Building Your Sketching Skills

We will explore:

Gesture, Volumetric Contour, Dot the Drawing, Light and Shadow (the lock in), and Structure, Speed with Dry and Wet Media !

These presentations may help you with future drawings and sketches. These are in video format (some may have no sound) and you can stop it anywhere you wish. These are from other lessons in my drawing and painting classes but maybe they may help you.

Post Course Resources

Exercises to Gain Speed!

Exercise 1:

Exercise 1: Brush Control
Purchase a lined notebook and practice making lines and “0s” (circular shapes with a brush). Put the lines close together and far apart.

Exercise 2: Value Patterns in Black
Set up a still life and light it from one side. Do a contour line drawing with a Uniball pen. Then with a brush and India ink indicate value patterns in solid black.

Exercise 3: Quick Sketches
Set up a still life and light it from one side. Mix a light and dark wash in watercolor. Draw your still life in pencil (no shading) and apply light and dark washes to the paper creating light and dark value patterns.

Exercise 4: Thumbnail Studies
Create a set of thumbnail grids. On each thumbnail mark the center and thirds. Then arrange a still life and sketch trying to get key objects on the lines indicating the third of the paper.

Exercise 5: Taking it to the Park (Cemetery Drawing too)
Take your sketchbook to the park or a place with statues such as a public historical site or cemetery. Do quick sketches.

On Facebook I have been posting hyperlapse demos in my Isolation sketchbook.
- Hyperlapse Demo from Photograph: Three Figures Sitting on a Beach in Florida
- Hyperlapse Demo from Two Photographs: Two Figures From Two Photos in One Sketchbook Spread
  
  BOOKS:
The Sketching and Drawing Bible by Marilyn Scott
The Urban Sketcher by Marc Taro Holmes
Felix Scheinberger: Dare to Sketch
Everyday Matters by Danny Gregory

In a nutshell:
“Sketching is the most beneficial act of brevity in art!”