look the same and what makes them look different...
4) and very lastly, look up in any grammar book and see if you're
using "who" and
"whom" correctly. Cuz I'm totally confused at the moment.
Keep on drawing! Warmly,
-Jeff
PS -- check out some of my latest
work: painting.htm
:-)
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