Exercise ~ Observing Negative Space and Perspective
Image 1 ~ Staged Line, Charcoal
In hindsight, charcoal may not have been the best medium to choose for this exercise owing to the tendency of the medium to smudge, as illustrated with the cat figurine’s face. However, the process of first drawing the top outlines of the objects, followed by the bottom outlines and then filling in the object details was an enlightening one in terms of promoting accuracy of proportion and observation of negative space. Unfortunately, the end result is somewhat skewed as the course materials warned it would be, but this emphasises the degree to which my observational skills still need to grow and be enhanced by further still life work.
Second Attempt ~ Continuous Line, Not Removing the Tool from the Page
Strangely, keeping the charcoal stick in contact with the paper constantly produced a result very similar to the first exercise. In places, the sense of perspective and proportion of the objects is actually more accurate than in the first instance, for example the cat lying on the books sculpture. I was really able to define the negative space and the composition of the objects by doing this, and also observe the nature of their forms tangibly, as opposed to formulating a composition in one’s mind and then applying it to an arrangement of objects before commencing the initial sketches. A very useful exercise.
Jessica Sketches 