Before coming to CSM, the closest experience to life drawing was watching YouTube videos and drawing in my room. After going regularly to the Thursday sessions for five months, I can say that drawing from reference is so much different from the real-life drawing sessions.
Looking at my first sketches and comparing them to what I create now, I can see the difference in the way I approach the whole process and the improvement in the quality of my drawings.
What I learned is that the most important aspect of these sessions is to capture the movement and ignore the unnecessary details. The easiest way to do so is by drawing simple shapes and using arcs instead of straight lines.
I still struggle with “minimalism” in my work, and I tend to go into details, thus having only a minute to draw a movement has proved to be the best amount of time for me.
Observing my three-minute drawings, I can already see the heaviness of unnecessary detail. Another habit of mine that I am trying to change is drawing really small figures, which frames the movement and I can see that these sketches lack fluidity and lightness.
Another aspect of the classes, which I found to be useful and interesting, was our last session with Maryclaire when we had to make 29 drawings of a man sitting on a chair. Even though we had a minute per drawing, I find the result quite satisfying ( as the images move fast and you cannot tell how bad my drawings are), so I decided to turn it into a gif.
I really hope that the gif doesn’t work only on my computer. Jeeeez Rick do something.
Bread and Butter,
Nicole