Happy Pessah

Hello!!!

Pessah is here and so is Matza, Gefilte Fish and Hagada reading.
So those of you who celebrate Pessah - I wish you a happy one!


Happy holidays,
Dalia

Drawspace: Lesson B09 - How to draw a chair using a Negative space method

Hi hi,

Welcome to B09 lesson of a Drawspace art program.
This lesson is a real treat. We get to draw from life using a Negative Space method. So it's a double challenge for me. First - it's never easy to draw from life - even if it's a still chair. Second - it's a Negative Space drawing, therefore you don't get to outline.

But let's begin. What we do here is we draw an estimated negative space surrounding the object.
So set your Viewfinder frame and begin drawing.

These are my three attempts to draw a chair. Why three? No idea... But what I do know is that I still have a very long way to go. Because, well, it wasn't easy.

I know I tried to cheat from time to time and make some kind of chair outlining but I managed to stop myself on time. Otherwise - I would lose the whole point of this lesson.
I want to calm myself by making an excuse that the chair I chose to draw was too difficult for me to draw at the moment, but it won't work. My sketches sucked. Although from attempt to attempt it was way easier to draw.

The challenge of the lesson was to draw another form using the same method - from life, of course.

So I chose much simpler objects - a rubber duck, a wooden figure of a pig head and a mug.

A rubber duck was pretty easy to do, although I still did two sketches. None of them is perfect, but yet again, making it perfect is not a purpose here.

The pig head and a mug were very simple to do - the forms are plain with absolutely no details.

So what can I say to conclude? It was very interesting. And very challenging. And I know that I would want to repeat this lesson to do it again. I'm still not quite sure what is the purpose of the Negative drawing but hopefully this mystery will be solved soon enough.

Did you find this lesson useful?
I know I did.


Have a great day,
Dalia

Drawspace: Lesson B08 - How is the Dog's head shaped?

Hi hi,

This is the B08 lesson of a Drawspace art program.
This lesson deals with one of my favorite animals - dogs. Well, actually, it deals with a subject of breaking a complex figure into several simple ones using a photo of a dog's head.

So first thing first - I read the article through.

Here's my sketch. This is the first time in my life that I've drawn an animal.
Now, as I observe it again, I notice that the ears of this dog are too small and the eyes are real tiny...

I didn't redraw this one on purpose, just to show the process I'm being through at the moment: learning, making mistakes, redoing the same and learning some more.






This is why I did another drawing if the same dog.

And I think it paid off - I think this one looks much better than the previous.













The challenge of the lesson was to draw the dog with full fur but, frankly, I wasn't ready to accept it yet. So I drew some more, yet other dogs.

I did a sketch of an Irish Setter and the English bulldog. The bulldog was difficult, I must admit. I did only one sketch, left it as is. And even if it has so many things to be re-drawn, I'm pretty happy about how it came out. After all, these are my first dog sketches.





I hope you found this lesson helpful and useful.

Have a great day,
Dalia

Drawspace: lesson B07 - How to draw a Grendel Gremlin

Hi hi.

Welcome to Lesson B07 of the Drawspace Art program.
This lesson is a real treat. This will be the first time that we're actually going to draw something realistic. Well, kind of. The theme is Grendel Gremlin of the Beowulf stories. Although this Grendel is kind of cute and not scary as it probably should be.

So, following the previous lesson's tip, I first read the article and then began drawing my Grendel.

This Grendel is constructed mainly of ellipses and circles: egg shaped head, elliptic eyes and nose and everything else is very curvy too.

This is my final result and I think it's pretty nice. I tried to sketch it as accurately as I could, although I had some difficulty with drawing the egg like head. Also, there was some troubles with the proportion measurements, but overall, it was ok.  

The challenge of this lesson was to create another, different gremlin. And since my first "other gremlin" - bottom right - came out looking like a New Year decoration ball and, for some, a Teletubby, I've decided to draw another one. I still don't know if any of these look like gremlin, but I know that I had fun drawing.

And I really like the idea behind this lesson: Draw something and the change it! I might take it as a periodic exercise.









I hope you enjoyed this lesson as much as I did.

Have a great day,
Dalia

P.S. While drawing I constantly thought of the upcoming Easter and the Easter eggs.... I should start working on the subject. Really soon.

How to draw a Hedgehog

Hi all,

It's spring now which means that Pessah is on its way. While thinking of a new greeting card, I've came to the conclusion that this year too I want to associate the card with the spring itself and not with the traditional holiday items. Somehow, I don't like the way Mazza and Gefiltefish look on greeting cards...

So I started to think about the things that associate with spring. Of course there are blooming flowers and butterflies, sunny blue skies and green fields, but then again - how corny is that?
And then I've remember that it's in spring when you start seeing hedgehogs sniffing around. And I've always loved hedgehogs. Actually, one of the most beloved, classical, interesting and philosophical Russian cartoons involves a hedgehog - of course, it's Hedgehog in the fog.

So I started to explore and found these How to draw a Hedgehog tutorials.

1. Jan Brett - How to draw a Hedgehog.
2. The Drawbot - Drawing Hedgehog.
3. Shoo Rayner drawing - how to draw a hedgehog easily.
4. YeDraw - How to draw a Hedgehog.
5. Luntiks - Draw a hedgehog step by step.

So these are my five hedgehogs.

What you see is my very first attempt to draw a Hedgehog, but obviously, not the last.

4/5 of these tuts are based on the same principle: you draw a horizontal oval, then attach some more circles and ovals to it and then add some more details. And the only difference between them is how easy it is to sketch them and how cute is the final outcome.


That means that what is left for me to do is some more practicing for the final sketch that will appear on a Pessah greeting card.

I hope you found these tuts as much useful as I did.

Have a great week,
Dalia

Drawspace: Lesson B06 - shading and values

Hi all!

Let's move on to Lesson B06 of the Drawspace program.

If you read my 2013 Goal list, you probably remember that one of the things that I wanted to do this year is to learn how to shade my sketches properly.
And this lesson is all about shading and shading methods.

There are many styles of shading: different kinds of lines, curls and curves and other forms - it's all here.

So I started doing the first sheet and got stuck on trying to do the curved line - as you can see from the many attempts - it wasn't easy.

The second worksheet wasn't easy too - it had a hearlike and the furlike shade.

The third worksheet made it difficult with the orb.

There were several times that I just took a glance at the sketch, did it and after giving it a second look - erased and re-sketched it because I understood that I didn't look at it carefully enough.

So the Tip of the day: Look - Analyze - Draw/Copy.

After finishing the worksheet I found the tip page where the author explained how to look at these worksheets, what to look for and what to pay attention to before getting to work.

So the second Tip of the day: When doing lessons such as this (text + worksheet) - do read the lesson first and only then do the tasks.











And now to the actual task of this lesson.

These are the actual four worksheets with the actual shaded sketches.

First one was easy - I just had to hold my pencil light and long in an obtuse angle and make long movements with my elbow in the air.



The second one was a bit more difficult, since I had to do more values - pressing a pencil differently every time. Also I had to measure the distance between each wave to make the sketch more accurate.

The third one was difficult mainly because there were circles involved. And they were very strictly placed, so I had to measure the working area again.




The forth one was interesting. I think it was the first time that I used the Negative Drawing method. It came out pretty useful here, since it was easier to draw the object as parts and not as a whole. On the other hand - maybe the Negative space was actually a positive one? I'm confused...








I hope you enjoyed this post.

Have a great day,
Dalia.