Lab 11: Cheater Blinds

I did a second lab this evening, skipping over Lab 10 (because it's late and all of the coffee shops are closed). In this lab, you draw from old family photographs (preferably vacation photos) simple black & white line drawings. This is called "Cheater Blinds" because you are doing a modified blind contour drawing, drawing without looking at the paper for a minute or two and then looking at the paper once in awhile to make sure that your drawing isn't "overlapping too much." The author suggests that you move your hand at the same speed as your eyes when you are drawing.

Here are my first few attempts next to the original photograph:

After drawing the outline with a fine-point permanent marker, you are to go back over the drawing with a finer point permanent marker and add in details, including shading, facial features, and texture. The drawings are to be simplistic and not-too detailed. In the first drawing of Tabitha, I added too much detail to her lips by adding fullness. I toned that down in the next drawing of Gideon. After a few drawings in my sketch book, and feeling more comfortable with the process, I drew a few more on Bristol for ATC cards. Here are those drawings:






Simon's eyes are particularly challenging, as they were in lab 9. After a few attempts, I figured out that instead of being oval-shaped, his eyes have an upward curve on the bottom lid, as well as the top. I tried to reflect that in the ATC card.

Lab 24: Scribbly Drawings

Well, I've been jumping around a bit in the book, trying different sections, but trying to work through each section in order. Today, I went to the "Inspired by Children and Childhood" section and tried my hand at "scribbly drawings." Just as the name suggests, "scribbly drawings" are drawings that you scribble. Using a ball point pen, the idea is to first just scribble on a page for a minute or two, relaxing and trying different scribble designs. Here is my scribble page:

Next, you are instructed to look at something and draw it, using scribbling to create the image. The instructions state that this is not supposed to be a contour drawing. To avoid drawing the outline and then filling it in, the author suggests to start from the middle and go outward.

On my first try, I think I did an exact contour drawing:

Try again! I took a look at an old picture of my husband and myself. This picture, from 1997 is from before we were married. I was 23 years old in this picture:

Well, what do you think? Did I capture the essence of the photograph? I tried to complete these drawings without lifting my pen off the page, thus the connecting lines. Here are a few of my sketch book drawings:

I took these drawings and re-did them, a bit differently. This time I tried looking less at the page to create the one of my husband. I actually like his a bit better. I think the second one of me is too "cultivated."

And, I couldn't resist trying one of the little stuffed penguin that Tabitha loves so much. Here it is: