Friday, 11 January 2013

Exercise: Shadows and Reflected Light and Shade

Annotated photograph, page 32: Sketchbook 1 (larger drawing not submitted)


 

I completed this exercise on 11th November. I went for simpler shapes this time but have still struggled. In particular with the handles on the saucepan which are not symmetrical. I also found the ladle very difficult to draw. The handle always looked rotated. Using charcoal on white paper made it even more difficult to keep the highlights from direct illumination bright enough. I tried to keep the major highlights as the white of the paper and represent the reflected highlights by lifting out charcoal with the putty rubber. This helped distinguish between them to a certain extent. Unfortunately the smudginess of the medium meant that maintaining pristine white highlights was challenging. I wanted to stop before it got overworked and smudged into oblivion. I think I may have stopped too soon though as there were many more reflections than are represented here.

I revisited reflective surfaces on 6th December in my sketch book. Drawing a reflective tea pot and that reflective milk jug again once in pen and wash and then again in compressed charcoal. This time I was so absorbed with the myriad of reflections that I didn't notice until I'd finished that both the objects were leaning across the page at a jaunty angle. This brought home to me the importance of stepping back and assessing the initial drawing for accuracy before proceeding with a lot of detail. (images not included here through embarrassment).

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