Drawing 1, Part 2 Observations in Nature, Still Life - Still Life Group in Tone

After the last exercise 'Still Life Group Using Line' this exercise sounded like it was going to be a breath of fresh air and indeed it was...

Still Life Group in Tone

I started with a bit of a study to firstly get the right composition for this exercise and then to try out different colours so I could find three colours that would give me three different tones for this drawing. I feel like I cheated on this exercise as I chose objects that could be drawn easily enough with just three colours, a yellowy green banana, an apple and two green bananas but I just started a high fruit diet the week before and I used objects that were at hand.

Like it instructed me in the brief I screwed up my eyes to take a look at the dark colours only and lightly sketched them in and then chose a different colour to sketch in the mid tones, then another for the light tone. On completion of the initial sketch I decided that my darkest colour was too light and so changed it for my final drawing.

Still life group in tone

I changed the composition of my final drawing slightly so I could depict the full form of the apple and I'm glad I did. The final drawing took me less than two hours going at a really steady pace and I am really satisfied with the completed drawing and my choice of colours, It would have been nice to apply a fourth colour though and also maybe a variation in orange and reds.

The one thing I am not happy with is the amount of blank space I left on the paper but I tried to make up for this by shading with my darkest colour.

Drawing 1, Part 1, Mark Making and Tone, Tone and Form - 2 Tonal Studies

The brief of the first part of this exercise was to draw four 5 cm squares in my sketchbook using 4 different drawing tools such as a pencil, drawing pen, nib pen and black ink and a ballpoint pen. Try to make 4 distinctive grades of hatching with each square without paying too much attention to detail, suggesting that we have close our eyes as this will help eliminate most of the detail.

I totally read this wrong, drawing the squares in pencil and then hatching within the square using the 4 drawing tools that it gave as examples as above. I tried different types of hatching to do this including, cross hatching at an angle as well as using horizontal and vertical lines to give a much denser tone. The nip pen was probably the most difficult for me and couldn't quite graduate the tones.

Tone Using Hatching

The second part of the exercise was to arrange 4 objects such as an apple, orange, ball, cup or other kitchen utensils, draw the objects then use a hatching technique to technique to add tonal shadow patterns to these objects. The 4 objects I initially chose were a mug, a small bowl an apple and a pong pong ball and chose to have a go at cross hatching with a Faber Castelle Ballpoint pen.

1st Drawing Using Ballpoint

I failed miserably in my first attempt, I even forgot I was hatching with a pen at one stage and went to smooth the pen and smudged the ink across the paper having to fill in the background to cover it up. However it did give me some well needed practise.and confidence towards the end to have another go with the ballpoint pen.

2nd Choice of Objects

2nd Drawing Using Ballpoint

My second attempt was much better, this time I swapped the bowl for a tupperware container turned on its side and I could clearly make out what each of the objects were in my finished drawing, well...apart from the ping pong ball that is.

3rd Drawing Using 2B Pencil

For my third attempt I went back to a 2B graphite pencil, the tool I feel most comfortable with and successfully cross hatched the whole drawing without smoothing any lines with my finger and this time even the ping pong ball was clear enough to make out in my finished drawing,. I think deciding to start off the exercise with a ballpoint pen was a very wise idea and may have even helped to improve my cross hatching technique.

View my learning full drawing 1 learning log at: http://www.mydrawingcourse.com/