Chair with cushion

This is a small nursing chair we've had for years. I've used charcoal to do a fairly swift drawing of it, and the sketch underwent a fair amount of adjustment during the process, as you can see from the smudges. It just shows that quite a simple shape can be hard to capture (especially when you've not been practising very much recently). It's still not quite right, but it's an image I'll keep working on.

Sophie leaning back on a chair

My granddaughter Sophie, aged 9, can't stay still for long, so I got here to pose on this chair and took a few photos, and then made this sketch from the best one.

It is done in charcoal, with the pad supported by an easel so that I could work vertically. Some initial studies got the legs a bit too short, and the tilt of the head and the angle of the left arm took a few tried before I got them fairly right.

I tried to fill in quite a lot of detail, but felt I might actually ruin the image if I tinkered any more. So this slightly unfinished picture was the result, and was the main piece for my final assignment.

Liz does Facebook

In the final stages of my drawing course, I did this charcoal sketch of my daughter Elizabeth in a typical pose - crouched over her phone textng and updating her Facebook status.

I took some photos of her in the pose (as she would not have stayed still), and then used a stick of charcoal taped to a long brush to do the main part of the drawing. This was recommended by my tutor as a way of freeing up my rather cramped style. I finished off the detail with charcoal held in the hand, as the long stick was a little hard to control.

The whole thing took no more than 10 minutes, and I'm quite pleased with the immediacy of the pose and the sense of frantic concentration...(and yes, she does have long prehensile toes).

Two fashion pictures

It occured to me that fashion photographs are usually well posed and well lit, and could provide some subject matter for sketches. These two are based on ads found in the Sunday Times Style section.

This first one was done in pencil. I quite like the picture, although I have to admit the result does not bear a close likeness to model in the the original photograph...

For this one, I used oil pastels and experimented with smudging the lines to achieve shading and form.
Again, the result is not a good likeness of the model, but I think that in some aspects of the image - around the nose and the cheeks - the effect works quite well.

Four self-portraits

In this first pencil drawing, I've tried to convey what I think are my most distinctive features - a slightly bent nose and two very different eye shapes. Looking at it now, I needed to work more on the subtleties of shading, on the mouth, and also on the hair.

This second charcoal sketch was done much more quickly, and I like it a lot more. And when I showed it to my 9-year-old grand-daughter, she recognised it as being me, which was gratifying.

This 3rd pencil sketch, I think, works slightly better than the first, especially around the mouth.
However, my attempt to depict my own rather scrawny 'turkey' neck has not worked at all.

In this final sketch, I decided to switch to oil pastels and have some fun with colour. Not sure about the results, but I'd like to explore this medium a bit more.

Life drawing with Tracy

With a new group based in Deal, Kent, we had a model who did just a few longer poses.
In this first pose, Tracy adopted a rather slouched pose in a metal chair.

I started off with this pencil drawing, with the emphasis on line. Compared to the charcoal sketch I did afterwards (see below), I think it lacks some life and vigour. while I am a lot happier with the charcoal one.

 In this last one-hour pose, I continued with charcoal, and added some colour with Conte crayon.
I did quite a lot of re-working of this, and made the left foor larger at quite a late stage, realising that the foreshortening was not properly reflected in my picture.

Life drawing with Charlotte

In this session, we began with a couple of one- and two-minute poses. I decided to use a fine pen for this, and I'm quite pleased with the spontaneity of the poses.

Then we had two five-minute poses

 I think that, having more time to think, my lines have less vigour than the ones above. I realise I need to develop more confidence to do bold confident lines.

 

In this 20-minute pose, I reverted to pencil and I think it lacks any real life. Also the legs look too small and the feet are completely wrong.

In this last pose of 40 minutes, I switched to Conte crayon on coloured paper. I like the hand better than the feet.

Life drawing as Hope takes her clothes off

In this life-drawing session, the model Hope started off clothed and gradually removed her garments with each new pose. I didn't find it very easy, but here are the results (with the time taken on each). The first two use Conte crayon.

2 minute pose - which I think captures the balance between her limbs

10 minute pose - a bit scrappy, and the foreshortening of the right thigh is just wrong.

40 minute pose - in pencil. Not pleased with this, as it looks rather lifeless

Life drawing: 3rd session with Geoff

I decided to try an evening using just charcoal for all the poses. Feedback from my most recent OCA assignment is that I'm still too fussy in my approach and need to achieve a freer style of drawing. That, I fear, will only come with greater confidence in my abilities.

Anyway, we started with a few very quick poses and then did these two, taking 10 minutes and 15 minutes.

The lefthand one doesn't work. The buttocks aren't right, and the right leg is too short (ran out of paper). I'm a bit happier with the righthand one, which I think captures the fact that he is gripping his left leg. The foreshortened shin and foot also work OK, although I probably need to emphasise the left knee to show it's pointing at the viewer.

Then came a longer 45-minute pose, which initially gave me me some problems, particularly the left elbow, which was pointed directly at me. After a lot of re-working, I think it came out OK. The face still looks a bit wooden.

With a few minutes left at the end, I decided to focus on the head, and do a very quick sketch hol
ding the charcoal quite loosely in an attempt to achieve this "freer" approach.

The result is quite rough, but has a certain energy that I quite like. It's something I need to try more of...

Life drawing: yoga poses with Nina

I'm still focusing on line drawing so I once again decided to leave the Conte crayons and stick to using charcoal pencils and graphite pencils.
Nina began with a series of two-minute poses in different yoga positions, which created some interesting shapes, especially with feet appearing in unexpected positions... It was a good exercise in trying to capture overall shapes very quickly.

Then came two poses of 10 minutes:

This final drawing took 25 minutes, using a 4B pencil. The model was facing away from me with here elbows leaning on a small stool (hidden from view) and her hands in a praying position. Due to restrictions of space, I had to do this one from a standing position holding the sketchpad in my hand.

I though the shape of the model's back, the visible line of her spine, and the upturned soles of her feet,  would have made this a good pose to draw, but for some reason, I don't think it really comes off at all well. I'm not sure quite why, but I just wasn't on form....

Second life drawing with Robin

I last drew Robin back in May 2013, when I attended my first life-drawing class, so I was hoping to see some improvements in the intervening seven months. I'm not too sure the drawings actually demonstrate that.

I'm trying to focus on line at the moment, as that is what is required for part of my next assignment on my OCA drawing course. I therefore steered away from the Conte crayons and went back to pencils and charcoal pencils as my main media.

We began with a series of short 10-minute poses where Robin played imaginary musical instruments.
Here is the flute:

The legs are too short and the hand indistinct, but I was quite pleased with the effect of smudging the charcoal pencil to get some shading.
Here is the violin:

I think the hands are slightly better here.

Finally, we did a 40-minute pose, with Robin holding a broom:

Again, I think the legs look slightly too short and rather weedy compared to the body, but I'm not unhappy wiht the line of the face and also the way hands rest on the end of the handle.
Is there an improvement on last May? Maybe a little...

Life drawing with Irina

In this life-drawing session, I tried using a variety of media, with charcoal for some quick (one or two minutes) poses, and pencil for some slightly longer ones.
In the end, I reverted to Conte crayon on coloured paper for the longer 50-minute pose shown here...
I had a few problems with the left arm and hand, and also the right hand, and the result is a bit strange, I have to admit. 

 This was one of the earlier, shorter poses, done in charcoal pencil. Again, I'm not very happy with the result, even though it was a very interesting pose with the legs crossed and the left foot hooked behind the right leg.
Basically, I think I've made the body too long and the legs too short. And the hands are completely wrong. All in all, not very good..I'd have liked to spend more time on this pose as I could have worked on someof these failings.

Samson Slaying the Philistine

This drawing was done at the Victoria & Albert Museum where they have a great selection of stone and marble statues.
I chose this statue because of its subject and general sense of movement and strength. It shows Samson about to strike the crouching Philistine with the jawbone of an ass (?). He holds the weapon aloft while yanking back the head of his victim by the hair. It's a pretty dramatic pose, full of tension and straining muscles.
I spent about 40 minutes on it, working with a 4B pencil, and working from a standing position (one of the museum assistants did kindly offer to bring me a stool but by this time I didn't want to change position!)
I'm not unhappy with the result but I must admit it fails to capture the sheer vigour and strength of the original. I plan to return and maybe use a combination of pencil, chalk and ink to achieve a bit more 'body' to the image. I will also need to spend more time.

I've added a photo to show how my image compares...

 

Life drawing with Richard

This was the final drawing of the session, completed in around 35 minutes, using 3B pencil. I decided to go back to using pencil (rather than my usual Conte crayon on coloured paper) in order to focus on line and getting shape and proportion right.
The pose was quite tricky to pin down, because Richard had his right hip slightly raised so that both knees were slanted away from me. I'm not sure what he was doing with the left arm but it was out of view for me. After some considerable use fo the putty rubber, I think I've come up with a fair approximation of the figure, although I did struggle quite a lot with the hand and the feet.
Preparatory sketches
In the lead-up to the final study, we did a number of faster sketches in quite with some quite interesting poses, such as these....(lefthand took five minutes; righthand 10)
I'm quite pleased with the right foot of the lefthand figure, in which I appear to have captured the shape and the foreshortening, despite (or possibly because of) having to work at speed.

This 15 minute pose, although quite simple, did not come out quite so well...maybe because I couldn't see enough of the model from my angle...I re-worked the right arm several times, trying to get the shape of the elbow and fore-arm, and I'm still not sure it's quite right.

Life drawing - 2nd session with Marie

I first drew Marie during one of my early life-drawing sessions back in May, so I'm hoping that these drawings will demonstrate some improvement since then.

The session started with a couple of very quick (three minutes) sketches in different poses, folowed by one of five minutes. I used charcoal pencil on white cartridge paper for these...

Then followed a crouching pose of 15 minutes, for which I chose Conte crayon on coloured paper. This was a tricky pose with both the head and most of the arms hidden from me, and the stool she was leaning on was covered in a white sheet. I decided to focus on the line of the spine and buttocks to anchor the image and then build out from there.

Finally, we did a long pose of nearly an hour. I stuck with Conte crayon and tried using the white and grey crayons more extensively to pick out the lighter parts of the body. The left leg and knee gave me a bit of trouble for a while, as the knee was pointing out at me and the foot was tucked under tucked under the right leg.
While there is obviously more work to be done, especially on hands and feets, and getting a better facial likeness of the model, I think I can see and improvementover the pictures done in May....

Life drawing: 2nd session with Geoff

It's a couple of months since we last drew Geoff, so I'm keen to see if there is any discernible improvement in my drawings of him.

The session went through the usual routine: a series of very short sketches just to get warmed up (which I've not included here), then some of 10 or 15 minutes, concluding with a 50 minute pose.

This first sketch was done in about 10 minutes, using charcoal pencil:

Then I tried this with Conte crayons. It's a difficult crouched pose of 10 minutes with not much of interest except the hands, which I am still trying to master:

This pose was of 15 minutes, and was quite hard again because of the angle and the foreshortening of the whole figure. I switched back to charcoal pencil for this and used to watercolour pencil to get a different texture. I didn't particularly enjoy doing this drawing, and I'm not sure it captures the subject very accurately, but I think it has a pleasing abstract appeal (which is somewhat accidental, I have to confess):

In this final 50 minute pose, I struggled for some time to get the right shape of the body, and was constantly rubbing out lines and repositioning the back, the right arm and the position of the right shoulder until I reached what I believe is quite close to the actual subject.

I used Conte crayon on coloured paper, and also spent some time on the folds of the draped sheet hanging from the stool on which the model sat. (I've been practising drawing fabric)

This drawing took 40 minutes, so I used the final 10 minutes to do a quick sketch of the same pose with charcoal pencil. Although it is not very well finished, I was able to achieve the shapes with far less use of the putty rubber - which goes to show that it's probably worth having a few cracks at the same pose until it comes more naturally..

Anyway, here is the quick pencil sketch followed by the longer one...

Life drawing with Karin

The session began with a 15-minute pose. Having forgotten my new charcoal pencils, I reverted to standard pencils on coloured paper.

Karin the model draped herself in a sheet, but in the allotted time there was little opportunity to depict the folds of the material properly. I also spent too much time working on detail around the face and upper body, and didn't have the time to work on the legs.

Here's the result:

For the next pose of 25 minutes, the model lay on the floor with her legs propped up against the wall.
The main challenge here was her arms and hands which were partly hidden and in the case of the right arm, greatly foreshortened by the angle of the pose.

Here I switched to Conte crayon to achieve a better contrast between her and the sheet.

In the final 50-minute pose, I reverted to pencil, which I think works quite well for depicting the Chesterfield sofa, and the shine of the leather.
However, the model herself looks a bit anemic in my view (maybe I should have been bolder with the use of soft pencils), and I now realise her head is slightly too small.

Life drawing with model Chris

In this session with new model Chris, we limbered up with some short poses.

In this 10-minute study, I used charcoal pencil and initially struggled to get the right proportions and general shape of the body. But after ample application of the putty rubber, it got slightly closer to the right image...The left arm still looks a bit odd, but I ran out of time.

Then came this 15-minute pose, with Chris curled into a ball. I used Conte crayon for this, and I'm fairly pleased with the result.

Then for the final long (55 minutes) pose, I went back to charcoal pencil adding Conte crayon (white and brown) later to get more texture and shape. I'm quite pleased with some aspects of the picture, such as the sheen along his back which was created by the white sheet on which he was laying.
I still need to work in the finer details of the hands, but I think I've managed a better job of depicting the foreshortening of the legs which went away from me.
The left arm, I now realise, is slightly shorter than it should be, but I was running out of paper (classic mistake!) and wanted to include the hand.