Hi, Louise! Using a grid... 🤔 I use a 9-rectangle grid made of a 3 x 4"card mount, almost 100% of the time for plein air landscape, but also for studio work such as still life. It's very useful for sorting out composition, by moving it around, portrait, landscape, back and forth, for placing rough, very light outlines of where things are going. The 9-rectangle grid is also useful in life drawing in the studio, just to get the initial placement of the parts of the body, where no-one is embarrassed. Doing this helped me a lot for drawing multiple mini, quick freehand plein air people on an A4 page, as I'd already got basic anatomy stuck in my muscle / thinking memory. I didn’t need guidelines. *But* I only mark off the thirds on the edge of the mount, and on the masking tape around my paper. I also use my eyes (draw what you see, _not_ what you think it should look like!!!) and use a pencil as an angle / measuring tool. The thing is, people call this a viewfinder. I’ve never heard anyone slagging off using a viewfinder and I have seen a lot of ArtTubers recommending them! I have only used the grid on a ‘reference’ once, when I overlaid the reference with the acetate nine-rectangle grid. It was to transfer a small section of a complex, finished, larger A4 plein air drawing (my own) into my 9 x 13cm Art Creation book as part of a 160 page sketchbook challenge. I didn’t draw the grid on the sketchbook page, just the six marks on the edges. The exercise (scaling down) was interesting, and the finished drawing in the sketchbook draws a sharp intake of breath whenever I show folk that challenge sketchbook. However, I have used it to help my students in their composition, placement, etc. for still life, or from their reference photos for landscape work or self-portraits. Again, they are not allowed to draw the grid on the paper, but only to mark the edges. _Using a grid:_ *Use less gridlines.* Two across and two down (9 rectangles) is enough for sizes up to 38 x 56cms (half of a full sheet of watercolour paper). It still gives a guide, but you aren’t a slave to the grid. It is simply your tool by which you learn to use your eyes and learn to use a pencil to measure length and angle. . *Remove* the gridlines from your reference (they aren’t on your drawing so it saves all that bother of trying to erase them and not your drawing!) _as soon as you have the basic shape on the paper._ This way, you can see the whole picture easily and get the balance of colour and shading as a cohesive whole, not possible when gridlines obscure the whole. A far bigger issue for me is the constant use of reference photos from the internet and the empty desert of ArtTubers doing drawing from life: objects easily found around the home, outside, or _our own reference photos,_ all of which are enhanced by our own memories of places, people, objects, things. Using our own eyes, looking around gathering mental images, using our own mobile phone cameras. Most people have a basic, if not a good, camera on their phone, so there really is no excuse for needing someone else’s photos! Eg: An ArtTuber on YT recently said they needed to look up references for hair - colour and styles. But all around her, in the city where she lives, are millions of people with millions of hair colours / styles on millions of differently shaped heads. Quick snaps which can be taken from across a crowded street, giving many options when zoomed in. And (especially for people using their photos for public viewing) the faces can be manipulated changed to protect the unknown person's privacy. Cars, buses, taxis, bridges, architecture, parks, people… for most of us, just about anything is easily accessed on our own two feet / a bus ride / at the local museum… The options are many, the takers are few. Eek! Rant over! 😄Hope this helps anyone who reads it! 😊 Edited to correct a formatting problem.
Sorry its taken me a little while to reply. I had replies to half of this but believe it or not my toddler touched my phone and it backed out of the reply so it was lost. I have to reply to long messages on my computer as im clearly phone illiterate! The plein air setup sounds really interesting! Ive never thought to use something like that when out and about but I can see how it would be useful! You are a fountain of useful info truly! I never thought to just use the edges of the grid but I can see how that might also be really helpful and much less rubbing out/ less chance of lines being seen thought the drawing. I forgot to remove the grid from the reference as I just got into the flow of colouring it in. If I try the grid method again ill be sure to remove them from the image and use a smaller number of squares! I try to draw from life wherever possible even if its just sketching random everyday things during the boys naptime. It defiantly has helped me the most, possibly because you can see how the light hits it properly? I used to take a lot of photos when I was younger with my DSLR so I probably have a few good inspiration pics ive taken knocking around! I guess it can just be convenient sometimes to rely on the ol’ google to get references. Thanks for the comment 💜
@@louisecreatesart Hi, Louise! No problem about taking time to reply! I also understand the 'losing a post half way through' issue, but I don't have a toddler, only me!!!! So often, I have no idea what I've done, but have covered the touch pad and its controls on my laptop yet again to try to eliminate accidental deletes, and try to concentrate more not to hit the 'cancel' instead of 'reply'... Yes - I agree here: _"I try to draw from life wherever possible even if its just sketching random everyday things during the boys naptime. It defiantly has helped me the most, possibly because you can see how the light hits it properly?"_ It really does make sense of form, because we've handled those things so often, light and shade, are sooo much easier when it's there in front of us, in 3D. Hmmm _"I guess it can just be convenient sometimes to rely on the ol’ google to get references."_ 🤔I wonder if it actually does save time to search online as opposed to searching our own files? I don't know, as I don't usually google images, and my digital photos / images are usually named and in folders. I also have literally thousands of pre-digital photos but I rarely use them for my own art. It's not a snobby thing, but simply because I began my current 'art life' when I was stuck in bed for months on end, and just drew whatever I could pick up on my short trips trips to bathroom or kitchen. When my husband was at home, I could ask him for certain thing, too. After that, when I was finally up and about, I soon began to go out to do plein air, because after so long indoors, I needed to escape! But I get horribly, horrendously distracted when I'm googling for information, because something will spark my interest and I wander down that route because I want to find out more!!! My worst time-waster, though, is the amount of time I'm losing just trying to clean up my home page to find the stuff by my friends that I want to watch and for which, for some reason I don't know, YT hasn't notified me! Oops - another long reply. I used to be really good at precis, but seem to have lost the art of being short and concise... but yes, I do understand, and don't expect prompt replies to my screeds. 🤗
Yeah, that's my impression so far. Will have to see how it compares to the freehand method (considering I'm not used to doing this size portraits it might take me just as long 😬).
Hello, hope you are well, I already visited and analyzed Your CZcams channel. Your content is amazing but channel growth is very poor, already found many problems on your channel. Just need to customize your channel now(Set up, and optimize with high-quality SEO) Especially need SEO service.
Hi, Louise! Using a grid... 🤔
I use a 9-rectangle grid made of a 3 x 4"card mount, almost 100% of the time for plein air landscape, but also for studio work such as still life. It's very useful for sorting out composition, by moving it around, portrait, landscape, back and forth, for placing rough, very light outlines of where things are going.
The 9-rectangle grid is also useful in life drawing in the studio, just to get the initial placement of the parts of the body, where no-one is embarrassed. Doing this helped me a lot for drawing multiple mini, quick freehand plein air people on an A4 page, as I'd already got basic anatomy stuck in my muscle / thinking memory. I didn’t need guidelines.
*But* I only mark off the thirds on the edge of the mount, and on the masking tape around my paper. I also use my eyes (draw what you see, _not_ what you think it should look like!!!) and use a pencil as an angle / measuring tool.
The thing is, people call this a viewfinder. I’ve never heard anyone slagging off using a viewfinder and I have seen a lot of ArtTubers recommending them!
I have only used the grid on a ‘reference’ once, when I overlaid the reference with the acetate nine-rectangle grid. It was to transfer a small section of a complex, finished, larger A4 plein air drawing (my own) into my 9 x 13cm Art Creation book as part of a 160 page sketchbook challenge. I didn’t draw the grid on the sketchbook page, just the six marks on the edges. The exercise (scaling down) was interesting, and the finished drawing in the sketchbook draws a sharp intake of breath whenever I show folk that challenge sketchbook.
However, I have used it to help my students in their composition, placement, etc. for still life, or from their reference photos for landscape work or self-portraits. Again, they are not allowed to draw the grid on the paper, but only to mark the edges.
_Using a grid:_ *Use less gridlines.* Two across and two down (9 rectangles) is enough for sizes up to 38 x 56cms (half of a full sheet of watercolour paper). It still gives a guide, but you aren’t a slave to the grid. It is simply your tool by which you learn to use your eyes and learn to use a pencil to measure length and angle. .
*Remove* the gridlines from your reference (they aren’t on your drawing so it saves all that bother of trying to erase them and not your drawing!) _as soon as you have the basic shape on the paper._ This way, you can see the whole picture easily and get the balance of colour and shading as a cohesive whole, not possible when gridlines obscure the whole.
A far bigger issue for me is the constant use of reference photos from the internet and the empty desert of ArtTubers doing drawing from life: objects easily found around the home, outside, or _our own reference photos,_ all of which are enhanced by our own memories of places, people, objects, things.
Using our own eyes, looking around gathering mental images, using our own mobile phone cameras. Most people have a basic, if not a good, camera on their phone, so there really is no excuse for needing someone else’s photos!
Eg: An ArtTuber on YT recently said they needed to look up references for hair - colour and styles. But all around her, in the city where she lives, are millions of people with millions of hair colours / styles on millions of differently shaped heads. Quick snaps which can be taken from across a crowded street, giving many options when zoomed in. And (especially for people using their photos for public viewing) the faces can be manipulated changed to protect the unknown person's privacy.
Cars, buses, taxis, bridges, architecture, parks, people… for most of us, just about anything is easily accessed on our own two feet / a bus ride / at the local museum… The options are many, the takers are few.
Eek! Rant over! 😄Hope this helps anyone who reads it! 😊
Edited to correct a formatting problem.
Sorry its taken me a little while to reply. I had replies to half of this but believe it or not my toddler touched my phone and it backed out of the reply so it was lost. I have to reply to long messages on my computer as im clearly phone illiterate!
The plein air setup sounds really interesting! Ive never thought to use something like that when out and about but I can see how it would be useful! You are a fountain of useful info truly!
I never thought to just use the edges of the grid but I can see how that might also be really helpful and much less rubbing out/ less chance of lines being seen thought the drawing. I forgot to remove the grid from the reference as I just got into the flow of colouring it in. If I try the grid method again ill be sure to remove them from the image and use a smaller number of squares!
I try to draw from life wherever possible even if its just sketching random everyday things during the boys naptime. It defiantly has helped me the most, possibly because you can see how the light hits it properly? I used to take a lot of photos when I was younger with my DSLR so I probably have a few good inspiration pics ive taken knocking around! I guess it can just be convenient sometimes to rely on the ol’ google to get references.
Thanks for the comment 💜
@@louisecreatesart Hi, Louise! No problem about taking time to reply! I also understand the 'losing a post half way through' issue, but I don't have a toddler, only me!!!! So often, I have no idea what I've done, but have covered the touch pad and its controls on my laptop yet again to try to eliminate accidental deletes, and try to concentrate more not to hit the 'cancel' instead of 'reply'...
Yes - I agree here: _"I try to draw from life wherever possible even if its just sketching random everyday things during the boys naptime. It defiantly has helped me the most, possibly because you can see how the light hits it properly?"_
It really does make sense of form, because we've handled those things so often, light and shade, are sooo much easier when it's there in front of us, in 3D.
Hmmm _"I guess it can just be convenient sometimes to rely on the ol’ google to get references."_
🤔I wonder if it actually does save time to search online as opposed to searching our own files? I don't know, as I don't usually google images, and my digital photos / images are usually named and in folders. I also have literally thousands of pre-digital photos but I rarely use them for my own art.
It's not a snobby thing, but simply because I began my current 'art life' when I was stuck in bed for months on end, and just drew whatever I could pick up on my short trips trips to bathroom or kitchen. When my husband was at home, I could ask him for certain thing, too. After that, when I was finally up and about, I soon began to go out to do plein air, because after so long indoors, I needed to escape!
But I get horribly, horrendously distracted when I'm googling for information, because something will spark my interest and I wander down that route because I want to find out more!!! My worst time-waster, though, is the amount of time I'm losing just trying to clean up my home page to find the stuff by my friends that I want to watch and for which, for some reason I don't know, YT hasn't notified me!
Oops - another long reply. I used to be really good at precis, but seem to have lost the art of being short and concise... but yes, I do understand, and don't expect prompt replies to my screeds. 🤗
Tbh I think it sounds like more effort than just free handing it to me 😅
Yeah, that's my impression so far. Will have to see how it compares to the freehand method (considering I'm not used to doing this size portraits it might take me just as long 😬).
Hello, hope you are well, I already visited and analyzed Your CZcams channel. Your content is amazing but channel growth is very poor, already found many problems on your channel. Just need to customize your channel now(Set up, and optimize with high-quality SEO) Especially need SEO service.