Work continues in my art class. It is really starting to become tedious and annoying. When I registered for this semester, I didn’t quite put 2 and 2 together. At that time I didn’t quite realize this was an actual college course. And since it’s an actual college course, that meant there was homework. It wasn’t going to be a simple “crafts” class like I mistakingly assumed. *Sigh*

So all these late nights spent completing homework are starting to become a bother. The class has been slightly tainted from all this evening effort, and it’s beginning to lose its appeal.

Images listed in this post are from March 7, and I’ve just now got around to publishing them. There are a few other images I haven’t catalogued since the ones above were done, and I don’t quite feel in the mood to photograph them right now. Looking back at them, I’m rather unimpressed with the work to boot.

The only thing that might help reinvigorate this blog (which is turning into an art/sketch blog), is my possible attempts at Illustration Friday projects. Just like Photo Friday, and the photograph project Jessica and I spent over year on, this is a similar concept but deals with topical illustrations.

We’ll have to see if I actually gather the will to try my hand at them.

So tonight I actually made it to class on-time and awake, quite a surprise. Maybe it was the smoothie from Jamba Juice perhaps?

Anyway, I think my results from tonight’s class are much better than the ones from previous weeks. I conciously tried to limit what detail I was working on, so that I could focus more on the shading. In addition, I tried to kick the contrast of the shading up a notch just to see if the results looked any better. Even if it was slightly more unnatural than normal. In the final example below I think that going for darker blacks really helped to make the depth pop out a bit more, which is something I will try to do more of in the future.

Is it odd that for 2006, 99% the posts on this have had nude people in them? Perhaps, I should post more family friendly fare…

Well we did in fact have the opportunity to draw from a model for this Tuesday’s class. However, with the long period without drawing the full body, coupled with the lack of homework for the weekend, my skills were quite rusty.

Each sketch I did for the night failed to meet my standards. I struggled to get the proportions, lines, and shading right on each one. The pic to the right was the best of the bunch, especially with the shading, and hopefully from Thursday on my work will be better.

Well this is the second class in a row of my figure drawing class, where the model failed to show up. In fact, it was the same model who was late for her first session.

So we ended up doing ten minute sketches of the heads and faces of our fellow classmates for both days exercises. I of course couldn’t draw my own head when I was asked to volunteer, so unfortunately that wonderful picture will be forever lost to the winds…

On Thursday’s class we did however have a more detailed tutorial using projected photographs. The image below is the first one I did and I’m quite proud of it. As much as I like it though, I hope that a model shows up for the next class.

Class continues and so do the miscellaneous detailed drawing assignments. This session’s subjects were the feet, ankles, and toes. The sketches above are the handiwork of about an hour or two worth of work.

More homework from my Life Drawing I class and therefore more body parts to draw. This assignment was to draw four different arrangements of hands.

I’m getting quite happy with my line work and speed.

Last Thursday was my first encounter with a male model for my Life Drawing I class. Somewhat unexpected, but something that was obviously going to happen eventually. Strangely enough, this particular model brought his own props like poles, rope, etc.

And add the fact that he looked very much like a current day Kenny Rogers, it was somewhat disturbing.

My initial full figure drawings were somewhat poor as I slowly got into the swing of things. By the time we got to drawing close-ups of the head, my line work got significantly better. All three head shots I drew came out quite well, and the final oddly posed shot came out better than I had expected.

Tonight was the second class of my drawing course in which there was a live model. Kinda crazy if you aren’t familiar with the practice, but it’s amazing how helpful it is to have a nude model standing there in front of you in 3 dimensions, allowing you to take down the form much more accurately.

Too bad the longest pose so far has been 20 minutes, with the average being 5. I know that it’s hard to hold a single pose for a long period of time, but needless to say most of my stuff is very sketchy. I’m still proud of how quickly I can turn the gesture onto the paper though.

Now if I could only start making the limbs a bit thinner than how I currently draw them. I guess I have the rest of the course to practice. Each class period from here on out should have a similar model for the entire session.

I’m continuing to trudge through Life Drawing I with little problem. The class is still enjoyable so far, even if I don’t like using the charcoal too much. To the left is my latest homework assignment where I had to draw 2 sets of eyes, 2 sets of eyes and noses, 6 different mouths, and 4 different views of an ear.

I guess if I had been smart enough, I would have done the work over the weekend versus staying up until midnight to finish it.