Perspective: Check and log

What problems did you find in executing perspective drawings?

Initially I had a lot of problems… but with practice I began to understand where I was going wrong. Getting to grips with the concepts of eye level and vanishing points took me time but helped a great deal and  was all new and useful learning. I discovered the importance of getting the angles of the receding lines correct and how to check these. I also discovered that my eye plays tricks on me with regards to foreshortening of objects in the distance and that I had to measure these  to get them right.

Make notes on the merits of using rulers to guide you.

There are two ways to use a ruler – to measure and also to draw straight lines. I found measuring (as above) to be really useful to get overall proportions and the foreshortened objects correct.

I  found that using a ruler to draw straight lines resulted in the appearance of a technical drawing. It also detracted from my observation so I found, for example, that  I would end up with a straight line but an incorrect angle. I gave up using the ruler for straight lines because I preferred the slightly looser look and I could work more spontaneously. For both exercises I drew our home and as it is an old cottage, it did not lend itself to absolutely straight lines.

Exercise: Parallel perspective – an interior view

View through to kitchen – drawing pen and 3b pencil

This was a tough exercise to begin the perspective project with and my early attempts did not fill me with  confidence. But after several rough practice sketches which I marked up with vanishing points and eye level I eventually I started to understand where I was going wrong.

My difficulty was in getting to grips with the fact that what your eye thinks it sees isn’t what you need to put down on paper in order to capture the perspective. Although I have drawn without a ruler, I found that  to get to grips with the compression of objects in the receding distance (foreshortening) I needed to do some measuring because I couldn’t trust my eye alone. Each time I was surprised at just how compressed the objects need to be, the radiator and curtains, for example.

Earlier pencil drawing – doorway too wide. Vanishing points not meeting correctly.

I put off and put off doing my final drawing for this exercise and didn’t get it done  until after completing the Townscapes project.  I think  I needed time for  the learning to sink in. I’m not displeased with the end result because it is so much better than my initial drawing and rough sketch.  I live in a 16th Century cottage and very little is straight – that’s my excuse and I’m sticking to it!

Initial rough sketch

Diagrammatic sketch

 

Exercise: A limited palette study from your sketches

Buttermarket, Stowmarket – Sunshine between showers (coloured pencils)

For this picture I abandoned the Conte pencils used in the previous exercise and opted for coloured pencils, preferring their subtlety as it suited the old town scene better.

In a break between the rain showers a rare glow of light fell on the top half of the buildings in the Buttermarket in Stowmarket, which is really little more than an alleyway with buildings, old and not so old, on either side.

What has worked

The limited colour palette (red, light brown, black pencils, white from the paper itself, plus grey-blue ink) suited this picture and gives it a stillness… with a slight sense of foreboding (not  intentional) because of the shadows and slightly  dodgy looking character.

Using medium textured cartridge paper kept the colours light and subtle too. The blue-grey ink wash across the pavement, and windows gives a slightly wet, reflective look, which feels right. The perspective lines of the buildings are not perfect but reasonable. The contrasting areas of light and shadow enliven the picture. There is a foreground, middle ground and background, and sense of distance. The ground level was uneven and I think I’ve conveyed this.

What hasn’t worked so well

The face of the building on the left looks a little dented. I think this is because the main bottom window was actually built out slightly and I’ve flattened it. The building in the distance is a little less sharply focused than the others but I could have made this even less defined. Some of my vertical lines are a little out… this is something I need to keep an eye on as I think they are straight when I’m working and then realise later when I step back that they are not. The figure looks as though he is frozen to the spot as there’s not much sense of movement about the feet / legs.

I enjoyed drawing this.  My confidence in drawing buildings and tackling perspective  is beginning to grow and the techniques learnt have been (and will continue to be) extremely useful.

A sketchbook of townscape drawings

The weather has been so bad that I had to visit our local town of Stowmarket several times just to get some photos I could work from. Rain was just a cloud away on all three occasions. I was plagued by dull grey skies that revealed no shadow or light on two visits but, hurrah, during the third visit there was a break in the downpour and the sun came out. It made all the difference. I know now why so many artists head for the south of France!

I focused on the Buttermarket, which is fairly dark alleyway with higgledy piggledy buildings, some ancient, some with modern frontages, either side. It isn’t a very exciting view but it does have a bit of atmosphere, and some drawing challenges in terms of perspective. I did two pencil sketches and an exploration in colour.

Sketch 1, Buttermarket, Stowmarket (pencil)

Sketch 1: Looking from the edge of the market square to the church. This was a very grey day (around about 2pm) with no shadows. It was quite busy for Stowmarket as it was market day. I chose not work further on this because I felt the lack of light and shadow was going to make a  dull picture.

Sketch 2, Buttermarket, Stowmarket (pencil)

Sketch 2: Looking from the church down the Buttermarket to the edge of the market square. It was around 2pm on a quiet Sunday. It had been raining and then a very bright sun appeared and created light and shadow. This was the sketch  I developed further because I liked the mix of old and new and the rooftops, and also the light was giving me something to work with.

In both sketches I left out a street lamp because it wasn’t sited in a place that complemented the overall picture. I also left out bins and chairs outside the cafe.

Sketch 3: Buttermarket, Stowmarket (Conte pencils)

Sketch 3: Exploring light and shadow and colour. This was useful prep for the limited palette study and enabled me to experiment with shadow, light, tone and the detail of the cobbles in the foreground.

In the end I decided  to use coloured pencils for the limited palette study instead of Conte crayons as the picture seemed to call for softer colours.

Exercise: Drawing statues

Statue of Cardinal Wolsey, St Peter’s Street, Ipswich (pencil)

Final version (post tutor report) with the lines of the paving stones adjusted to improve the linear perspective

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thoma Wolsey statue
While sketching in St Peter’s Street for the ‘Study of a townscape using line’  I noticed a wonderful statue of Thomas Wolsey and just before the rain came down in buckets I managed a good look and got some photographs, which I used to draw from  at home.

The statue, by David Annand, was unveiled in 2011 and although I’ve passed by it before, this was the first time I’d stopped to take a really good look. It is a bronze and has a variety of semi-rough textures. It is situated very close to where Cardinal Wolsey, who was Henry VIII’s Lord Chancellor and a very powerful statesman until he fell from grace, lived.

Photograph of David Annand’s Thomas Wolsey Statue

My attention was particularly caught by the pose; Wolsey is sitting back in a chair with long flowing robes spread out in front of him. This means that when looking straight on, he is sitting some way back. I particularly liked the ruffled texture of the sleeves.

Wolsey used to have his cat at his side when he was presiding over judicial proceedings.

In my initial sketch I got proportions wrong; Wolsey’s body was too long which meant the impact of the long robes was lost. I’ve not shown the sketch here because I rubbed most of it out immediately before deciding to start again using a bigger, A2, sheet.

It was a very grey, overcast day with just a glimmer of light coming from the left. I decided to include the bollards and paving as an indication of place and context but kept the background very simple as a contrast to the more detailed statue. I used a lightly textured cartridge paper, which leaves some weave marks and seems to suit the quite ‘rough hewn’ nature of the statue.

I was having trouble with drawing the hand from the photo as I just couldn’t get it to look right, so I photographed my own (not an easy thing to do at that angle) and worked from the photo with more success.

While my drawing has faults, I am pleased with it. The plinth should have extended back a little further and, overall, the statue is very slightly thinner and the robes do not billow out quite so much, but this has not detracted much from the overall impression.

I decided to leave out the cigarette butts discarded around the plinth – in a larger study I think I would have include them because they say something about how different relationships are with statues when they are out on the street rather than inside museums or galleries. There was puddle of dirty water in the robes at the front. I tried to capture it but it looks like a shadow.

I am quite encouraged by this drawing, and reminded how nice pencils are to work with and what a handy thing a putty rubber is for creating highlights.

Horse statue

Karen’s horse statue

I  hadn’t planned to draw another statue but while drinking tea at my friend Karen’s I spotted a statue of a rearing horse in the corner of her dining room. It was made of matt black resin and the darker indented areas had been highlighted in white, just to confuse me. It was lit from the back so the combination made it quite difficult to pick out the light and shadows. But it was a good exercise and fun to draw in my sketch book. I used B and 2B pencils.

Photo of horse statue

 

 

 

In my drawing the top back leg is a little low and a little long.  I seem to have shortened the horse’s back, perhaps in response to it appearing  too long in the statue itself (see photo).