Foreshortening

Your one is welcome to The Twenty-Seventh video in the secret to drawing video course brought to you by the virtue instructor dot com in this video we’re going to delve into Figure drawing a bit deeper by talking about foreshortening often a figure is viewed from an angle that requires the artist to consider perspective when parts of the figure are viewed in perspective. This is called foreshortening foreshortening can be viewed in just about every figure pose most of the time. It’s very subtle but sometimes the figure is in a dynamic position creating extreme foreshortening. It’s important to be aware of how foreshortening will affect the finished drawing. Although foreshortening will create some obvious distortion. We will approach the drawing with the same four steps that we outlined in the previous video. Here’s the completed drawing that we’re going to create but I’ve added some lines of perspective to help you see how that perspective is going to apply to the figure. So let’s go onto the steps. The first step is going to be to define the line from the head to the feet. In this case since our figure is lying down that line is going to end in the middle. Go ahead and draw that line first drawing the line from the head to the feet will help ensure that we get the entire figure on our pitcher. It will also help us to start visually planning the proportions of the figure once we’ve got this lightly established. We can go ahead and decide where the line for the shoulders and the line for the waist will be . In this case I’m going to make the line for the shoulders and the line for the waist a bit curved. Now using those lines is a God we can create a stick figure to start filling in the skeletal structure of our figure. In the beginning stages of this figure drawing we want to keep our lines light and as we progress we can begin to make our lines a bit darker. So as we are defining the structure through the stick figure make sure that you make your marks light . Once we have the structure of our figure established we can move on and begin to add details. But before we do that I want you to see how foreshortening affects our figure and how it creates distortion . Notice the size of the hand in the foreground and the bottom portion of the picture plane. Well how much larger it is than the hand that’s in the middle ground that’s resting on the head of the figure. Then compare those two sizes with the size of the foot. If we don’t pay special attention to the distortion that happens with foreshortening are drawing suffer and will not look representational. Keep this in mind when you were planning out the structure of your figure. Notice sace relationships that will happen between different body parts. Because the figure is fude perspective . Again within the figure drawing. It’s ok to be loose with your marks in the beginning stages of the drawing. Doing so will make your drawing actually appear more lifelike and more interesting like with any other type of drawing success and figure drawing is going to rely heavily on observation be sure that you pay special attention to the details that exist. Neither your photo reference or live model. The process of drawing should be a process of observing and then putting that information on your paper . When foreshortening occurs This is especially important distortion that happens between the different body parts. Pay close attention to positive and negative space and the relationships between the different body parts. Trust your eyes and draw what you’re actually seeing. Don’t let your mind convince you into anything else . Now that we’ve loosely established a structure and we’ve started to loosely outline the contours we can become a bit more confident with our marks and make our contour lines a little bit darker . We can also add details like fingers with our contours established. Now it’s just a matter of adding value and creating the illusion of a light source thus creating the illusion of a form of a figure. I’ll start in the area that’s the darkest in the cash data right underneath the neck of the figure as you add your value. Don’t forget about cross country lines. Be cognizant of the lines that you make as you add these values the direction that you make your marks will help create the illusion of form . Here again pay special attention to the shapes that the values make on the figure . And always keep in mind if you’re using a dark material on a white surface it’s always easier to make areas darker if need be. You’ll find it harder to make areas lighter if you get too dark too quickly . In this case are figures lying down and has his feet up against the wall. Therefore I do need to add some information about the walk up to this point in the drawing. I’ve been using an AF graphite pencil. Now I’m switching over to a forby pencil. This is a softer graphite and and allow me to make darker marks. I’m going to focus on making areas darker in the foreground areas that are closer to the viewer parts of an image that are darker and have higher contrast appear like they’re closer to the viewer . So we’re going to exploit this phenomenon and add darker values to the parts of the body that are closer to the viewer . You’ll also find that making a line quality a bit thicker in these areas will help as well . Of course you will want to push the values in other areas as well to be sure that we have a full range . Although the focus of this drawing is on the figure and not the face. How do you find it necessary to add a bit of detail to the face. Just to add a little bit of realism and a darker graphite in areas that you think will benefit but be sure not to add it everywhere you want to be sure that you maintain the contrast so that the darker graphite does its job with foreshortening. It’s important to be patient and practice in the next video will wrap up everything we’ve learned in this series.