Gallery #1 - Negative Space

Lian and John have been working at home over the past week on assignments to enhance their awareness of negative space. Here are their results and comments. 
I am really pleased with their progress after so short a time. Congratulations both of you.

John

Oak tree: 1 hr 10 mins, including carefully looking first. Well - did I do this?!! As it was [yet another] wet morning, I had to take a photo and work from that, which made it much easier. I think I really would have struggled from pure observation. The negative space technique really helps to get the object correct.  
'A good first attempt. The difference in shading strength breaks the unity of the work, but if you were planning to do an abstract piece, that change in shading could further help with fragmenting the image. (Sylvia)'

Nude: 50 mins. head too far to right on page - my quarter divisions wrong! Tried to ignore the shade on the original and use the true contour of the body. Found the dividing lines into segments very useful. 

Did the work as portrait with feet at top (habit from last 3 weeks?) 'Totally valid John, since it helps to focus on the spaces and not name parts. Well done (Sylvia)'

Bighorn sheep: copying 55 mins, 

negative spaces 20 mins, segments 15 mins.

 I felt my shading improved as I got used to 5B pencil - first time.  

I really enjoyed copying the image, and using the negative spaces helped enormously.  'Watch out for slight distortion when you re-do the shapes. Just a small change can create a whole new image; again great for abstraction work though. (Sylvia)'

Chair: 1 hr 30 mins. My first real attempt at drawing from observation, not copying, and whilst difficult, I so enjoyed the work. I thought that I had set out key points OK using a viewing frame, but ... The seat is too wide and the back too short. 

Having done the negative space drawing, I just couldn't resist going on, so to save time I took a photocopy and did the rest. Made me realise even more how using the negative spaces helps so much to get shape (well, roughly!). 

'Your observation is really improving already John. The distortion of the seat and the back is normal at this stage of your experience. As your observation improves and with more practice you will be able to correct inconsistencies more readily.

I like the negative space chair drawing very much and glad you enjoyed filling in the chair! (Sylvia)'

Sylvia - 3 weeks ago I would never have thought I could do this. Thank you so much. 

'You are welcome. But remember...I can show you how but the quality of the results are all down to your own hard work !'

Lian

Bighorn Sheep: The first modified contour drawing and negative space reproduction was nicely observed Lian, well done. 
  
But I really liked the third fragment too. (Sylvia) 

Tree:When I started to draw I saw every moment more negative spaces! So I stopped and started to do a 'pure negative space drawing'. Together with the frame it helped to organise everything I saw.
'You really have made the tree appear!(Sylvia)'



Chair:
The little window helped to see the space around the chair. Sometimes I caught myself using contour drawing with the difficult places.

'The viewer really works well to frame the object and you have good proportion in your chair Lian and have seen the negative space well. (Sylvia)'

Nude: 'This is a very tricky exercise Lian, and using the idea of breaking up the negative spaces with key lines (erased by me for this image) really does work well. (Sylvia)'