Structure class

 

Here's a 3-hour drawing from another week of structure class. I started over this week so I could work a little bigger--this basically fills an 18x24" sheet of paper.

Setting the proportions without the structure of sight size is scary. But learning things like how to divide up the figure into quadrants to find proportion is really a good thing. Even though each figure will be a little different from the standard, it gives a jumping off point for finding the proportions when you're drawing more freestyle. 

I like how in this class we start the drawing with a "chief line" or sweeping gesture line. It helps keep the overall thrust of the rhythm in mind while building up the shapes of the figure. I feel like rhythm is something I often struggle to hold onto working sight size. One of the instructors posted a video outlining the steps of the drawing, and he mentioned which landmarks you follow when drawing the chief line, and that was super helpful. For some reason I had missed that info the first time around. 

Anyway, we have one more session with this model, so I'll try to push this figure a little further in the next session. And I'm really glad I did all that torso sketching on vacation, ha :)