One more post

I know I was definitely not on top of my game with keeping up with my posts and I need one more!  I am so happy the semester is over and this post is the only keeping me away from being done with EVERYTHING!!!!  I figured I'd take this post to show some of my gestures.  I really liked doing gestures, but I feel some days I'm really good at them and then some I couldn't be more off.  I was not used to going really fast to slowing down, but have gotten a lot better with slowing down in my drawings in general, but getting the point across in gestures. 

The Manikin

This project was by far my least favorite this class.  I've had so many of my muscles fall of and get random places. For instance, by whole abdomen fell off on my walk to class and didn't even realize it and my butt had fell off in a parking lot and got lost under a car. ehhhh...just my luck! Anyways,  since I had to redo many sections of the manikin I really got the feel of how the muscles form and move on the human body.  Even though this manikin was certainly out to ruin my life I really learned a lot from it and I guess that's all that matters! I'm not blown away about how my final manikin turned out, but maybe if it would've been a solid color it would've looked like it flowed together instead of just different individual muscles. Here they are!! (sorry they're so small.  I couldn't get them larger without having them be blurry)

Final Post

Well it's sad to say that it's the end of the semester and even though I am extremely relieved, there's another part that's going to miss this class.  At the beginning of the semester I had mentioned that I hadn't taken a drawing class in years and was a little rusty, but now after this class I realize how much I actually love drawing and hopefully will keep up the hobby.  I learned so much in this class.  I literally came to this class not knowing anything about the human form, muscles, or how to properly draw them.  I can confidently say that I walked away from this class knowing more about all these things.
The manikin alone taught me so much more about the human body.  Even though the manikin was my least favorite project and I swear it was out to ruin my life with my muscles always falling off and getting lost somewhere. Ehh! I feel like without this project I wouldn't have learned so much about the human form and how each muscle moves forms against the body.  My final shell drawing I feel turned out way better than my first one.  I liked how my background turned out, but I feel the shell itself looks way to plain and if I were to do it again would definitely add detail within the shell.  The first shell drawing I struggled with just making contour lines and feel like I've improved since the beginning of the semester.  I still have a ways to come to draw the perfect human figure, but hopefully one day I will successfully get to that point!!
Here's the link to my final portfolio. http://www.flickr.com/photos/48094664@N06/

Hands

In one class we spent a whole day working on hands.  We learned the different parts of the hands and then had other classmates model for you.  I personally found that drawing hands are extremely difficult  I couldn't get the proportions right and got really frustrated, but hopefully if I keep practicing I will eventually find it easier to draw hands and have them look good!

Final Day of Class

On the final day of class it was way too cold in the classroom for her to pose nude so she posed with clothes on.  We also worked with drawing the model taking and putting on different pieces of clothing.  I really liked this activity because it was really interactive and a different way of drawing a human figure.  We then also did a long pose and I was really happy with how mine turned out.

Skulls

In class we worked on drawing skulls.  I actually really liked this activity because it was interesting learning about all the different parts in the skull and using that info to proportionally draw a correct skull.  The only problem I encountered during this activity was not making the skull way to long and not overextending the chin.

Open Draw

On December 7th I attended an open draw to make up for my attendance in the class.  I drew for three hours and worked more on not sketching or pressing so hard during getsture drawings.  I have a bad habit of sketching my long pose drawings instead of making solid lines to draw the figure and I'm really working on getting better at that.  It was also nice to have a different model to draw because we've had the same one all semester and it was a nice change of pace to have someone different.

Field Trip

On November 23 we went on a life drawing field trip to the Walker Museum and The Bell Natural History Museum in Minneapolis, MN.  The Walker was filled with amazing modern art and I really enjoyed the photography exhibit.  The guy who put on the exhibit was from Minnesota and captured people in their everyday life.  At the Bell Natural History Museum on the University of Minnesota Campus we got a chance to draw there.  We could draw anything from rocks, bones, or the stuffed animals on display.  I unfortunately didn't find the room upstairs with all the bones until we were about to leave so I didn't get to draw those, but I did draw a caribou.  I had a lot of fun and it was interesting to draw animals because during the class we only drew human figures.

Sick

I had missed class last Tuesday for surgery and we didn't have class on Thursday so I didn't do much last week for life drawing, but will catch up on drawing and sketching this week!! 

Reflection

     I am a Senior and I was soo nervous to be taking another drawing class since I haven't taken one since my sophomore year.  I didn't really know what to expect all I knew is that we would be drawing and focusing on the human form.  Just in the first week I was amazed on how much muscular and bone structures there are to know about to successfully draw the human figure.  We worked on simple gesture drawings and then slowly worked our way up to long poses and through the weeks noticed the progress I have made.  We also had to build muscles onto a maniken to fully understand each and every human muscle and how they are built on the human skeleton.  I find this actually super difficult and I have my skeleton done up to this point, but would love to re-do it before the final is done so I can get a better grade on it.  So far through this class I really enjoy it because I never thought I could successfully draw a human figure in proportion or decent looking, but I've proven myself wrong and quite happy about it! 
     In the second half of the class I am really looking forward to our field trip.   I also like I said before would like to re-do my skeleton and really use the different colors to show the depth of the muscles.  I also of course am excited to expand my knowledge of the human figure.  Spending even just more time drawing human forms will give me that much more practice and get me that much better! I want to also spend more time on longer poses with the model in different poses.  I am very excited for the second half of the semester of the class and to continue exploring and drawing the human form.

Long Pose

Thursday we had a very long pose for two hours.  It was nice to have a longer period of time to focus more on the body shape, figure, and form.  I was pretty excited on how my turned out and can't wait to work more on longer poses.  I missed class on Tuesday, but started working on my second contour shell drawing.

Contour

Last week I was little rusty from not doing a lot of drawing from the week before.  In class I learned more about the positioning of the pelvic bone and how to incorporate that more into the drawings I do in class.  I sometimes feel that when doing gesture drawings I'm getting worse and not better. Ehhh! We also turned in our shell contour drawings and it was really hard to get used to the concept of following the lines how they shape the shell and not just draw the lines that were already on the shell.  For my next drawing I have to work on using up the space on the paper and not having an outline.

Life Drawing

This week we learned more on how to draw a whole body form.  I thought it was hard at first to get used to drawing the spine and rip cage shape first on the body.  The gesture drawings really help with getting used to this and finding out how much the spine really curves with the shape of the human form.  We also learned how to properly hold a drawing utensil.  In all of my drawing classes I always held the utensil like a writing tool, but learned this week to hold it differently and have your shoulders move more while you draw.    

Life Drawing I

So far this semester I have learned a lot in Life Drawing.  I haven't taken a drawing class since sophomore year so getting back into it was exciting, but realized I was a little rusty with my drawing techniques.  Tuesday we had our first live model and I really liked doing the gesture drawings that we did in class.  Ive never really drawn a lot of human figures so it was interesting to learn how the body moves and forms.  The 30 sec gestures were fun and I liked how you didn't look into the detail of things, but more on the simple body form.  I enjoyed working with live models and look forward to learn more about successfully drawing the human shape!