So you never formally studied drawing? Sorry to press the point yet it’s key to what I’m trying to understand about what you’re saying.
By drawing I mean:
a) Form
b) Perspective
c) Anatomy
d) Values & lighting
e) Composition1. Did you study any single one or any number of those fundamentals?
2. If so, for how long and by what method of study?
(added a-e for reference)
a) without google I have no idea what a is...
b) It's just maths/geometry .... I don't really understand what there is to study. Academically I'm aware that the ability was lost in the Western world during the dark ages .. I struggle to understand how.
c) My human biology is above average but lets take fossils.... I spent a long time understanding them, their articulation and anatomy and how they fit into a paleo-environment. [This was what made me want to study geology]
d1) Values... no idea what that means....
d2) lighting
e) composition ...
I dunno but would these count as lighting and composition?
https://www.flickr.com/photos/paris-steve/3977311119/
https://www.flickr.com/photos/paris-steve/864003128/
Not like I studied them... but I think this is better than my drawing ...
My understanding of invertebrate anatomy is good but I can't draw them...
My hand simply doesn't do what's in my head which is why I can't understand how that is "studied".
I can make a mech hangar .. I can't make a statue.
A high proportion of the architects in Richard Rogers' practice are dyslexic, as are many art school students, the focus being on abilities rather than disabilities.
So how did you learn (say) perspective and form? Or are you ‘winging’ it still?
You seem evasive to the terms ‘study’ and ‘fundamentals’.
I have no clue what form is... perspective is simple geometry you don't need to study it..it just is.
You seem completely unable to accept I can't draw or paint as if its something that can be taught. My hand doesn't do that...
How do you explain to a diabetic they just need to learn how to make glycogen by studying the fundamentals and they aren't listening or trying or they could just do it?
Thanks Steve for the answer.
I’ll take it that you haven’t studied the fundamentals of drawing (not a criticism*, especially if you didn’t study drawing and/or art, it’s just detective work hopefully to get clear answers)
So fair to say:
a) Form - No
b) Perspective - A little?
c) Anatomy - No
d) Values & lighting - No
e) Composition - No
*For my part, I haven’t studied music yet played (badly) in bands for years by learning rote/experimenting, playing by ear. Badly. I couldn’t tell you what a treble clef is, neither could I play guitar. Maybe one chord.
You seem completely unable to accept I can’t draw or paint as if its something that can be taught. My hand doesn’t do that…
Drawing is absolutely something that can be taught. Your hand/brain co-ordination may be a different matter but we haven’t gotten to that bit yet!
I think in terms of the OP the reason not being able to draw / sing isn't seen as being dyslexic is because well you can draw and sing just not very well. As someone thats dyslexic when someone gives me a set of numbers I struggle to comprehend them in my brain. The only way I can describe it is its foggy and they get all muddled up its the same with spelling i get letters in the wrong place and miss words. You can draw a car where as I would struggle with basic times tables.
perspective is simple geometry you don’t need to study it..it just is
Do you know how much that isn't true?
It wasn't until something like 1600 before artists cracked how to portray perspective on a 2D surface.
Thanks for the answers Steve
Just to restate - a to e were in the strict sense of ‘drawing’ studies. It’s not a criticism (most people haven’t studied drawing (or sculpting) etc at any level. I just find it unusual that you seem to think you should magically know it? You didn’t magically know your regional dialect, for instance, and you’ve had many thousands of hours practicing it.
Question: How many hours have you ever practised drawing a simple building with two- point perspective?? Again, not a criticism or test...I’m first trying to build a picture of your views on the process of study and learning, and how it relates to your ability.
Question: (Practical 1 point perspective study)
1. If you were to grab a pencil and paper, eraser etc. And were to study and complete the below tutorial would your knowledge and ability of drawing improve?
Answer A, B or C
A. Yes. After 2 attempts (Watch, absorb, rewind, complete. Assess. New page. Repeat)
B. No. Not at all no matter how many times I study and complete it
C. Well, I would prefer to complete the study a few times before I answer.
Note: I notice (I teach landscape painting) a lot of (especially older adult) students are very insecure and defensive if they don’t *know* something (so why are they coming to learn???) or get it first time - especially if they imagine that the majority of a population/class DO know these things, or can intrinsically just ‘achieve‘ a level of knowledge and/or practical skill without any formal/applied/structured training or study.
I can usually guess (hands on, not by distance) if the learning ‘blockage’ is more an ego/defence\denial thing - or more an actual hands-on frustration born of ability/aptitude/wiring. But I’d never assume.
Apostrophes signify one of two things: either possession (Dave’s socks) or that something is missing (don’t = do not).
In this case it’s the second one, “who’s” is a contraction of “who is”. So if you need to use [whose / who’s] then expand it out first, does “who is” work in this sentence? If yes then you need who’s, if no then it’s whose.
Exactly the same rule applies for “they’re,” it’s a contraction of “they are.” If they are fits in your sentence then it’s they’re, if not then it’s one of the other two.
Actually apostrophes always signify something is missing. In the case of Dave's socks it is because this derives from the archaic form of the phrase: 'Dave his socks' which obviously meant the socks belonging to Dave. HTH
I’ll take it that you haven’t studied the fundamentals of drawing (not a criticism*, especially if you didn’t study drawing and/or art, it’s just detective work hopefully to get clear answers)
I don't understand how anatomy is a fundamental of drawing?
That is I understand what anatomy means in a scientific/medical sense but that seems completely irrelevant/different to "drawing" because I can only assume you have a different definition...
The same goes for perspective ... it seems there is a different definition for "drawing fundamentals" to the rest of the universe where perspective is simply a matter of geometry.
To me the perspective I learned is described in the opening chapter of Relativity, from what you have written it seems to be something completely different in drawing fundamentals.
Like Molgrips and Crazy-legs examnples... in reverse.
I have 2 friends who can draw... background wise one's father is a psychiatrist the other an engineer. Neither had any sort of pre-school drawing influence...but both say they could just do it as long as they remember. This seems to be innate ...
but we seem to be hung up on drawing... and it seems much wider
I think in terms of the OP the reason not being able to draw / sing isn’t seen as being dyslexic is because well you can draw and sing just not very well. As someone thats dyslexic when someone gives me a set of numbers I struggle to comprehend them in my brain. The only way I can describe it is its foggy and they get all muddled up its the same with spelling i get letters in the wrong place and miss words. You can draw a car where as I would struggle with basic times tables.
Technically I'm diagnosed dyslexic though going back to the post earlier it very much seems different yet the same. Is it even the same thing or is it just some test?
Numbers and letters are all fuzzy to me... it makes no difference to me if they are all upside down or back to front... but I just ignore it.
When I see an equation (like the Bernoulli one earlier) I see a geometric shape not really a set of letters and numbers...If I actually tried to concentrate on the letters and numbers it would be confusing but whilst I view it as a describing a shape it makes sense.
Or really really simply say: (n+1) x n/2 is a shape. In my head its a set of steps.
It's n long and n high and the total number of steps is (n+1) x n/2
When I "read" the equation what I see is the shape...
[]
[][]
[][][]
[][][][]
[][][][][]
[][][][][][]
[][][][][][][]
When I read its the same.... its a shape or story ???
It wasn’t until something like 1600 before artists cracked how to portray perspective on a 2D surface.
yet weirdly this was done throughout the classical period...
and back into deep pre-history.
https://public-media.si-cdn.com/filer/ff/c8/ffc8d945-a2c3-464c-9eb3-c260e3972841/8.jp g" alt="" />
Even better many of the Chauvet paintings are actually animated viewed with a flickering fire.
It’s a bit like say how do you know that everyone perceives say Red the same?
We might acknowledge colour blindness because it has a name and is diagnosed but that isn’t the same as everyone having the same perception of colours?
Oh, don't. This is the sort of thing that keeps me awake at night (and indeed this question specifically has).
In the case of Dave’s socks it is because this derives from the archaic form of the phrase: ‘Dave his socks’
So why don't we say "Karen'r socks?"
I don’t understand how anatomy is a fundamental of drawing?
That is I understand what anatomy means in a scientific/medical sense but that seems completely irrelevant/different to “drawing” because I can only assume you have a different definition…
I picked up on that with our to and fro with the words ‘study’ and ‘learn’
Definitions of words can and do change between disciplines/application.
When I asked if you’d studied through a to e I did wonder after your responses that I hadn’t emphasised that I meant in the formal sense as applied in the study of drawing and art.
They are connected to the terms in physics, geometry etc, but have particular meaning and application in drawing and art. Hence ‘Drawing fundamentals’.
*Edit. These ‘drawing fundamentals‘ have of course ‘existed‘ forever (potentially) but they’ve been formalised by different schools/artists and therefore made more accessible/understandable/practical.
Cougar
Oh, don’t. This is the sort of thing that keeps me awake at night (and indeed this question specifically has).
Red specifically ?
More seriously... I find it fascinating.
Like say why someone "likes a colour and not another" ... why we can do technical drawing but can't draw a recognisable dog.
Then more recently its the original question... or another is how do we define "excusable" mental illness? I find it very hard to imagine how someone deliberately kills someone else, let alone a serial killer so I struggle to understand how for example anyone who is a serial killer isn't pitied. From my naïve view either they were born that way or something made them that way but it's not their "fault"
This series was very thought provoking...
https://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episodes/b07xt09g/the-missing
When I asked if you’d studied through a to e I did wonder after your responses that I hadn’t emphasised that I meant in the formal sense as applied in the study of drawing and art.
It's interesting to me that you don't consider photography art in the same way ... whereas my painter friend would wax lyrical about brush strokes by Ryman. Yet I can't really think of anyone I know who'd want a painting of a white canvas on their wall other than for snob value over a Bresson...
I couldn’t draw an animal where you’d look at it and go “yeah, that’s a dog” with any confidence.
Just write “woof!” Near it’s mouth, job done 🙂
Just write “woof!” Near it’s mouth, job done
As I said earlier.. I can draw a stag or something you might think was a billygoat or ram... and i'm pretty good at spiders (at least they are recognisable as an arachnid if you can count) but dog vs pig vs cat... is best done by "woof/oink/meow) or an arrow
It’s interesting to me that you don’t consider photography art in the same way … whereas my painter friend would wax lyrical about brush strokes by Ryman. Yet I can’t really think of anyone I know who’d want a painting of a white canvas on their wall other than for snob value over a Bresson…
I’m more interested that you’re telling me what I think! 😉 (I’m also a fine art photographer. Ran a business selling my prints for a number of years, before going back to art school to learn painting. Photography (art of) suits my attention deficit better, but I’m more inspired by painting as a both discipline and art form. They also inform/inspire each other as disciplines/pursuits, sharing most ‘fundamentals‘
Yet I can’t really think of anyone I know who’d want a painting of a white canvas on their wall other than for snob value over a Bresson…
You may be right, but that doesn’t speak for all painting/paintings/patrons.
Painting/art is a vast (limitless) subject. Not an opponent in a popular wrestling match with ‘fine art photography’.
This is all digression! Sorry. So what did you think of my question about you vs that one point perspective tutorial?
Some people appear to have a greater perception of colour - subtleties in hue and vibrance. Like some have better night vision than others.
On the drawing thing - I can't really draw that well. Not sure if that's because of the dyslexia. I can struggle with balance / hand eye co-ordination. Which I think is why I drawing isnt a strong point. Did a couple of lock down sketches - which worked once I stopped trying to draw a whole image and just built it up. Going to give box approach to drawing figures a go. I'm definitely from the woof / meow / hello school. Prefer sculpture in an Andy Goldsworthy type assembling things - still do a good snow monolith. No danger of turning it into a fox, eagle or anything more creative. Just a monolith.
Wouldn't mind trying pottery again - that's probably a mindfulness thing trying to get out.
Sorry OP, I didn’t address this properly:
I don’t understand how anatomy is a fundamental of drawing?
That would be for one or a number of the following reasons
1. You haven’t yet studied anything about the fundamentals of Drawing/Art related to ‘Anatomy’
2. You haven’t referred to a standard dictionary
3. You don’t understand how it might be that you haven’t (yet) learned that how academic disciplines often use general terms/words (such as ‘anatomy’) in a more specific sense related to the discipline?
As a slight aside, it still amazes me that so many people still think they should ‘just be able to draw’?
Ask the same people to grab some metal tubing and welding torch and ‘can you knock up a nice trail bike’?
‘Nah, I’m not a welder’
‘Well, neither are you an illustrator, but you somehow believe that competent drawing skills/understanding and mastery of anatomy/perspective/light/shade/form/line/compositiin etc are in most cases magically conferred to some Special Ones ...
...whereas you find it easy to know that welding/fabrication/bike design takes time, theory, study, trial, error, instruction, practice, passion’?
So why don’t we say “Karen’r socks?”
That would be silly
Good point though. Perhaps women didn’t wear socks in antiquity.
You appear to have fallenen into the common trap of conflating dyscalculia and dyslexia with being shit at maths and spelling, rather than looking at what they actually entail.
Oh hi! I didn’t realise one of my teachers as kid posted on here, hard to say which one though only about 2 or 3 it can’t be.
On the drawing thing – I can’t really draw that well. Not sure if that’s because of the dyslexia. I can struggle with balance / hand eye co-ordination. Which I think is why I drawing isnt a strong point. Did a couple of lock down sketches – which worked once I stopped trying to draw a whole image and just built it up. Going to give box approach to drawing figures a go.
Did you drop lucky on your ‘build up’ method, or had you previously studied drawing at any level?
I ask because I’m not aware of many illustrators/artists (if any) worth salt who would construct the ‘whole image’ first. Not without first understanding/sketching out the fundamental forms/shapes and relations to each other. ‘Building’ is a good word when it comes to representing 3d forms (even on a 2D surface, if the intention to give a 3D impression of the subject)
You may occasionally witness someone with lots of experience/practice under their belt and so can just fire off something they’ve previously learned to draw at a certain angle, in a certain way, style, perspective etc. Learned and practiced many times over. But that’s by such tine more a parrot trick than an actual method. If you see them do this simply say, OK now I want to see that figure from a viewpoint above to the side of the right shoulder. And they’ll most likely be stumped. UNLESS they know how to construct. Fundamentally.
Maybe have a look at (oldies but goodies) Andrew Loomis (light) and/or George Bridgman (intense). They teach what one might call ‘constructive anatomy’ in drawing.
There are free PDFs of their books if you search. If you prefer video then Proko’s channel follows the same/similar methods.
I did not know that.
It might be bollocks.
A cube isn’t “art” though it’s geometry… isometric or plan…
Yet I’m fairly convinced that I apply some form of geometry most if not all of the time when I’m making art? And I’ve definitely seen countless works of art that involve/represent (specifically) cubes.
In fact - constructional anatomy studies for drawing usually begin with simple geometric forms/shapes.
One of us could be mistaken or misled on that? But then I’d have to relearn a lot of what I thought that I knew about art/drawing! But have you considered that you may be wired (or have stumbled) into seeing things more often (always?) in a binary/polarised/fundamentalist/oppositional sense? ie
Y/N. On/Off. This/That.
?
Rather than (at times, variously):
either/or. and/also. sometimes/sometimes not. depends/if
?
Before this inevitably digresses to the ‘OK so what makes it ‘art’ neverendingthread (am not going there tbh) ...
That 1-Point Perspective tutorial challenge/question I set for you upthread?
A, B or C?
(When you have time! I’m going to help you get nearer to the bottom of this, like a dog with a bone 😉)
Kettle's on. Hob Nob anyone?
I can make a mech hangar .. I can’t make a statue.
What about a sculpture of a giant mech-hanger? Could you make that?
What about a statue comprised of 4742 mech-hangers welded or glued together in such a way as to be the recognisable form of a simple bust? (head and shoulders)
Could you make that? If not, which additional skills/knowledge/ability might you require in order to make that?
How do you (personally) identify and determine the form of a mech-hanger?
p7eaven
This is all digression! Sorry. So what did you think of my question about you vs that one point perspective tutorial?
I don't really know ... I'd have to say I'd need to see the entire lot but:
Overall ... and more a question but why would you think I or anyone else with a background in mathematics and physics doesn't understand that?
I have no problem at all making plans or elevations of buildings etc. all I'd need was a set of cartesian coordinates and a datum. I can make a plan or elevation from any arbitrary point... (as I suspect could Cougar) and apply a light source.
The buildings isn't what I struggle with/can't do. It's like the teachers at school it seems you are presuming my lack of motor skills is deliberate and somehow my inability to draw something I can't see the formula of or do neat handwriting is because I'm lazy.
Right out of my window is a bungalow... I can quite happily reproduce it as a plan you could build it from. It even easier because it's brick built so I can count the exact number of bricks and their ratio is fixed... If I move about I can count them in the 1st plane of perspective so I can make the outline from behind where I can see assuming the builders were semi competent and its built squarely.
What I can't do is the 3 bushes between me and the bungalow or the hundreds of leaves scattered about or the moss on the roof or blades of grass on the verge.
The fundamental point on that specific tutorial is I would use a ruler.
From that one video I can't see anything that would make me want to NOT use a ruler.
The second thing stands out for me is that it is a forced single point perspective.
Obviously I don't know the difference between "perspective" in physics and drawing/painting but to me that forced perspective is unnatural and I wouldn't want that on my wall.
If I was taking a photograph I would go to considerable effort to avoid this with only some specific circumstances forcing a single point. [an example]
https://www.flickr.com/photos/paris-steve/3364813309/in/dateposted-public/
(Somewhere I have an architectural photo I stood on a bin, in the rain for 4 hours for the sole purpose of being in the right place to not force a single point) in some landscapes I stand in nettles or thorns or lie in mud or wade into freezing water for a long time to get the best perspectives, light and composition. The whole drawing seems a unnatural forced perspective.
The 3rd thing strikes me is the repeated don't worry too much about detail.
It's either there or it isn't... or is removed evenly ? This seems all very random... it's like post process editing a photo... something that from my perspective turns a photo into a picture of a product??? [fine to post on ebay or advertising a new bike for example but not actually a photo in the true sense]
To illustrate that refer to the second photo.
This was taken with 2x polarising filters, a ND grad and a 4 stop ND then a straight conversion to mono.
The first one was a tobacco ND grad and a single polariser. The sun wasn't playing ball hence the poor composition as I had to wait a second for the light.
Non of them is edited beyond what I could easily do in a darkroom. That includes the last one of the BM where I screwed up and it isn't level. It is what it is... I'm not going to crop it because I failed to get the camera level.
Thanks steve. I’ll address your questions/assumptions about art/drawing/what you assume that I think etc, etc, in time. They take me quite a bit of time to respond to but I’m not ignoring them, just trying to keep on track and prioritise. Your response above is really helping me to understand how you may think about art vs engineering drawing btw.
Example:
What I can’t do is the 3 bushes between me and the bungalow or the hundreds of leaves scattered about or the moss on the roof or blades of grass on the verge.
Not part of my question. Not asking you to do that. (There’s a reason I’m being blunt here)
To bypass all of the ‘digression’ I’ll just repost the question.
Question: (Practical 1 point perspective study)
1. If you were to grab a pencil and paper, eraser etc. And were to study and complete the below tutorial would your knowledge and ability of drawing improve?
Answer A, B or C
A. Yes. After 2 attempts (Watch, absorb, rewind, complete. Assess. New page. Repeat)
B. No. Not at all no matter how many times I study and complete it
C. Well, I would prefer to complete the tutorial a few times before I answer.
My mum has an unusual one of these - Amusia, which is medically tone deaf. She can't tell the difference between notes that are 3 octaves apart which ought to make undestanding speech difficult - but she has no problems there and aces all the standard hearing tests. It's just music she can't do.
Shes Irish so grew up surrounded by music, and a couple of my uncles are accomplished musicans (I'm a classically trainined violinist FWIW). This makes our family an interesting case study for neuroscientists who periodically invite her into unis for interviews and other tests. We also end up on the radar for journalists which has led to some amusing situations, my favourite being in a car battering around rural Northern Ireland, driven by very slightly pissed Alan Yentob.
it seems you are presuming my lack of motor skills is deliberate and somehow my inability to draw something I can’t see the formula of or do neat handwriting is because I’m lazy.
Very much this, it's a lot like what my little brother had to go through at school being told he was lazy (and punished for it) because he couldn't spell or keep up with the work. Nope spectacularly dyslexic.
I did the same things as my peers at the same time but my writing looks like a drunken spider has run across a page and I cannot get my hands to recreate what is in my mind. It's a fine motor skills thing, at the point of choosing GCSEs I was told by the art teacher there was no point in it for me. As a geographer my understanding was good but I would be criticised for my diagrams. It was frustrating and disheartening, it's not a lack of artistic vision, give me a camera and I can take decent photos but I cannot translate the vision to paper.
Still playing catch-up ...
As a slight aside, it still amazes me that so many people still think they should ‘just be able to draw’?
Ask the same people to grab some metal tubing and welding torch and ‘can you knock up a nice trail bike’?
‘Nah, I’m not a welder’
Steel or aluminium alloy? HT or FS?
I'd quite happily braze a steel frame ... it certainly wouldn't be anywhere near as good as a professional but it would be infinitely closer than a drawing yet I spent infinitely shorter time learning to weld than over a decade of teachers telling me my handwriting sucks and I can't draw.
‘Well, neither are you an illustrator, but you somehow believe that competent drawing skills/understanding and mastery of anatomy/perspective/light/shade/form/line/compositiin etc are in most cases magically conferred to some Special Ones …
…whereas you find it easy to know that welding/fabrication/bike design takes time, theory, study, trial, error, instruction, practice, passion’?
WHAT DO YOU see WHEN YOU LOOK AT
(y - mx - b)^2 / (m^2 +1) = (x - h)^2 + (y - k)^2
In the first second what shape do you see when you look at the above shape. No using graph paper ... just what does this look like in your head?
This to me represents 5 minutes of learning... BIDMAS and order of precedence and raising to a power and understanding cartesian coordinates... then it represents a shape.
The difference is I'm aware this isn't the same for everyone... some people see letters and numbers and symbols.
Designing the frame ? Its a set of formula...
Welding the frame .... its a matter of prep and then selection of method/material and then current or gas mix.
What about a sculpture of a giant mech-hanger? Could you make that?
Yes if you tell me what the structural requirements are and what it's for.
What about a statue comprised of 4742 mech-hangers welded or glued together in such a way as to be the recognisable form of a simple bust? (head and shoulders)
nope...
Could you make that? If not, which additional skills/knowledge/ability might you require in order to make that?
I would need to know it's purpose and what structural requirments it had.
How do you (personally) identify and determine the form of a mech-hanger?
Its a set of equations realised into a physical object.
Mr Hoppy
Very much this, it’s a lot like what my little brother had to go through at school being told he was lazy (and punished for it) because he couldn’t spell or keep up with the work. Nope spectacularly dyslexic.
I did the same things as my peers at the same time but my writing looks like a drunken spider has run across a page and I cannot get my hands to recreate what is in my mind. It’s a fine motor skills thing, at the point of choosing GCSEs I was told by the art teacher there was no point in it for me. As a geographer my understanding was good but I would be criticised for my diagrams. It was frustrating and disheartening, it’s not a lack of artistic vision, give me a camera and I can take decent photos but I cannot translate the vision to paper.
EXACTLY THIS
I’d quite happily braze a steel frame … it certainly wouldn’t be anywhere near as good as a professional but it would be infinitely closer than a drawing yet I spent infinitely shorter time learning to weld than over a decade of teachers telling me my handwriting sucks and I can’t draw.
But it does raise the question, what did you learn about drawing/art from teachers over that decade? (Rhetorical question, food for thought)
Anyway, the tutorial. Was it
A
B
C
?
WHAT DO YOU see WHEN YOU LOOK AT
(y – mx – b)^2 / (m^2 +1) = (x – h)^2 + (y – k)^2
I see a lot of numbers and symbols that I understand to be ‘an equation’. Nothing more. I was made to cry over maths at junior school. Also remember angry evenings with my father trying to get me to ‘get it’, I remember him hissing with frustration at me over logarithm tables. I remember seeing my big rolling tears on the paper which only made him more frustrated. Quick make movie 🤣
Because I couldn’t ‘get it’.
I am a slow/compromised ‘learner‘ at certain things. OK a lot of things. Especially maths/formula. But at this stage (53 years) I’ll probably never know whether my ongoing inability to deal with mathematics (I still struggle with scoring dart games) is compounded/blocked by my now ingrained aversion/attitude/confounded apprehension/evasion/anger/disappointment/
Have recently taken up drums/drum music to try and help me tackle my attention disorder/stay on task - and it’s taking me months to get beyond understanding other time signatures than 4/4. My mind just recoils and makes me wish to tackle something that I find easier to do.
Not part of my question. Not asking you to do that. (There’s a reason I’m being blunt here)
To bypass all of the ‘digression’ I’ll just repost the question.
As I said, I can't say until I've seen them all.
Which makes it C.
But the reality is I can't see anything in the first one that would make me want to see the rest until the end when it has pictures of trees in the series.
When I look at the picture 2 things stand out...
First there is a building road etc. and I see that as a set of cartesian coordinates.
Then there are some other things... trees/clouds I can't visualise as a set of formula.
This is to me what I see...
The second thing is I find the mistakes and ommissions make me feel uneasy.
The lighting and shadows are wrong.
The tower and chimney shadows are a different light source.
To put into words
It reminds me of a passage in book (can't remember what) but there are some animals in a boat and a child spends their childhood not able to sleep because one of the animals is in the water.
As I remember many years later they realise the animal in the water is an Otter or Beaver or some semi aquatic species.
When I see the lighting and shadows it looks like that.
The picture doesn't explain why the light is blocked or why the front is lit ... and looking at it makes me feel a bit queezy.
But it does raise the question, what did you learn about drawing/art from teachers over that decade? (Rhetorical question, food for thought)
It might be rhetorical but what I learned is they were unable to tell me the formulae that describe the drawing.
You still didn't answer my question...
WHAT DO YOU SEE WHEN YOU LOOK AT
(y – mx – b)^2 / (m^2 +1) = (x – h)^2 + (y – k)^2
As I said, I can’t say until I’ve seen them all.
Which makes it C.
Not quite sure we’re on the same page.‘Them all’?
It was just one tutorial?
*edit And (unknowingly ?) you’ve just modified answer ‘C’ by changing it from ‘
C. Well, I would prefer to complete the tutorial a few times before I answer.
To
C. I can’t say until I’ve seen them all.
The picture doesn’t explain why the light is blocked or why the front is lit …
So when you actually complete the tutorial you’ll be able to
1. Describe the experience
2. Show (to self) how you applied lighting and tonal values to your own version of the shapes/scene/drawing in a way that you find to be more convincing/pleasing/correct*
3. Begin to assess whether or not your second (third, fourth...) completions of the tutorial made any difference to your progress/learning?
*’correct’ and ‘convincing’ are not always the same thing (in art and other things)
I may have misinterpreted...
C. Well, I would prefer to complete the study a few times before I answer.
to mean the series of which this is #287
This specific episode seems to be entitled "How to draw buildings in 1-Point Perspective" but this is not something I'd find difficult at all... it's by far the easiest part.
Where this gets very very challenging for me is "and maybe some trees and bushes, we don't need any details just a sketch"
So when I see this it is do something incredibly simple ... draw a set of buildings in a single point perspective but make it harder by not using a ruler..
yep OK....
then do something incredibly difficult that's not even in the title and sketch some trees and bushes
Hence I feel like either I'm missing the point... or you are?
I can draw the buildings in 1 point perspective. They have shapes and holes of simple shapes...
Trees and bushes however are next to impossible... they don't look like that. They have raggedy uneven shapes and bits you can see through and bits you can't. I can't even tell what general species they are in the drawing...
This is the part I get completely dumbfounded.
Unless there is some deep hidden agenda in this video then it looks to me like what the title is?
It doesn't help me with the part I struggle with...
I haven't actually sat and done this specific drawing but I have drawn lots of buildings with different perspectives many many times. I can even go back 45+ years... where I had to draw a picture of Solomons Temple from some bible picture or something... ridiculously simple until the teacher wanted me to include people and palm trees or whatever...
What she didn't seem to understand is why I could do a detailed perspective of the buildings but to all intents and purposes I might as well as just vomited over the page when it came to people and palm trees.
So when you actually complete the tutorial you’ll be able to
1. Describe the experience
I don't need to do it....
Last year I was in an action group to stop some tower blocks being built.
I drew the lot... in multiple perspectives from architectural plans... people were really happy.
Then they wanted some trees and people and like every other time in the last 50yrs it looked like someone gave a pencil to a blind monkey.
Ah Dude, you might as well explain the workings of the Pancreas to a diabetic. It won’t help them produce enough insulin.
good point…. but that’s kinda my question.
Why don’t we berate the diabetic for not keeping up when they are hypoglycaemic or the dyslexic that struggles to spell but if you can’t draw or play an instrument it’s because your not f***ing trying?
I'm reminded about the old saying about judging a fish by it's ability to climb a tree. I see 24 hours later that some Posters are still trying to prove anyone can draw if they try hard enough using maths... an interesting proposition.
I can't draw for shit, I can't get the proportions right, I can't get everything to be where it needs to be (dog's ear somewhere near it's hind legs, no worries). I suppose, should someone put a gun to my head and give me long enough, I could get better, but no amount of effort is going to make me as good as one of my mates who could draw a deer running from memory in Art when we were 12.
Despite that, and the fact I'm still not 100% confident with punctuation and STILL can't spell "Secret" reliably, I've somehow manged to have a fairly diverse, successful career, have a nice, if not flash house, a lovely (when she's in the mood) wife, two kids that don't hate me all the time and my very own Pear Tree!
One of the hardest lessons I had to learn after leaving school and trying to become an Adult it's that it doesn't matter if you're Dyslexic, Diabetic or a Decepticon. It's doesn't matter if you can't draw, can't paint or can't dance the fandango. The world doesn't care, because the world isn't fair. You can either accept that and do something fits with your natural talents, or talents you can hone because your particular brain chemistry finds it interesting enough to devote time to it, or you can spend your life the frustrated and failed Orchestral Pianist who can't play a tune, the Accountant who can't count (okay, cheat tax) or the illustrator who can't draw.
And if you have no talents and not interests at all, may I be the first to say "Welcome to Sales".
some Posters are still trying to prove anyone can draw if they try hard enough using maths
This is known as a strawman argument. It may be unintentional on your part, but that’s what it is.
Always fun isn't it, when an aspie brain and an NT brain collide.
some Posters are still trying to prove anyone can draw if they try hard enough using maths
Not quite... I can draw certain things using maths. Some things I can't draw at all.
I'm totally aware that many or most can't or do it completely differently.
I suppose, should someone put a gun to my head and give me long enough, I could get better
Maybe.... what I can say is for me the longer you give me the worse it looks. To use your example.. the dogs ear might move towards the front but then look nothing like an ear and it's tail would then be sticking from its nose or something.
Always fun isn’t it, when an aspie brain and an NT brain collide.
Possibly ... but then the original Q of which ability to draw or not was just one example.
I think perhaps where you two are at angry dolphins is, there is a difference between technical ability and practical ability.
Like, I knew most of the stuff about perspective in that tutorial. I could probably have drawn something of a similar form and structure off the top of my head. But it ignores the creative process, "oh, I'll pop a building here, I think I'll make this one a tower... put an archway in here... add a bit of detail at the end..." which is harder to teach. It assumes basic techniques (understandable at lesson 800+) like being able to draw a straight line freehand, or getting different tones of even shading out of a single pencil. If I attempted to recreate that sketch there it sure as shit wouldn't look like it does in the example when I'd finished.
And sure, yeah, practice. My high school English teacher once somewhat politically incorrectly described my handwriting as looking "like a spider had crawled through an inkwell, had an epileptic fit and then died." Meanwhile my peers - girls particularly - were turning out work that was practically calligraphy. Did they have more writing practice than me?
So that's rather the question isn't it. With sufficient teaching and practice could a given someone learn to draw, or to sing, or to spell, or to drive, or do to complex algebra, or will it always be out of their reach no matter how hard they try? How do even define those things, what level do they need to attain to say that they've learnt it?
Like, I knew most of the stuff about perspective in that tutorial. I could probably have drawn something of a similar form and structure off the top of my head.
Exactly my feeling...
But it ignores the creative process, “oh, I’ll pop a building here, I think I’ll make this one a tower… put an archway in here… add a bit of detail at the end…” which is harder to teach.
I'm missing that ... partly admittedly because I took the title literally.
It assumes basic techniques (understandable at lesson 800+) like being able to draw a straight line freehand, or getting different tones of even shading out of a single pencil. If I attempted to recreate that sketch there it sure as shit wouldn’t look like it does in the example when I’d finished.
I'm not sure I ever could but I'm not saying practice wouldn't help either... but non of that seems like it would help me draw the dog you can recognise as a dog but perhaps more to the point is what you said about perspective.
I didn't learn anything new about perspective and I'm reasonably certain that is the main point of the tutorial.
Meanwhile my peers – girls particularly – were turning out work that was practically calligraphy. Did they have more writing practice than me?
I don't think that is the correct Q... perhaps the question really is if you had all done the same practice would the writing be the same and was their beautiful calligraphy proportional?
Perhaps the real Q is regardless of time you practice could you ever write at any speed whatsoever like they did. I know I can either write not exactly beautiful but not dying spider or I can write at a decent speed.
Moving through caligraphy though... having just built a wheel for a mate who is busier than me...
I use the pitch to get it pretty reasonable... it doesn't take ME much effort that way.
However I realise that is just my way...if someone is tone deaf though then telling them "you're not trying hard enough" isn't going to help or is this way the best way for them.
