Part 4 ➤ Developing Drawing Skills 130 More Techniques Okay, we’ve talked about supplies. Now, let’s try a few additional tech- niques that will improve your ability to see and draw the shapes and spaces in a composition as you add either tone or detail and texture. Drawing in Circles Is not Going in Circles Circles and ellipses can be seen as building blocks or basic shapes for a lot of objects in composition, because the shapes of all the parts are what make the whole. Use circles and ellipses to draw space into things right from the start. This will help in making sure that you have left enough room for things. A circle in space is a sphere, or a ball. An ellipse is space is an ellipsoid, rather like a rounded-off cylinder. Practice drawing them as a warm-up and practice seeing them in the objects as you draw in the basic shapes. You can make a page of marks or a tonal scale from any new medium to test its uses and range of possibilities. Back to the Drawing Board Fancier materials can make a fancier drawing, but not neces- sarily a better one. Experiment, but be sure you remember to see and draw before you start in with new tones and textures. 131 Chapter 11 ➤ At the Finish Line: Are You Ready for More? Scale Is Sizing Things in Space Our eyes are wonderful, subtle lenses that work together to give us binocular vision and the ability to see three-dimensional space. With our eyes, we can gauge how far away things are when we look at them in space, and see the difference in scale. Even across a room, an ob- ject is smaller than the same object seen up close. You can see this with a piece of paper rolled up. Try it: 1. Set an object close to you and another similar object of the same size across the room. 2. Roll up a piece of paper and look through it at the object close to you. 3. Adjust the diameter of the roll until it just encloses the ob- ject. 4. Now, look at the object across the room. Smaller, eh? It is this difference in scale that you must see and draw to make three-dimensional space and scale on your two-dimensional paper. Remember to draw what you see and that alone. Don’t draw what you can’t see. Don’t even draw what you think you see—or what you think you know. Measuring Angles in Space Remember that the plastic picture plane is an imaginary plane par- allel to your eyes through which you see the world. Objects that are parallel to your plastic picture plane appear flat; you are look- ing straight at a side. If an object is turned away from you and your plastic picture plane, it appears to recede into space. The ends of the plane that slant away from you are smaller than the ends close to you. Those Every shape has its own unique geometric equa- tion. Try Your Hand Seeing the difference in size and scale is the first step toward drawing space into your work. Try Your Hand Drawing in circles and ellipses can make shape, space, and vol- ume in your drawing from the very beginning. Part 4 ➤ Developing Drawing Skills 132 planes are vanishing in space and must be seen and drawn that way. In Chapter 15, “Into the Garden with Pencils, not Shovels,” we will explain the more formal rules of perspective. For now, seeing, measuring, and drawing the angles of things will help you put them where they belong—in space. The Art of Drawing You can measure the angles of receding planes against true horizontal or vertical, without using formal perspective rules. Hold up your viewfinder frame and see the angle that you need to draw against one of the sides of the frame. See the slant relative to the horizontal or vertical of the frame and draw the same relative angle on your drawing. Or, you can hold your pencil up at horizontal or vertical. Look at the angle you want to draw relative to your pencil, decide on the relative difference between your pencil and the line you want to draw, and draw it in. Back to That Race to the Finish Line Additional elements that define objects as you are seeing and drawing them are surface de- tail and texture. Some detail is actually part of an object, structurally or proportionally, but other detail is more on the surface. Texture is an element that is prima- rily on the surface and follows the shapes and contours of an object. Sometimes, the pattern of detail or texture can make it hard to see or distinguish tonal values that make the object have volume, so it can be better to get the shapes first, the volume, light and shadow next, and save the surface detail and texture for last. When you can see and draw an arrangement and balance the various elements, you can really begin to draw anything you want, any way you want. And It’s Details in the End—by a Hair Our world is filled with detail—good, bad, and indifferent. Sometimes, there is so much extraneous detail in our lives that we need to get away or simplify it. But in drawing, detail tells more about the objects that you have chosen to draw. Choose some objects with surface detail and texture that define them. Pick objects that appeal to you because of their detail or texture— remember though, you will have to draw them, so don’t go overboard at first. Human-made objects are full of interesting detail and texture, but you can’t beat Mother Nature for pure inventiveness and variety. Choose a natural object or two that will require your naturalist’s eye. The Art of Drawing Detail and texture are added in- formation, more or less on the surface. Detail may have more to do with the refined shapes in your objects, while texture may be critical to really explaining what you see on your objects. But the simple shapes come as spaces first. Until you can draw them simultaneously and see line, shape, space, and form, all of them together, you won’t truly be drawing. 133 Chapter 11 ➤ At the Finish Line: Are You Ready for More? Take a Closer Look and See the Detail When the shapes and spaces in your composition are drawn correctly and you have estab- lished a tonal range for dealing with the lights and darks that you can see, you can also add surface detail in line, tone, or texture, or a mix of all three. Some of your object choices will be rich with surface texture and detail. To accurately describe that specific quality about an object, you will need that vocabulary of marks, but only in response to a real seeing of what is there. Practice a page of marks similar to the page you created in Chapter 7, “A Room of Your Own.” You can create a tonal chart with any new mark or texture to see how you can use it to handle tonal variations or detail that is in both light and shadow. Nature’s Detail Is Unending Why not be a botanist for a day? Pick a branch from a houseplant, a flowering plant, a flower, something from the florist, or some- thing from your own garden or backyard. 1. Sit and see the branch or flower as you may have never seen it before. 2. Look at the direction, length, and width of the stem. 3. Look at the arrangement of the leaves on the stem. Are they opposite (across from each other on the stem) or alternate (one on one side of the stem, one on the other side of the stem, up the stem)? 4. Look at the shape of the leaves. Think in visual terms—what basic geometric shapes are similar to the shape of your leaves? Try Your Hand Detail is part of why you pick an object, why it seems to go nicely with another object. Texture is the pattern or surface of an ob- ject and further defines it. Part 4 ➤ Developing Drawing Skills 134 A flowering branch has its own proportion, angles, shapes, and relationships, in the parts and as a whole, so there is a lot to see and draw. Practice in seeing proportion in nature is practice in seeing it for anything—as well as just good practice. 135 Chapter 11 ➤ At the Finish Line: Are You Ready for More? 5. Look at how the flowers sit on or hang off their stems. ➤ How are they arranged? ➤ How big are the blooms relative to the leaves? ➤ What general basic shape do the flowers remind you of? Trumpets, flat spheres, little balls, cones, or what? 6. Flowers are the reproductive organs of their plant. Don’t ignore that, exploit it. See all the shapes and draw them. Flower shapes and detail all have a purpose— procreation and the at- traction of those bees, insects, and humming- birds that do the work of pollinating the flower; drawing the detail tells us about each individual purpose as well. 7. Consider the base of the flower in your decision. How do the back and front of the flower meet? 8. Look at the shapes and sizes of the petals. ➤ Are they all alike? ➤ Are there pairs of petals? Pairs of three? Maybe five petals, but not all alike? ➤ Where do they join the base of the flower? ➤ Do they overlap? How much? The shapes and angles of petals are as expres- sive as the parts of the figure. Part 4 ➤ Developing Drawing Skills 136 At the Finish Line Again As you draw, see the botanical detail and the biological detail in your objects from nature. Consider the following: ➤ Think visually, mostly of shape and the relationship of the details to each other. Draw the detail as you see it. ➤ Continue to balance your drawing in line, tone, and texture. The Art of Drawing The balance of line, shape, space, form, volume, tone, texture, and God’s own detail is ulti- mately completely personal. No one can tell you what you like and how you should work or what you should go after. Even we can only suggest what you might still need to work on to be able to express yourself in drawing without hesitation. 137 Chapter 11 ➤ At the Finish Line: Are You Ready for More? You may prefer a heavily tonal drawing with less detail or you may love the line aspect and not care about a heavily toned drawing. Experiment and find a balance that is challenging but personal. Look back frequently at your composition to see if you are capturing the essence that you were intending. The finish line is of your own making. Part 4 ➤ Developing Drawing Skills 138 Onwards and Outwards So, are you ready for that unending string of ideas that await you? Subjects are everywhere, just waiting for you to take the time to see and draw. The next three chapters cover sketchbooks, as well as drawing in and around your house. Then, in Part 5, “Out and About with Your Sketchbook,” we will move outside, with a clos- er look at perspective so that you have all the tools you need to draw anything that you en- counter on your travels. You decide where the finish line is! Chapter 11 ➤ At the Finish Line: Are You Ready for More? Your Sketchbook Page Try your hand at practicing the exercises you’ve learned in this chapter. . the angle you want to draw relative to your pencil, decide on the relative difference between your pencil and the line you want to draw, and draw it in. Back to That Race to the Finish Line Additional. page of marks similar to the page you created in Chapter 7, “A Room of Your Own.” You can create a tonal chart with any new mark or texture to see how you can use it to handle tonal variations or. shapes and contours of an object. Sometimes, the pattern of detail or texture can make it hard to see or distinguish tonal values that make the object have volume, so it can be better to get the