8th Gr. The 5 Skills of Drawing

The 5 Skills of Drawing

"Drawing is not really very difficult.  Seeing is the problem.  And the secret to seeing, I mean really seeing, is quieting the bossy know-it-all left-brain so the mellower right-brain can do it’s magic.” -Betty Edwards

1. The Perception of Edges: EX: Upside-Down Drawings, Line and Contour Drawings

Tip for Drawing Edges: Lightly draw the basic shapes first, then go back and trace the lines of the object with your eye and simultaneously draw the detailed lines to make up the subject, using the basic shapes as guidelines to ensure you have the correct proportion.

Drawing things upside-down is a great exercise for training the eye.  You take a picture, put it upside-down and draw what you see upside-down also.  This helps you stop thinking about the object you are trying to draw and instead helps you to look more at line, scale, and proportion.  Instead of thinking "I'm drawing a horse", you should think "I'm drawing lines," and you'll end up with a really nice drawing!

Blind Contour Drawing/Semi-Blind Contour Drawing

Blind-Contour drawing is where you look only at the 3D object you are drawing and not at all at your paper.  You slowly trace the edges of the object with your eye and simultaneously draw with your pencil using one continuous line.  These drawings are quick- 30 seconds-2 minutes- and are a great drawing warm-up!  It helps you to really see the object you are drawing, improves hand-eye coordination, and will help you draw what you see!

2. The Perception of Spaces: EX: Positive and Negative Spaces and distances between lines

Tips for drawing Positive and Negative Spaces: Examine the Negative Space (space around the drawing subject) just as much as you examine the Positive Space (the drawing subject).  "Size" both the positive and negative shapes to help ensure correct proportion.

What do you see?  A vase (black) or 2 facial profiles looking at each other (white)?

Examining Positive Space (the subject) and Negative Space (the space around the subject) can help you draw accurate lines, shapes, and have correct proportion and perspective of an object.

3. The Perception of Relationships: EX: Proportion (sizes) & Perspective (angles)

Tips for Proportion: Use your pencil to "size" the objects you are drawing.  Hold your arm out straight and measure form the top of your pencil with your thumb.  Then check the size of your drawing to make sure everything drawn is the correct size.

These are students Pre-Instructional and Post-Instructional Drawings of the hallway.  Students learned how to "size" with their pencils (which helps with drawing things in proportion) and how to draw in One-Point Perspective (which helps with drawing angles and showing depth in a drawing).  Huge improvement, huh?

4. The Perception of Lights and Shadows: EX: Shading

Tips for Shading: 

• Shade the object in the same direction as the outside line of the form to help make the object look more 3D.
• Squint your eyes at the object and your drawing, make sure your drawing shows about 5 values and your shading is gradual and blends well.
• Squint your eyes at the object and your paper to make sure the location of the shadows and highlights are correct.
• Black and white should be used sparingly only for the darkest values and the smallest brightest highlights.

Students did value scales where they practiced gradual shading from black to white.  They learned how to use a light source in their drawings and practiced shading using a light source.  

5. The Perception of Gestalt (or Wholeness): EX: 3D object to a 2D drawing

Gestalt involves bringing all your drawing skills together.  To practice this, I acted as a model for the students and they drew me for exercise in gesture drawing and body proportion.  Students drew mannequin heads as an exercise in facial proportion and gestalt.

Body Proportion:

Facial Proportion

Excellent job 8th Graders!!  We are going to use our drawing skills for one more drawing project in drawing a landscape.  Students will select a tree as the main focus and draw the tree and surrounding landscape, stay tuned!