Marianne's Journal of Fantasy Art

Update On My Woodland Troll Painting

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Thu, 31 May 2012 17:55:00 +0000

This is an update on my Woodland Troll painting. In my next update I will add the trolls.

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Sketch Book Video

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Tue, 29 May 2012 13:55:00 +0000

Acrylic On Collage

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Sun, 27 May 2012 19:34:00 +0000

I have been experimenting with collage and acrylics. I glued rice paper on canvas with decoupage glue.

The paintings are created for children's rooms. My idea is that, the paintings can hang on the wall or in the ceiling over the bed. The paintings are going to be sold with a bedtime story.

I am going to paint a sign for my new art studio and gallery. This is a digital sketch I did to figure out what size and shape the sigh should have. We are still working on the gallery.

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Transparent And Opaque Colors

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Tue, 22 May 2012 08:10:00 +0000

If you ever painted with watercolours you properly know that some of the pigments you can buy are transparent and other are opaque. I just recently discovered that the same goes for oil and acrylic paint.

You should think that it is obvious that if a pigment is transparent as a water colour that would also be the case if you buy oil or acrylic, but I always thought of oil and acrylic as opaque paint. Of cause, I knew that I could dilute the oil and acrylics with painting mediums to paint translucent layers, but I never thought of buying oil or acrylic colours because they were either transparent or opaque colours.

One of the things I love about water colour is that it is very easy to establish a feeling of depth and distance. The reason I find it easy working with watercolours is that I know my pigments! I know that mixing the background colours using transparent pigments will make the opaque colours pop if I apply them in the foreground. I guess this also goes for oil and acrylics.

When you buy paint, the manufacturer will state if the colour you are buying is a transparent or opaque colour. Some colours are semi-transparent this means that they probably are a mix of one or more pigments and Titanium White. This goes for a colour like Cerulean blue. Paint manufacturers' mix Cerulean Blue from Phthalo blue and Titanium White. Always ask for a colour chart before you buy, so that you can find all the information, you need about the colours. If you are looking for pure pigments read carefully to see if the color is a mix of pigments or a true pure pigment!

I would love to hear from you if you have any thoughts on this subject!

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

New Acrylic Paintings

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Thu, 17 May 2012 18:16:00 +0000

Lake Dryads.

To day I have finished two acrylic paintings. The two paintings was started as plain air paintings, and finished in my studio. I really enjoy painting outside and I am leaning so much about paining the light and shadows.

Fairies traveling with a map.

I have been practicing painting trees, and I think I am getting the hang of it.

My next painting will be something totally different. I am going to paint a commissioned painting featuring a young man and his first car. This is a small sketch I did for him to give him an idea, of how I am going to paint it.

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

What Happens Without A Sketch?

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Fri, 11 May 2012 17:45:00 +0000

Normally, I will do a pile of sketches before I start on a painting, but the last two weeks I have been painting plain air, and attending my three local art groups, so I simply couldn't keep up with the different groups, and I decided to start a painting without any pre-studies.

My idea was to do a painting of a forest with all sorts of twisted trees, dryads and trolls. Last night I added two tree spirits, some rocks, and a few trolls to the painting. I wasn't too happy about the trees; I found the branches was confusing and busy, and the trolls didn't turn out very well. At this point, of time I was ready to cover the canvas with a layer of black paint and start all over again. I showed the painting to my husband, and he asked; why don't you finish the painting as a sketch, and then do a second painting based on the ideas from this one? I also showed the painting to some of my online friends who seemed to like the painting as it was.

Some how thinking of the painting as a sketch, made me feel freer, and today I added the spots of light into the trees and reworked the two tree spirits. I have no idea what I will do next, I am just going to paint whatever I feel like, and see where it takes me.

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

The Giants' Hills

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Tue, 08 May 2012 14:28:00 +0000

This is another watercolor I finished today.

I will add a story about this soon on my

Nidlongdir blog!

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Finished Watercolor

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Tue, 08 May 2012 13:52:00 +0000

I finished this watercolor to day.

Read the Nidlongdir storry!

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

My Graphite Art Gallery

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Thu, 03 May 2012 07:32:00 +0000

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artist, Week #6

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 10:05:00 +0000

Week #6

Welcome back !

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

This is the last week and we are going to work with composition.

In fantasy art you can add a lot of surpising effects to your artworks if you work with your composition before you start to paint. The picture starts in your mind and not on paper.

"A dragon egg was picked up by an army of ants."

In this short sentece you could find many ways to do an fantasy illustration. Using size as an surpicing ellement is on of the things you can do. You can also try to chock people by combine somting we think of as cute like a rabit, and then give it the eyes of a reptil. In fantsy art every thing is possible and that is why it is so much fun to do it.

Allthoue we have a lot of possebileties there are still some compositonal rules that goes for fantasy art as well as other genres of art.

Assignment 6

1) Try to cut and paste the three simple objects seen below, and make at least five compositions. Upload all five, and tell which one you would choose if you were going to make a painting.

2)In this exercise, you are going to solve some of the problems you will have when you are drawing from your imagination. In most cases, you will have an idea, but you might have to use many different reference photos to work from. You can draw most objects by constructing them from spheres, cylinders, boxes and cones, including characters.

Please choose three objects to draw, from the photos below. Try to construct the three objects from spheres, cylinders, boxes and cones!

Make three small compositional sketches showing different ways you could arrange the objects in a painting.

Choose the best sketch, and make a drawing where you decide what side the light is coming from. Add values to the drawing!

Get a better version of the photo

This was the last assignment. I hope you have enjoyed the past six weeks. The next obvious thing to do is to sign up for a perspective drawing study group, or a figure drawing group. Please check out the main page, to see the starting dates of the upcoming groups!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

To help you with the part of the drawing that you struggled with I would like to tell that I found it most helpful to do the following: .....................................................................................................................

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

The next assignment will be uploaded on Sundays GMT time 20:00

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Blick Art Materials

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artist, Week #5

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 10:03:00 +0000

Week #5

Welcome back!

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

Fantasy Portaits

Face recognition is one of the characteristics of our brains that make us humans, and evolution have endowed us with this ability so that we don't have to smell each other every time we meet, just to ensure we're talking to the right person. You should think that it would be easy to draw portraits with that ability, but unfortunately, our brain also has another library of more simplified images, and it is those images we are stuck with when we try to draw. We need to re-program our brain, so that it will help us to draw what we actually see, and not what we have stored in our brain.

Many emerging artists struggles to learn how to draw the proportions of the face. How accurate you want to learn to draw the proportions, depends on what kind of fantasy art you would like to do. There is no right or wrong way to draw, but hundreds of different styles.

Blind contour drawing

Blind contour drawing is a way to improve your hand-eye coordination, and sharpen your ability to draw exactly what you see. If you would like to try this, you will need a pencil and a piece of paper. You can choose whatever subject you like, but why not try to draw your own hand? Your task is to draw your hand, without lifting the pencil from the paper when you have started to draw. You must not look at the drawing while you are drawing, keep your eyes on your hand all the time. Draw slowly and make sure you get all the details down on the paper. If you get to a point where some lines are crossing you will need to decide which way you want to proceed with your drawing.

The result of the drawing will look abstract the first times you try the exercise, but the more you practice, the more your drawing will look like your hand.

Drawing Style

Cartoonist draw in a stylised manner and is it a lot easier to learn to draw in this way, than it is to learn how to do very photo-realistic fantasy portraits.

Although the above stylised portraits are drawn in a very simple way, they still have the facial proportions of the human face, so learning the basic proportions of the face is essential no matter your chosen style.

Many artists starts to draw, by learning to draw Manga. If this is s a style, you would like to persuade you can find more tutorial on How To Draw Manga here.

I have uploaded a video showing how to construct a head based on Loomie's book Drawing The Head And Hands. Watch the video

There are two approaches to drawing portraits, you can base your drawing on a line construction or your can draw from observation. Many artists combine the two ways of drawing, they start the portrait with a line construction and proceed with the portrait by drawing from a photo or from life. One of the best ways to breathe life into your characters is to build them on real humans. If you don't have a sketch book, I would suggest that you get one as soon as possible, and start to do some small sketches of your friends and family.

Assigenment 5

1) Draw the construction of a realiatic human face as shown on the last two pages! Use the above illustration or watch the video to work from!
2)Draw this flipped portrait entirely from observation. Keep the drawing as a simple line drawing!

3) Draw the same portrait again, but this time flipped back to normal. Try to compare the two portraits! It's very likely that the drawing you did when the portrait was flipped up-side-down is the best of the two. This exercise shows how difficult it is for your brain to stop using the old saved information about the human face. Keep practicing how to construct the human face, and keep doing exercised that will strengthen your eye/hand coordination!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

The next assignment will be uploaded on Sundays GMT time 20:00

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Blick Art Materials

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artist, Week #4

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 10:01:00 +0000

Week #4

Welcome back!

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

Form and texture

This week you are going to to add some nice textures to your drawings.

Find a soft 6B pencil and try to do a lot of different hatching dots and marks. Divide your paper in at least eight frames and fill the frames with your hatching. Save the hatching for later you are going to use them in your assignment.

When you render a sphere, you have to decide on where the light comes from. Notice how the shadow under the sphere change if you change the light.

You can try to place a ball or another round object in a window and then keep an eye on it once every hour. Take a snap photo every time you watch it, and try to compare how the light and shadow have change over time.

On this golf ball, you see how you can split up the values. This will help you to locate the three most importuned things, the highlight, the form shadow and the reflected light. The form shadow is the dark values that give from to the object. Reflected light is light reflected onto the ball from another light object near by.

Practice rendering the basic forms it will help you to understand how to add values to more complex forms like the human body.

More complex forms with texture also have light and shadows

Clouds and trees can be rendered as spheres with textures .

Assignment 4

The Dragon Egg

Find the eight texture sketches you did.

Draw an egg shape on a piece of paper, and add a horizontal line behind the egg.
Imagine that the sun is shining on the egg from the upper left corner of the paper.

Try to decide where you want the highlight to be on the egg. The edge of the egg that is inside the highlight will often become, what is called a lost and found edge? This means that the background will blend into the edge of the object's color/value.

Draw a form shadow where the egg curves towards the deepest shadow.

Add reflected light near the deepest shadow. Reflected light is never as bright as the highlight.

Please chose a texture for your dragon egg from your eight sketches

Try to render the egg with the texture and add the values as you planed them!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

The next assignment will be uploaded on Sundays GMT time 20:00

GMT Time converter

Blick Art Materials

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artist, Week #3

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 10:00:00 +0000

Week #3

Welcome back!

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

Proportions

If you want to draw from your imagination, you need to know something about the real world, because fantasy art is always related to something, we can recognise from the real world. This will of cause not be the case if you do abstract non figurative fantasy art, but if you are drawing fairies and gnomes, they are built on the human form and proportions. Dragons and other fantasy beasts are built on the proportions of various animals.

Last week I showed you how we can build objects from simple forms like spheres, cylinders, cones and boxes. More complex things like humans and animals can also be constructed from those basic forms.

This portrait of a cat is build on a sphere and a cylinder. The snout is partly a box and a ball.

Try to study how the cat has been drawn in many steps to make sure the proportion are right. You won't be able to learn to draw just from step by step tutorials; you will need to draw from life as well! If you can learn to figure out how to simplify complicated objects, you will find it much easier to draw humans and animals.

How to draw from life

Construct the human figure from simplified forms

A wooden manikin is a helpful tool to have. You can pose it in any way you like, and it is easy to draw the simplified forms. If you don't have a manikin, you can draw a family member or use a photo.

Assignment 3

1) Construct figures from photos

Try to simplify this rooster. Draw the rooster using some of the ideas shown above.

Try to simplify this lady. Draw her using some of the ideas shown above.

2) Draw a sketch of a dressed man or woman from life. Draw the person standing front on and straight up in front of you. Make sure you can see the person from top to toes! Use your pencil to measure the figure. Don't try to draw any details like the face or fingers, you should only draw the simplified forms.

Use this page to check how well you manage to do the proportions!

3) Draw an object like a mug or a jar. Place your object in a window so that it is lit from one side. Use your pencil to measure how tall and wide the object is! Add as many values to the drawing as you can.

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artist, Week #2

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:58:00 +0000

Week #2

Welcome back!

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

Line And Form

One of the problems you have to solve when you draw and paint, is to turn real 3D objects like the apple above into looking three-dimensional in your drawings or paintings.

Most people who are new to drawing will only think of lines when they are drawing. Lines are good, but if you want to draw something that looks like it is in 3D, you need to add values to the drawing. If you look at your own hand, you don't see any lines drawn around it! What you actually see is that your hand is made up of light and shadows, and some negative and positive space.

When I turn the model black, you can clearly see the negative space around her. This space can help you to draw, because it defines the edges of your object.

What do you think is wrong with this drawing? You might say nothing! But, then try to compare it to the next drawing below.

Do you see the big difference between the two drawings? The first drawing looks much more flat than the last drawing. For most artists, the steps between those two drawings are the hardest to obtain, because you have to know how to build values in your drawings.

Negative space surrounds the chair, but you will also find negative spaces inside the chair. On this chair there are negative spaces between the armrests and the seat, and between the legs and the floor.

The best way to learn how to build values is to practice on some simple shapes like spheres, cylinders, cones and boxes because you can build almost anything from those basic shapes in your drawings.

Assignment 2

You will need:

2B pencil
paper,
black marker
an egg or an apple

1) Chose one of the above images, and draw the object by drawing only the negative spaces! Try to fill in the negative space with black or a dark grey when you are done with the line drawing.

3) Find an egg or an apple, and place it in a window, so that it will be lit from only one side. Try to draw it, and add as many values as you can! Look for the darkest shadows and the highlights, and then fill in the middle values!

4) Study the above pages and draw:

a sphere
a cylinder
a cone
a box

Try to add some shadows. Use the drawing you did of the egg or apple as reference for the light and shadows. This is an importuned exercise because in fantasy art, we often have to imagine where the light is coming from when we are drawing. The best way to learn how the light and shadows can be added to an object is by studying the light and shadows from real life!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Drawing For The Emerging Fantasy Artists, Week #1

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:56:00 +0000

Week #1

Welcome to six weeks of exciting drawing!

We will work with parts of the following public domain books:

Download pdf

Pencils

We are going to explore how we can use pencils. If you buy a box of drawing pencils you will get some pencils with hard graphite and some with soft graphite. You will see a letter and a number on the side of the pencils.

H -H9 are hard pencils

B-B9 are soft pencils

For a start chose the following pencils: 2H, 2B,6B

You will also need an eraser. Buy a traditional plastic eraser and a kneaded rubber.

The kneaded rubber is a bit like clay it can be shaped with your fingers and can lift graphite better than the plastic eraser.

Paper

You can buy many kinds of paper; some paper has a smooth and hard surface like the paper you use in your printer. This kind of paper is cheep and will do nicely for practicing. Sketching paper is a bit more rough and will hold more graphite then the paper you put into your printer. Buy yourself a pad of sketching paper or a sketch book.

Starting to draw

When we start to draw fantasy art, there are a lot of things to learn, and it might seam a bit daunting to learn all the drawing and painting skills needed to get the ideas you have in your imagination down on paper. There are a few basic skills that will help you to improve your drawings a lot faster than you might think!

Eye and hand coordination for artists.

You will need a pencil and a some paper. Place the paper on a table or a drawing board, and hold the pencil like shown on the drawing below.

Lines

Try to draw some long straight horizontal lines. Keep you pencil horizontal while you are drawing! While you are drawing make sure your are drawing with you shoulder, arm, wrist and hand and not only your wrist. This will make your hand steady while you are drawing!
Turn the paper and draw some long straight vertical lines. Keep you pencil vertical while you are drawing!
If you want to draw diagonal lines your pencil should also be kept in a diagonal position.

Circles

Find a new piece of paper and fill the paper with circles. While you are drawing the circles, make sure you are doing a circling movement with your shoulder, arm, wrist and hand. Draw faster and faster, and try to close the circles' lines the best you can! This exercise will train your eye and hand coordination.

Do the above exercises every day or at least start all your drawing sessions with the exercises? You will see an improvement in your ability to draw with a steady hand in a few weeks if you keep practicing the exercises!

Testing your pencils.

To be able to draw you need to know your tools, so the first thing to do is to test your pencils. Fill a paper with lines, dots and marks and some cross hatching. You can do it any way you like, The above page show one way of testing your pencils and the drawing below is another way!

Do a value test with you H, 2B and 6B pencils.

This is a pencil test I made with a 2b pencil. I start by drawing lightly in small circles. I continue to go over the piece of paper I started with. I continue a tad further each time, so that I will achieve a shading as you see above. You can do the same kind of tests with colour pencils, charcoal, markers, pen, ink and pastels.

How to boost your imagination.

Assignment 1

1) Fill a paper with lines, dots and marks and some cross hatching.

2) Do a value test with you H, 2B and 6B pencils.

3) Fill a piece of paper with doodles that comes to mined when you read the following key words:

butterfly
wind
rock
sweet

Don't be concerned if the doodle will look like a finished drawing! This exercise it a way to boost your imagination!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Book Of The Week

The Magic of Drawing by Cliff Wright, is an absolutely beautiful book. The book is one of the few books I have seen, that is aimed towards emerging fantasy artists. Cliff Wright has created lovely exercises build on the same principles as you will find in Drawing On The Right Side of The Brain by Betty Edwards.

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Perspective Drawing, Total Beginner #6

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:50:00 +0000

Week #4

Welcome back !

Public domain book titled; Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling

Download the book as pdf

Public domain book titled; Perspective Drawing Handbook

Download as pdf

Welcome back!

This week we will learn to draw in three-point-perspective, and we will study page 177-181 in

Perspective Made Easy.

Study the following pages from the Perspective Drawing Handbook about the construction of a cube seen en three-point-perspective!

The two last page we are going to study in this six weeks study group will summon up the different viewpoints that makes up one, two and three point perspective.

Assignment 6

1)Draw a box you are looking down at.

2)Draw a box you are looking up on.

3)Make a sketch of some buildings and a roads seen from a helicopter.

4)Draw a sketch at a castle that you are looking up on.

This was our last assignment, and as you might have noticed I skipped some pages in the book Perspective Made Easy about shadows and reflections. You can read the pages on your own if you like! Now it's up to you to do awesome artworks with some great perspective views! If you are interested in learning more advance perspective drawing, we have an upcoming study group that is going to work with fantasy landscape. This group will study things like how to add shadows and reflections to landscapes, the use of four-point perspective and much more!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Perspective Drawing, Total Beginner #5

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:49:00 +0000

Week #4

Welcome back !

Public domain book titled; Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling

Download the book as pdf

Public domain book titled; Perspective Drawing Handbook

Download as pdf

Welcome back!

This week we will lean about the use of diagonals, spacing in perspective, and we will start to draw all sorts of objects in perspective. We will study page 107-142, but don't worry a lot of the pages are illustrations.

Assignment 5

1)Draw a sketch of a cylinder/pipe standing on the end, and lying on its side.

2)Draw a standing cone inside a cylinder and a cylinder laying on its side.

3)Draw a sketch of of three objects of your own choice. Arrange them in a group as on a still life. The drawing should be in two-point-perspective. You can use the objects on the above pages, or set up a still life to draw. If you draw from a photo show how you found the horizontal line and the vanishing points!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Perspective Drawing, Total Beginner #4

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:47:00 +0000

Welcome back !

Public domain book titled; Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling

Download the book as pdf

Public domain book titled; Perspective Drawing Handbook

Download as pdf

This week we will look at the center of interest, and study how a box can be turned into a room full of interior. Page 91-103.

I have also include page 148-150. The pages show how to draw a checkerboard in one, and two point perspective. This can be used to add tiles and carpet on floors or in a streets.

Assignment 4

1) Sketch a box in two-point-perspective. Add a row of boxes on both sides of the first box using the same vanishing points for all the boxes. Notice how far you can extend the row of boxes before they start to get distorted.

2) Draw a castle with three towers. Add roofs to the towers with the same slope. ( Look at Page 94)

3) Draw a two-point-perspective box and tune the inside of the box into a room. Draw a window and a door on one of the walls. Place three boxes inside the room with different vanishing points. Turn the three into boxes into a bed, a table and a chair. Place a pile of books on the table. The books should all have different vanishing points.

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

©Marianne Mathiasen 2012

Perspective Drawing, Total Beginner #3

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 09:45:00 +0000

Week #3

Welcome back !

Public domain book titled; Perspective Made Easy by Ernest R. Norling

Download the book as pdf

Public domain book titled; Perspective Drawing Handbook

Download as pdf

This week we will jump a bit around in the book Perspective Made Easy.

Page 59-65 explain how you can rotate a cube. If you are interested in animation or perhaps 3D art you might want to read them, other wise you can skip them.
Page 69-77 explain how to build a city from boxes.
Page 145-148 explain how to divide a surface in perspective.
Page 81-88 explain how to place figures on the street.

Assignment 3

1) Draw a simple city seen in two-point-perspective. You don't have to add windows and doors, but try to add a road and a box that symbolize a car on the road.

2) Draw a simple building in two-point-perspective and add a street in-front of the building. Add windows, and door, and a one-car-garage to the building. Place a man in the doorway. Sketch 3 figures walking along the street. Show the height of a car inside the entrance of the garage. Show the height of the same care driving down the street.

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for your review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 17 Assignments, Compare Male And Female Anatomy

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:56:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

We are going to study page 59-61 this week.

The next three weeks we are going to study the human bones, muscles and fat pads, to compare the male and female anatomy.

Week #17 we study the torso

Week #18 we study the arms

Week #19 we study the legs

This is not included in the book, but I found it helpful!

If you compare the male fat pads to the female fat pads, it's obvious that the male body has fewer fat pads than the female body. That is an importuned thing to know when you are drawing humans. The female body should be drawn softer and much more curvy than the male body.

This is not included in the book, but I found it helpful!

In fantasy art male, characters are often drawn with exaggerated big muscles, while the female body is drawn showing the curvy fat pads. This is going to be valued knowledge when you are going to do some value studies of humans later.

This is not included in the book, but I found it helpful!

The largest differences between the male and female body are the chest, the lower half of the face, and the area between the waist and the knees. The male and female body has the same muscle groups, but the female body has less muscle mass than the male body. On average, men are taller than women. Women have a larger hip section than men, an adaptation for giving birth to infants with large skulls.

Assignment 17
The alien king needs an anatomy map showing the differences of the male and female torso for his robots. Draw the male and female torso seen front on and seen from the back. The drawings should be simple line drawings, just block-in the main muscles and fat pads. Don't add any values to the drawings! You don't have to name the muscle on your drawings. The idea of the exercise is to spot the shapes of the muscle and fat-pads.

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 16 Assignment, Draw The Female Mannikin

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:54:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

page 54

page 56

page 58

We are going to study page 54-58 this week.

Assignmnet 16

You have been studying the male anatomy for some time now, so the alien king now will give a reward for the artists who provides him with sketches of the female anatomy. Page 54-56 shows what to notice when you draw women. Draw the female mannikin on page 54. Draw three poses using the female anatomy from your imagination! Read page 57-58 to prepare for the upcoming assignments!!

This page is not included in the book, but I found it helpful!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 15 Assignment, Draw Poses From Your Imagination

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:52:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

We are going to study page 52-53 this week.

Assignment 15
By now, the alien king trust you to do some drawings of some male pose drawing from your own imagination. The poses will be used to learn his robots to move. To warm up start by drawing some of the above poses and then moves on creating your own. Keep the proportions right, try to draw posses seen from different points of view.

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 14 Assignment, Anatomy, Landmarks

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:50:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

page 50

page 51

We are going to study page 50-51 this week.

Assignment 14
You started out by drawing a map of the human body where you added the proportions, then you did some studies of the skeleton and muscles. The long-term goal is to be able to draw from you imagination without a model, so this week the alien king wants you to hand in a drawing showing a male torso. He also wants you to draw the back of the male model on page 51.

Reference

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 13 Assignment, Draw The Figure Into Boxes

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:49:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

We are going to study page 48-49 this week.

Assignment 13

The alien king has found some human books with some fairy tales, and he would like to know what a fairy and mermaid looks like. He would like you to draw a fairy flying in the air and a mermaid swimming away from you. Start the drawings by drawing two mannikin drawings where you put the mannikin inside a box like shown on page 49. Add wings to the fairy and a fishtail to the mermaid, but keep the drawing inside a box. Keep the drawings simple and don't erase any construction lines!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne

Week # 12 Assignment, Fore-shortenings

noreply@blogger.com (Marianne) — Wed, 02 May 2012 06:47:00 +0000

I hope you have downloaded the book we are going to use, if not, please download it now!

Download the book!

page 46

We are going to study page 45-47 this week.

When a figure is seen in perspective fore-shortenings often arise. In some cases, it might be an arm, or a leg stretching out towards the viewer.

This page is not included in the book!

Assignment 12

If perspective drawing is new to you, please try to do the exercise with the pencil and the tube seen above before you go on!

Please hand in three sketches of a mannikin seen front on, from above and from below to the alien king. He needs the sketches for a new wall decoration in his spaceship!

Remember to draw the horizon line at the eye level. You can use the photos below as reference. Even better you can pose a wooden mannikin or perhaps a doll and draw it from the three view points!

When you are done with your drawings please post them as a reply to this post! Please remember to post a review of your work! Use the questions below for you review.

What part of the artwork do you like the most and why?

Did you feel comfortable drawing this weeks' assignment?

Was there any part of the drawing you struggled with, and in what way did you have problems?

Do you have any questions about this weeks' assignment?

If you were going to improve your artwork how would you improve it?

To get the most out of the assignments you can help your fellow members of the study group by taking time to review their work. Please use the sentences below for your review!

Please start by reading the review posted by the artist who created the artwork!

I would like to feature the following part of your artwork as the most well done because..........

I would like to answer your question about this weeks' assignment by adding the following information...

I find that it was helpful to see how you would improve your artwork because..................................

Please upload your artwork and review as a reply to this post!

Happy drawing!

Marianne