Instead of starting small and drawing my hands and feet as I stated last week, I decided to make a rough draft sketch of a face. This isn’t anyone’s face in general, but it is a face. I was starting to work on my hand drawing, but then started to doodle a face on a second piece of paper and couldn’t stop. For my first sketch, I don’t think it turned out too bad, but there is definitely room for improvement.
One of the “Yes”moments was starting and feeling good about it. Then came the ” I don’t know” moment when I started on the nose and mouth. Finally the “I need a lot of practice” came after putting it all together and calling it “quits” for this drawing. I put quotes around the quits only because I could potentially come back to it and finish it or fix it. The practice portion came because of the proportions of everything put together. I forgot to take a step back and look at it in the middle of drawing it, rather than just looking at it put together at the end. Now, the “I don’t know”, the nose portion is smaller than the eyes and mouth. The nose is also a little crooked towards the right side. I have tried to fix it multiple times and failed to get it any straighter. Then came the mouth, I am still trying to learn how to place the mouth on the face without looking fake. The “yes” moment is what is going to help me achieve better and not leave this skill at this.
This big picture in this is that, I do want it to look more realistic rather than something thrown together, as this one feels to me. (Even when I spent most of the day working on this.) I think to master this, is to break it down to individual features, as I stated before. Then putting it all together. This is going to seem weird for me at first and hard. This is because I like to try to master something right away with out thinking of the process that will have to come to get to master it. In the next couple of weeks I will have different sketches of the facial features. Then hopefully put it all together and have something that looks better than the picture above.
Courtney18's understanding 
Courtney, I think your drawing looks really good for starters! I myself love to draw and I think I got that trait from my dad and grandmother. Drawing faces is a challenge for me and I usually end up tossing the drawing in the trash left unfinished. I did do a drawing of hands and I was pretty impressed for just looking at the picture and transferring what I saw to the paper. I think the key to drawing is practice and patience. I am a perfectionist when it comes to my drawings and if it doesn’t look like what I see than it’s going in the trash. I need to work on having patience. Some advice I could give is possibly research tips on how to draw the eyes, the nose, the mouth, and ears and then do a bunch of different sketches of each on a piece of paper. Keep going though! You got this!
Shania 🙂
LikeLike
Thank you for the encouragement! I plan to do some research this week to fix some things. I normally would throw my pictures in the trash if they didn’t look right. Until I started this and found that I can’t throw away everything or I wouldn’t have anything to show. Practice is patients and I will have to practice on that as well. Thank you again!
LikeLike
HI Courtney,
Your willingness to be vulnerable and share your practicing is all we as students need!
P.S. I like her mouth just the way it is.
LikeLike
Thank you. I need to be honest with myself and my art so I can create that for my future students. Thank you, the mouth is one of my better parts in the piece.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Have you ever tried drawing a portrait on a grid? I had to do a few grid drawings for an art class I took, and it made it way easier to practice proportions. I like the plan you have set up for yourself to establish a starting point, break it down, and put it back together. Sounds like a good plan!
LikeLike
I have done some pictures on a grid before, but it was not a portrait. I know how it works and I could do it to start and have a better feel for it. Thank you for reminding me of them!
LikeLike
I told you I would come and look this week to see what you were up to, and I wasn’t disappointed! As someone who doesn’t draw, I think this looks pretty awesome, but I also know that in everything I do, I am my own worst critic, and I’m sure that is true for you as well! I think it is pretty neat that you weren’t planning on even drawing a face and then your mind took over your pencil and you couldn’t stop! To me, that is what art is about!
LikeLike
I honestly didn’t think of it that way, thank you. After I got done I instantly thought of all the things that could be fixed, but spent to much time trying to fix it time and time again. It is interesting when our minds take over and I am glad it did. Thank you again for the comment.
LikeLike
I think it’s a pretty good start! We are all critical of our work even when we don’t need to be. To me this doesn’t look put together, it looks like it all belongs. Keep working at it!
LikeLike
Thank you I hoped for it to look like it all belongs together. It is hard sometimes with the proportions and its still something to work on.
LikeLike
I admire that you were able to look at your sketch, recognize your weaknesses, and then establish a plan to improve upon those areas. At least you have a goal! For a beginning sketch I am quite impressed with the complexity of this piece. Just as it has been previously stated, we will always be our biggest critics. Keep up the great work, though! And happy learning!
LikeLike
Thank you, I am pleased on how it turned out. However, I do plan to do better. I really am hard on myself when it comes to art sometimes, but hope to get over that sometime to. Thank you again!
LikeLiked by 1 person
You might think you need a lot of practice, but your drawing is way better than anything I could ever do. I have never been good at drawing. Thanks to our independent learning project you get all the practice time that you need.
LikeLike