Figure Drawing, Pt. 16

~4x7" pencil, 20 min.

R: ~4.5x7" pencil, 20 min.

I know I left my blog page without naked folk on it for a few weeks. I apologize, if that's the main reason you come here. As an aside, might I recommend Arkady Roytman's "Nude of the Day" blog? He's a good guy, and helps coordinate the drawing sessions at the Society that I go to to do these. He does his usually in straight watercolor, and you may on occasion catch our results from the same evening. You can also buy his, where I haven't figured out what to do with mine yet. Though pt.15 was posted not that long ago, it ends up that I haven't been to figure drawing since I think late May, which I couldn't believe until I looked at the scans. And the last session I didn't even post anything from, as there wasn't much worth showing that week--a model had shaved her head bald, giving everything a slightly freaky look.

I've taken to making a point to draw small portraits of the models, sometimes when the poses aren't particularly interesting as a whole. These quick portraits are useful in just improving overall accuracy when doing portraiture.

It was a great night, as drawings go. I was happy with almost everything I did, which isn't always the case. The drawing at right may be my favorite one all year.

~5.5x3.5" pencil, 10 min. each

R: 4.25x8" pencil, 20 min.

As always, the 20 minute maximum length vexes me. The last drawing helps to show why I don't often draw the whole figure. I simply run out of time. You can see the detail fading as I go down. It's not that I can't draw feet, but they take more time to draw than, say, a leg, for a much smaller feature. Another 20 minutes would've given me all I needed. Even 10 minutes more would've at least gotten the feet in and more resolution on other parts.

As I sat down, I noted that I'm getting towards the back of the pad I've been drawing in. I told myself that after filling it, I'd change up and do something else for awhile. Figure drawing is always good, but there are other exercises I should engage in, in following with my bee-pollination/Jenga analogies of growth. I have a couple of ideas, but with winter coming, it may limit my choices. For now, I hope to finish up this pad by year's end, which would give me enough of these posts through probably next Spring at the current rate of posting one every few weeks.