all finished.

So, my passion project for this year is technically officially done! I did my final presentation this week, meaning I no longer need to work on this project. I can't say that I will continue to do as much as I have in the past few months, but I'm pretty sure that I'll keep doing some drawing occasionally.

I never did finish my second portrait project, it's not very far along so I won't bore you all with pictures of a partially completed portrait :) But, I did accomplish a lot and am happy with what I did learn. I was able to set aside time for something that I enjoyed learning about {and realized that I do quite like to learn!} and also that it's good to not just dive into a project without background information.

 I also realized that just because you have information and resources, it doesn't mean that you'll excel at something the first {or second...or third...} time that you do it. As I've said before, greatness requires practice... and practice requires discipline and the willingness to make mistakes. {Believe me, making mistakes was not enjoyable!} But if i never made some of the mistakes I did, like not measuring out proportions when drawing faces, or shading the dark lines really dark right away, I would have never learned the importance of those skills.

Overall, it's been an enjoyable and fairly productive semester. I might be back occasionally with some new projects, and possibly next year with a continuation to this "journal" :)

finishing up.

I know that I haven't posted any progress for the second portrait, but I'll do that pretty soon.

The end of the first semester is approaching, and that also means the end of my passion project work for now. We also have to do a presentation on our projects to conclude them... and that involves a bit of reflection. So this post is more about what and how I've learned throughout this project.

I started with a lot of reading and looking at other people's drawings, and tried some of it on my own sometimes. It worked better {i think} than just deciding to try draw portraits on my own. There is a lot more to drawing faces than simply copying lines... you have to consider lighting, angles, and face shape and structure. Plus, everybody has a differently structured face, so it's not like you can just draw the same outline every time.

While I was drawing child portraits, I realized that it was important to make sure that you only start drawing the features about halfway down on the face, and you can't make too many lines or smudges, 'cause that seems to add age. Their jawlines and cheekbones aren't as defined either, so the shading is a bit softer. When I was working on my first project, I realized that it is also pretty important to measure out the features and where they are on the face. When I just tried to guess approximately what the proportions were, the sketch turned out a bit far from the actual image.

I also had to start scheduling specific days to work on my project {like Tuesdays and sometimes Thursdays} so that I'd actually get it done. :) Otherwise, other things would take priority. Hopefully, I'll still have time to work on this "hobby" {for lack of a better word} even though the semester is ending.

next "project."

My next attempt will be with drawing this portrait below, which looks pretty simple... yet i know it'll be a bit more than simple, especially because of the fact that it has a more fine style than the portrait of the boy.

It is an adult face, meaning the shape is different than previous sketches. What makes it a bit easier is that it's straight-on view, so there's no need to factor in the lighting and angle complications. I'll probably start it, but then finish my other one at some point too :) My progress should be fairly quick since it's Christmas break and this is a way to get rid of dullness and boredom and gives me something useful to do. 

We'll see, though ;)

young boy portrait - part three.

So by now i'm almost finished with this picture and am going to start moving on to a new one very soon. Before that, though, I need to finish this portrait...

There's still a couple things that i want to finish on it. This time, i shaded some more things darker, including the eyes. I worked on the hair a bit, but that got to be really challenging because there are lights and darks, but it cannot look random... so there has to be definition, but if there is too much then it looks like straw hair. I also had to change the hair line a bit because it was going to far over the boy's forehead. Also, I think i finally got the face shape really similar to the actual picture, which I was very happy about. {That took a lot of measuring with the end of my pencil, and much erasing!}

One thing that you'll notice looking at the original is that there are some very prominent shading/shadow lines under the eyes, which I tried to work on as well. It's difficult because I didn't want it to look overly shaded and with a child's face you don't want too much shading because it makes the skin look a bit older. However, there is some obvious definition, which takes a gentle buildup of sketching.

The picture isn't the best quality, but that's because of the size of my scanner compared to the sketchpad - it lets some light in. All that being said, for a first full-page project, I think that it's looking fairly good :)

young boy portrait - part two.

So i spent a few hours one evening working on my project picture, and I'm quite happy {and surprised} to say that it's going pretty well. There are some things that I still need to work on, and the face shape still isn't quite right {very very very difficult to get that similar to the picture, especially because my image is a larger scale of it.} Here's how it looks right now, compared to the original.

As you can see, I shaded the eyes a bit more and defined more of the hair. The nose and mouth and lines are also more defined. Next time I'm going to work on the hair the most, as well as fixing up some details. I also think that the space between the nose and mouth is a little less than it should be, so I might very possibly change that next time :)
I have found that I enjoy working on this project, but once I have drawn for an hour or two, I need to stop before I make unnecessary changes and get frustrated!
Any suggestions?

young boy portrait - part one.

So I started the work on my first {official} project, and I realized that it's going to be a bit more work than I thought... I thought I might just be able to freehand the face shape and guess as to where the features and such are positioned. That didn't turn out too well for me {as you can see in image two... not really my proudest artwork I must admit!} :) The picture printed actually is about half of a page, while what I'm drawing is a full page of sketching paper, meaning that I can't just "cheat" and trace it or something like that...

Here is what I began by doing {it looked good at that point, i thought} (:

But when it came to doing the features, it didn't work so well to just try best to guess/sketch it. I ended up having to erase a lot of what I did at first because the proportions weren't exactly right... as you can see in the next picture :P

I had to use my pencil and measure the size of the distances from the mouth to cheek, nose to eyes, eyes to side of the face... etc. I also started shading too early {which is why the mouth and the eyes did not turn out very well!} I learned that it is much better to do light outlines before you start working the shading too much, otherwise you have nowhere to go when you finish, and it's better to build up your dark/medium tones as opposed to going with them right away. I made this mistake with the boy's mouth.. shading the middle but not the rest.
I worked on the picture a bit more and it did end up much better than image two {but then I got so sick of it and decided to stop at that point.} However, I forgot to take a picture but I'll include that in the next post. Maybe I'll do a quick sketch in the meantime before coming back to that picture on Monday or Tuesday :)

child faces first sketches.

These two are the ones that I started with for practicing drawing a younger face. The first one of the young girl I don`t really like as much, especially the hair and the forehead should have been a bit longer. Also, the eyes look a little too old to be a child. It could be more of a little bit older kid.

The next one of the little boy was just a quick sketch just to get more of an idea of the basic face structure. I like this one because of the simplicity, and I wanted to do one with closed eyes.

I learned that when drawing a young face, it`s important not to make too many shading lines and such, because kids have much ``softer`` skin, and less wrinkles or lines. If you shade too much, it ends up adding a few more years. Odd, but true! Also, when making the eyes, it`s important not to outline them too much...which i had trouble with in picture one.

faces a different ages.

The composition of a child's face is much different than that of an adults... and the key to an accurate children's portrait us understanding that...and {the much harder thing, applying it on paper.}
One of the major differences is that the face pretty much begins halfway through. The forehead makes up half, or sometimes over half of the face's composition. Also, the head is a lot rounder. The eyes look a lot larger compared to the rest of a face. Another thing to note is the lack of a defined jawline and pointed chin, and not really prominent cheekbones. The nose, jaw, and eyebrow ridge are upturned a bit more as well. This picture shows how a child's face changes throughout the years. It's not that detailed, but it gives a rough idea...








This picture {despite how weird it looks} is pretty accurately showing the difference from the side view...













Finally, This link was very helpful just to see some examples :)
http://www.pxleyes.com/blog/2010/04/50-ultra-realistic-children-portrait-drawings/

With all of this information, plus a bit of tips from my art books {listed on the resource page}, i'm going to try to get some practice and hopefully post a few of my attempts sometime this week or next.

update.

So, the last time I posted I was beginning to be not-too thrilled with this project. However, I've put a bit more time and effort in {probably something I should've done in the first place,} and it's been pretty enjoyable. And, I've surprised myself with some of the way my first sketches are turning out. Here are my two favorites so far.

The first one turned out alright, I was working with lighting from the top right. I don't quite love how the left side of the face turned out, but it's alright. I tried to do some cross-hatched shading for the shadows. The angle of the face is also about a three-quarter view, so getting the left side to look realistic was a bit challenging. The one thing that was fairly difficult about that was not making the jawline or cheekbone too sharp. Also, it's pretty hard for me to get the left eye {the one to the left on the paper!} to resemble the right one {because I usually draw the right eye first.} This time, I drew the eye on the left first and it worked a bit better!

The second one was just a quick sketch for practice. Not quite as much detailing and shadow work :) The main goal was just to get it to look like an actual human face.

Any comments or suggestions?
Let me know!

adjustments.

I've realized that when it comes to drawing realistic looking faces, my main holdup is that they take a lot of time. The portraits can potentially take days, and in all my practicing just the basic features, I've taken hours.... which does not work well for me. I'm the type of person who prefers to start something, and then be able to have a finished product by the time I'm done. However, with drawing portraits, this is not the case. I'll have to go back to my work and continue where I left off.

I've also had difficulty making enough time for it. We're halfway through the semester, but I just can't seem to set apart enough time to sit down and work on specific things. Which is sort of frustrating, because despite that I want to do this, I keep making excuses.

So, because of lack of other ideas, I'm making a more rigid schedule for myself. {I guess I just need that discipline.} Although I've been keeping up with my goals, I do the minimum amount, but it's just not satisfactory. So, all that being said, you should expect to see much more progress in the future due to the fact that every Tuesday, I will force myself to sit down and work... and I know that even though I am 'forcing' myself to work on a passion project, I will enjoy it once i stop putting it off :)

My lack of progress will {hopefully} also stop frustrating me with this new 'system' {for lack of a better word.}

pictures...

as promised, some of my first attempts in photos :)
any suggestions? i'd love to hear them.

eyelashes...many futile attempts. 

 rough sketch of eye.

 making a grid helps, actually ;) but again, first attempt!

 textures and shading exercises, kind of fun :)

i obviously haven't done this in a while!

So today I happened to have some extra time, and decided I'd better put some more time into my passion project. I opened the art book and decided to make myself an artist because i felt "in the mood to learn."
Ha.
Was I wrong...
Have you ever realized that it sometimes doesn't matter how much you feel like doing something? Sometimes, you're just not that great at it. But...greatness requires practice. So I hope to put in some more practice to produce something better than the way things are turning out now.
However, my time was not all wasted {thank goodness.} I now can say that I have a whole lot of experience with pencil shading {and all the different sharpness-es/hardness-es of the drawing pencils} as well as some practice with basic facial features.
My favorite one to do is the eye... mostly because it looks the best and I am sort of good at it :P The nose, not so much. There are so many different angles and sizes and shapes when it comes to noses that it's hard to get it just right. Especially if i'm trying to get it to look like an example for when i work on portraits later!
I like working with the softer pencils because they smudge a bit easier, and most lines on faces aren't really defined, other than the outline. Creases by the eyes or other lines aren't made by just using one line, it takes a bit of shading and a couple strokes {and erasing!} to perfect it.
My main challenge when drawing my practice eyes was the eyelashes. They ended up looking a bit more like checkmarks, rather than eyelashes. I have to work on getting the curve but also going from the thick to thin like an eyelash is.
i'll add a few pictures of my practice work soon :)

starting slowly.

Instead of just jumping right into a project like I would typically do, I decided to do some research before I just started drawing {and became really frustrated with myself.} So, for the first passion project class, I did some reading. My Gramma had given me a book that goes through the basics of drawing portraits, and one of my friends was lovely enough to let me borrow hers that teaches a lot of different strokes to achieve texture. And that's when i realized that there is a bit more of a technique to art than I thought... There are complex and labeled diagrams of the bone structure and muscles of the face, which can help you decide where to shade and so on. Not to mention direction of light source, and all the profiles to choose from. Oh joy. And I barely am able to do front view :P

So, after last week Friday, I decided to practice some of those preliminary shading techniques or different strokes on the sides of my paper when I found myself bored {mostly during two driver's education classes...} Not only were they a wonderful way to pass time, it also prepared me to start. 

This week, I'm going to unpack the pencils and real artist paper and just work more on technique and such. As well as doing a bit more research as to the construction and elements of an effective portrait... all of which i am still wondering how i am going to pull off :)

It'll be nice to absentmindedly draw during class {listening, of course...} and not be too shamed by my lack of artistic ability. 

All in due time :)

beginnings.

Hey y'all.
I guess I should start by explaining what in the world I'm doing and why :)
For our Bible class, we have to choose something that we want to do and then work towards a product or a goal for the semester. The whole decision making process was not easy for me at all, due to the fact that this could be absolutely anything. I wanted to choose something that I would enjoy, yet it was difficult to think of how that would be workable in class time.
When I was younger, I really enjoyed art. My grandma would come to our house and teach us about art styles, give us projects, and other stuff like that. My favorite part of this "class" was drawing. I'd try landscapes, architecture, and {my favorite,} people. It was fun to see how different strokes and shading could create something that actually resembled something. {Which, unfortunately, was rare and difficult for me to do.} So, I tried to get better, but eventually I stopped practicing.
Being the type of person that is a perfectionist, I hated the eternity that it took to achieve something that looked real. {Like my sister, or even a building.}
I still really want to be able to have a {sort of!} artistic ability, and am hoping to explore the art of how to be a better freehand artist, as well as drawing something that is a copy of another thing. {For lack of a better way to explain things.} I'll be using those typical art pencils and a few erasers. And a lot of my patience.

But by the end, I want to be a more confident artist, {a better artists,} and have some items that I'm proud of in my portfolio. I'll working on different "projects" each month, and have specific goals. I'll also be sure to post lots of pictures, even though I cannot promise greatness {or even semi-goodness!}