A COLLECTION OF BODY PARTS

Here is a collection of sketches from the final stages of our life drawing class which I actually feel were some of my strongest. I feel these are so successful because it was when I finally really pushed breaking down all of these body parts into planes and showing planes to the best of my ability. I think it is much easier to see these planes and portray them on these more complex body parts rather that the body as a whole. Finding these different planes is very vital in these body parts to give them the intriquite structure that they need.

MUGSHOT.

Overall I am fairly satisfied with my self portrait. I really have been focusing on dividing body parts into separate planes when constructing the form. I think this is one technique I'm finally getting a better grasp on but still need to improve. I feel this to be very important especially in design sketching which i do alot of. To get a better visual representation of a three dimensional object you need to provide cues through axis and planar line work to know where an object curves or contours. One thing I wish I could change about this self portrait is that I would have done it on an easel rather than a drawing table. It resulted in some distortion due to having such a close up and limited view of my sketch.

BEST IN SHOW

FIRST LONG POSE OF THE SEMESTER

RIB CAGE STUDY LONG POSE

LONG POSE DRAWINGGESTURE DRAWING

I think that my figure drawing has come a long with along with my sketching techniques. As you can see the first image is very much done with my stubborn sketchy style where I can't resist to throw on a dark sketchy outline around the whole object. I tried to push different techniques and methods learned in class as much as I could. The techniques I found to be useful and could see improvement definitely stuck. I altered my utensil grip positioning as well as my posture along with sketching stroke methods that I picked up directly from the teacher. I also, although not until later in the semester, worked harder and discovering the different planes of the body in certain areas to create the shape and depth without any sort of shading. I feel much more comfortable with line work rather than intraquite shading so I was right at home and embraced many of these methods. Overall I feel this class was a huge success and will help to continue to improve my sketching.

MY CONTRIBUTION TO THE MANIKEN ARMY

A. B. C.

D. E. F.
This collection of gesture drawings definitely illustrate signs of progression with my technique and understanding of how to create a strong and complete gesture drawing. In drawings A,B, and C my outlining mentality is still very evident although there are sign of understanding some of the internal structures as well. I also struggled with a proportion problem throughout the early part of the semester, always elongating the torso and legs creating almost a fashion sketch figure. In my later sketches, D, E, and F, it is evident that my understanding of internal structure has evolved quite a bit and focus is taken away from outlining and put more on capturing the life and motion of the pose.

DAILY DOSE OF ID

Here is a little taste of an ID project in the works. The task was to redesign an existing hand tool with ergonomic improvements. As you may be able to see my choice was the hand sander or sanding block, an area I felt could be improved greatly dealing with factors of ergonomics and comfort. These pictures are my rough user testing design models. I feel they turned out quite nicely and all held up to vigorous testing. All of my testing is actually complete and the victor was the first design. Now ill go back to the drawing board for small refinements and slave away to build a very realistic final appearance model. Wish me luck!

BUNS 'O' STEEL

The glutes were an interesting task to tackle. My technique for muscle construction became put to the test with the building of these muscles. Unlike all of the back muscles, moving into the legs it becomes much more than simply cutting out the rough shapes of how the muscle looks in the book and pasting them accordingly. Now the factor of layer multiple muscles appropriately was a huge factor in acheiving a final realism to the shape and thickness of the muscle area. I experienced some difficulties with this so obvously took a bit more time but in the end i think turned out having quite a nice looking rump!

"I vant to PUMP. YOU UP!"

spinalis
longissimus
iliocostalis

external obliques

external obliques
quadratus lumborum
rectus abdominis

quadratus lumborum
rectus abdominis

Now we are getting our hands dirty with the clay muscles to give life to our scrawny adopted manikins. My approach to the construction of these muscles was fairly crude. I began typically by vigorously taking my rolling pin to a large clump of clay and continuing until flattened to my desire. I would then use an appropriate tool to cookie cut a section as closely resembling of the image in the book. Often my eyeballing approach would leave me a bit short but thanks to the wonderfully easy to build medium of clay I could simply morph an additional pinch to my existing muscle, if it only were that easy in real life. My technique held out surprisingly well for the given muscles and held the mentality not to get too worked up over a uncooperative muscle or two. I just hope I can stay this strong in the days to come.

COME FLY WITH ME...

This little number is my recently completed layout of Illustrator renderings for Computer Imagery. We were to redesign an existing or create an entirely new airline company and create as realistic interpretations as possible using only Adobe Illustrator. My concept was to capture the sleek and innovative aesthetic of clothing and footwear company PUMA and recreate that original look and feel in a cutting edge airplane design. This just so happened to be my first project in Illustrator and I feel it turned out to be a very strong representation of my concept. I'd love some feedback too! Cheers

PELVIS.STUDY.

PORTFOLIO

RIB.CAGE.STUDY.

DEGAS, Woman Bathing in a Shallow Tub, c.1886 (original pastel on paper)

DEGAS, The Tub, pastel

I am realizing more and more every day that the relationship between knowledge of the human anatomy and skilled figure drawing or painting is incredibly crucial. You can't create a piece of work portraying a living human if you don't understand the characteristics of the body that give it life. The rib cage is one of the keys to unlocking the ability to give these figures life. Upon study a person in any position or pose you have to be able to analyze their body and how exactly they are arranging themself to achieve this. The ribcage is so crucial because it is almost the entire mass of the upper body. Learning to, in a way, x-ray the body when study it has helped me visualize exactly how certain parts create a pose and work with all the other body parts to create a drawing filled with life. In these works by Degas, he portrays the figures of women very elegantly showing ribcage's breathing life and how they taper down to a slender female waist and continue to their hips. These shots show great treatment of the ribcage forshortened as well maintaining a lively and realistic feel.

THIRTY.MINUTE.DRAWINGS.

I came into this class very excited to improve my drawing and quick sketching ability of the human body. I feel I have a fairly good understanding of basic drawing skills and techniques, but human body understanding has always been a struggle for me. Beginning with the gesture drawings are extremely benefitial because I think for a lot of people as well as myself, it goes against every natural feeling we have about our drawing. It limits us to such a short little window of time to capture an entire body gesture forcing us to quickly place our lines on the page as close to how we are interpreting them with our eyes. The problem is, often they don't turn out to be the work of art we are likely to proudly show off. But once this initial shock is overcome, the benefits become more apparent. I feel they have significantly improved my longer figure study drawings. I must say I was very surprised with the result of my first drawing (bottom of the four). I feel it is one of the stronger compositions compared to the ones that followed. I do feel that in the long run with the practice that we get in this class and my knowledge of the human anatomy my drawing abilities will continue to grow.

Just a little taste...a very blurry taste

Drawing II: Two Part Fruit Study

First off I would like to appologize for the poor quality of these pictures im posting, they were all captured on a cell phone camera which doesn't do colors justice so again sorry.

These two drawings, both done in chalk pastels, were from my drawing two class of last year.

The first one, "B-A-N-A-N-A-S", was a pretty straight forward approach on the task of capturing a type of fruit on a complementary colored paper. I feel it turned out very well considering the initial approach I was headed in for this particular drawing. I focused on capturing the image in a very realistic sense so spent great time tweaking shades and textures until I was satisfied, which was an feeling that remained through completing this piece.

The second, cleverly titled, "Banana Gat," was the result of the second portion of the project, which involved human interaction with said fruit. This was a much different approach where a far different emotion is produced. A realistic sense remains in terms of shading and details, but a different stroke and texture is involved, as well as the overall comical composition. This is obbviously less serious, but still a strong piece.