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How to Shade with Pointillism

Aug 23, 2009 Drawing

Pointillism or stippling  is when you use a series of dots to create an image. It takes time, and loads of patience, but the results can be incredibly impressive!

For pointillism, you’re going to want to get some special pens. The best ones are fine tip pens with free-flowing ink. Ball point pens won’t work very well because they need to be moving for the ball to refresh teh ink. I’ve used Staedtler Pigment Liners. You’ll also want a range of sizes as well. Something like an 01, an 03, and an 05 would work well.

You want to make sure the dots of the different sized pen are blended together. You don’t want to see the border where you switched pens. Also, don’t rush your mark-making. If you get careless, some of your points might get little tails. You want nice clean dots to create an even surface.

As with any drawing, you want to start out with a good line drawing. Outline the contours of your subjects, as well as the shapes of the major shadows and highlights. You want to have good guidelines for when it comes to filling in the values.

When using pointililsm to shade, you need to think about values just like you do when shading with a pencil.

Around the highlights, use your finest pen and make the dots far apart. Avoid putting any dots inside the highlight area, but make sure that the points gradually become more and more farther apart closer to the highlight. You don’t want your marks to suddenly stop dead.

As the highlight fades to the midtones, switch to the middle-sized pen and mark your points closer together.

For the shadows, use the fatter pena nd make your marks close together. In the darkest areas, your dots may be so close together that no paper shows through. You might be tempted to  cheat and use the pen to shade in the entire shadow.

Try to resist!

It would be faster, but it would be obvious. With pointillism, it’s important to draw everything using only dots. The marks create a pattern or a texture that is visibile even in the solid black areas. If you have a really large area of black that would take you days to dot, you could try colouring it in solid, then adding a few dots on top to mimic the pattern.

Also, don’t draw any lines! Even if there are wrinkles or eyelashes, don’t draw a line. Use a series of points to create the line and it will look more natural. A solid line will be a distraction in amongst all those dots.

When your drawing is done, let the ink dry for ten minutes or so before erasing the pencil lines. You’d hate to smudge all your hard work!

Pointillism in Colour

You can also use pointillism with paints or pastels. You do this by layering different colour dots on top of eachother. When seen from far away, the dots blend together and create a different colour. A simple example of this would be dots of red and yellow, which would appear as orange from far away. This type of illusion was used extensively by Seurat. This example from Wikipedia is A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, by Seurat.

Tags: drawing tips, ink, pointillism, shading

Reasons NOT to use a Grid

Aug 22, 2009 Art General, Drawing

As Aladine Vargas pointed out in my last post on gridding, the grid is not always the answer when it comes to drawing. Because most of my lessons so far have focused on the beginner, I have emphasised using the grid. The grid is a great tool for learning the technical side of drawing. It provides you with a template ot practice your shading and rendering skills. It is also helpful for those struggling with proportion. On the other hand, the grid is just a tool and should not be relied upon all the time. It can’t replace the artist’s judgement.

Gridding is not for everyone, and it’s not for every occasion. Try not to use it all the time; you also want to practice your other drawing skills. It’s important to be able to judge angles by eye, because drawing a grid may not always be possible. Using a grid is no excuse to not learn how to draw without one.

The risk of gridding is that it can produce a stiff copy of a photo. When you focus on one square at a time, you can forget about the whole picture. Don’t let gridding become a crutch to you. Draw from life as often as you can. Whether it’s a life drawing class, plein air painting, or drawing mundane objects at home, these practices will help you develop an eye for shape and form. You will also develop those oh-so-important observational skills.

You may also find that some freehand drawings can be more lively and expressive. While they may not be dead-on in terms of proportion and likeness, they can capture the “essence” of the subject much better than a gridded drawing can.

If this story has a moral, it’s this: don’t let the grid become a crutch. It’s a tool, and a useful one at that, but it’s not the only way, or necessarily the best way, to produce a drawing. It all depends on what you’re comfortable with and what you’re trying to achieve.

Tags: art tips, drawing tips, grid

Painting of my Chair

Aug 21, 2009 On my Easel

As promised, here is my painting of the wingback chair! Done from the sketch of the wingback chair. This is still a work in progress… It’s been fun and refreshing to work on something other than my abstract paintings. I am using the techniques that I developed in that work to render the chair in a loose but recognizable way.

I approached this painting in a very relaxed way. I’m really just having fun playing around with the paint. I don’t really care if it works out or not, I’m just enjoying the process! I had no forethought about anything other than the composition. The rest has been painting on the fly.

 This is the first incarnation of the painting. Much darker, looser brush work.  It was at this point in the painting that I decided that I wanted the background green. I also wanted to try to bring some more light into the chair and give it a sense of luminosity.

Well, after painting the green, the colour of the floor didn’t work, so I had to fix that. I would also say that I might have gone too far with the “luminosity” of the chair. I kind of like the moodiness of the dark version. Also, I need to be less stingy with the paint! I love the wet on wet look, but I cringe every time I see those huge piles of paint on my palette disappear in three brush strokes.

I’m not sure where this is going… we’ll just have to see where it takes me next!

Tags: art, oil painting, paintings

How to Draw from a Gridded Reference - Tutorial

Aug 19, 2009 Drawing, Tutorials

As an extention of my post about tips on gridding, I have decided to write a more in depth tutorial on how to draw from a gridded reference image. I’ve included pictures to help show what I am talking about. When using a grid to draw, I try to image the squares being divided up even further. In your mind, split the squares in half, or in thirds, to help you judge where lines intersect.

For this I will be using the same reference image I used for my eye tutorial. I am using a B pencil to make it easier to see, but you shoud use an F or H pencil for gridding so that you can erase your lines later. This is the image I am working from:

One way to draw from a gridded reference is to draw one square at a time. This means isolating each square and drawing the shapes within it. Use the edges of the square to judge the placement of the shapes. I will start with the square three in and three down.

Sorry for the pixellation, it can’t be helped when the image is made this large… So first I’ll start with the inner edge of the eyelid. I can see that it starts in the bottom left corner of my square, and ends about one third of the way down the right hand side of the square.

Next I’ll look at the edge of the iris. It starts at the bottom, not quite in the middle of the square, and ends at the eyelid about one third from the edge of the square.

To draw the eyelid, don’t just look at the line of the lid, look at the negative shape created by the edge of the square and the line of the lid. Draw the triangle it creates, instead of drawing the line.

Continue drawing the shapes inside each square and you will see the eye start to develop.

Now you’ve drawn the basic features of the eye, but there is way more information that you can get from your reference image. The more you draw now, the more accurrate your finished drawing will be. Draw the shapes made by the shadows and highlights, using the edges of the square and the lines you’ve already drawn as reference. Remember to look for the shapes created by negative space.

Another way to draw from a grid is to look at the large basic shapes and draw them as they intersect through your grid lines. Instead of drawing everything inside one square, you would draw the outline of the entire eye in one go. Make sure you study the position of the line inside each square as you go or you might be tempted to draw more from your mind than what you see.

Continue drawing in the rest of the features, using the grid to measure where they go.

Here we have the shape and placement of the eye and brow, but let’s get everything we can from the reference. The area around the eye is important to shade correctly if the eye is to appear natural. Because there are no features to judge by, it can be difficult to know where exactly the shadows should go once the grid is erased. For that reason, you should draw the shadows in while the grid is still there.

These lines will be your guides when it comes to shading. They show you the boundaries of the darkest shadows as well as the edges of your highlights.

Tags: better drawings, drawing tips, getting started, proportions, Tutorials

5 Benefits of an Art Gallery Membership

Aug 17, 2009 Art General, Creativity

In the  post 21 Ways to Kickstart your Creativity, I mentioned becoming a member at a gallery as one way to become a better artist. Today I will expand on this, and explain why it is such a good idea.

As an emerging artist, it’s important to involve yourself in your local arts community as much as possible. For some of us, this comes almost as naturally as breathing. For others, it’s more of a struggle, but it’s well worth the effort. A gallery membership can be very beneficial to the emerging artist.

1. Visiting Exhibits:

As a gallery member, you pay a one time fee that allows you to visit exhibitions for free. This means that you can see a particularly good show over and over if you wanted to. Visiting exhibitions is important for a number of reasons. It can be a  source of ideas and inspiration. Seeing what others are working on can expand your own ideas and lead you in a new direction. Even if the work isn’t to your taste, or isn’t applicable to your art practice, it’s good to be aware of what is happening in the art world. Visiting galleries in a way of keeping in touch with the art world beyond your studio.

2. Exhibition Opportunities:

Most galleries will have a members show once a year. These shows are open only to those holding a membership and often are not juried, which means that everyone is accepted. This can make for a very interesting, varied show. For a beginning artist, it’s a great way to build your CV, get gallery experience, and get exposure for your work.

3. Networking:

Don’t just go see the exhibits, actually attend the openings. This gives  you a chance to meet other artists and build a network of connections. As they way, “it’s not what you know, it’s who you know,” and some of your best opportunities can come from other artists. As you start attending these kinds of events, you will probably notice that you see many of the same faces over and over again. Get to know these people, they are the ones who are active in your community!

4. Artist Talks:

Another great way to get involved is by attending artist talks. This gives you another opportunity to network as well as getting a deeper insight into someone else’s work. It’s one thing to look at art, it’s something else completely to hear someone speak about their own work. Also, when the time comes for you to do your own artist talk, you will have a better idea of what is expected of you!

5. Mailing Lists:

As a gallery member, you may be asked if you want to be included in their mailing list. Say yes! Mailing lists are a great way for galleries to get information to you about shows, talks, events and exhibition opportunities. These include calls for entry to galleries and juried shows worldwide. Being on a gallery’s mailing list can provide you with many opportunities  you wouldn’t find elsewhere.

Get Involved!

The bottom line is this: get yourself out there and get involved! Attend shows and openings, volunteer for fundraisers, and most  importantly, talk to people! You never know where it might lead!

Tags: art, art tips, Creativity, getting started