DIARY - Can you see what it is yet?
Date: 2007-05-30 13:59:40
Author: Pat Kent
I've been asked a couple of times if I could post something about the drawing process I adopt. I must admit there are probably millions of better art tutorials out there in web-world, posted by thousands of artists better than I but as I’ve been asked I thought I'd try and oblige. So, for Blue Smith in particular, here it is, The Pat Kent guide to drawing Pat Kent style!
But first, a bit of history.
As you may have noticed I tend to draw a lot of women! And they mostly appear unclothed, this is principally for two reasons.
1. I like drawing.
And
2. I like drawing women.
At school I had a great Art tutor who, despite the schools extreme Catholic leanings [it was a Catholic school], promoted ART in its broadest sense. He was a true gentleman, in the most exact and proper nature of the word, he was also a great educator. He taught me to look beyond the study books and was the first person to make me realise that the drawings I liked at the time [American comics] was actually still ART.
I also had several very gifted contemporaries round me as fellow students. Tony Pasfield, Pat Mulray and Anne Dixon were all very talented artists in their own rights [much more than I could aspire to].
Tony did great work with pencil images, Pat was a dab hand at oil painting and Anne was a very talented graphic artist and it was her representations of BIBA and Ossie Clark style images that made me start to look for sources of inspiration outside the text book art world of E H Gombrich and the school curriculam.
First stop on my journey was checking out the art deco roots of the BIBA brands and they led me to the many artists of pin-ups golden age, some of whom [my main inspirations] I have written about previously. A discussion with Peter Krumins, my art tutor one night at evening classes resulted in me doing no work at all but having a whole new doorway opened for me, the worlds of Mel Ramos, Alphonse Mucha, and a few other key names in the world of early pin-up like Vargas were suddenly thee to explore.
The school library was not going to stock this sort material and so I had to look elsewhere, no internet, no Taschen, resource material was pretty scarce, but somehow I managed to get a bit of knowledge on pin-up history and an idea to the work that the artists had done.
From that point on I was sort of hooked on glamour and pin-up art as well as comic art. I suppose it's a bit anal and juvenile but at the end of the day, I enjoy drawing my subjects as much as any other artist gets a kick out of doing what they do. My only regret is that I'm never going to be talented enough to truly do justice to the subject matter, no matter what it is.
Anyway history lesson over…..
First off - Choosing the image.
I tend to keep sheets and sheets of images torn from magazines or keep eye out for book images [mostly stored digitally nowadays]. I'm not the most creative person in terms of ideas, and tend to rely on capturing the image rather than concocting a scene. I do however have a reasonable eye for a striking image or layout and that is something that normally grabs me when I first see an image that attracts me. The new wave of comic book artists and the scope the internet has provided in accessing their work opened up the opportuity for seeking out suitable images and poses, add to that the fact that if you are drawing the human form there are now plenty of good books out there in the market which are simply reference manuals for posed images.
I do often draw the image as I see it coldly, no elaboration or change, I'm a person who needs to practice their drawing and so I do tend to copy other peoples work to keep my hand in but I normally admit to that where I can.
I also work a lot from my own photographs and would prefer to do this when I’m able.
I can't advocate where you get your images from, the only thing I would say is make sure you give credit where it’s due if you can.
Starting out.
When it comes to sketching the image I tend to work them up in several ways. If I'm working from a photograph I tend to pencil out a very rough sketch from the photographic image, concentrating on the figure or face alone. Mainly I use Daler-Rowney, acid free, 95 g/m2 sketching paper. It's thin enough to overlay the image and trace if you need to, but I tend to prepare a very rough hand sketch [See fig 1 below]. I use a very basic pencil for this, in fact, I can hear the purists all taking a sharp intake of breath as I admit, I use a "pop-a-point" pencil, one of several dozen I liberated from a hotel conference room many years ago. To me they are ideal for the task and provide a light enough coating of graphite that can be erased and redrawn several times without too many problems.
Fig 1 - Rough sketch made on sketching paper from photo image.
From the base sketch I then prepare another drawing using the rough template, normally on another piece of sketching paper.
On this I work up the body form and face in a bit more detail [Fig 2]. Normally at this stage, I am still in two [well several actually] minds as to how the finished image might look, so I tend to scan it in the PC and hold a reserve copy for use at a later stage. This is a bit of cheating that new technology allows me to participate in. If I bugger up the original I can reprint and sort of start again, without losing the position I was at…a sort of restore point so to speak. Again, another sharp intake of breath from the purists.
Fig 2 - 2nd stage sketch on sketching paper.
It also allows me to "muck about" with the layout and look of the drawing, moving it on the paper, erasing bits, changing shape or scale without having to do several drafts before committing to a final layout. [see fig 3 below]
Then I dig out the box of Staedtler studio graphite pencils that I use. I've been using Staedtler pencils for years, other than the cheap old "pop-a-points" my only other concession is that I also use a Rotring propelling pencil. Both the Staedtler's and Rotrings hark back to my days as a trainee civil engineer and I was advised never to use anything else when doing technical drawings. The lesson and the quality of their instruments has stayed with me ever since.
At this point I will make a decision whether it will simply be a sketch drawing to be held for reference purposes for a drawing to be done at some later date; whether it simply isn't going anywhere other than this far; or whether it will get done in some greater detail as a stand alone drawing.
If it's the first option then I will work it up a bit more in terms of rough detail and shading.
The second option sees it get put in the portfolio marked "roughs"
The third sees me transferring the drawing from sketch paper to Cartridge. This I can do in several ways, One is to simply redraw it, the second is to use "Transtrace" paper, a grahite coated papaer to allow images to be transferred between the two mediums, or more increasingly I reduce the intensity of the image on a scanned copy using Photoshop and print it lightly onto cartridge, using it as a base to work up the detailed image.
I then start to work up some of the detail, starting with the face and head. I try where I can to begin to work up the hair first, all to frequently I don’t know when to stop and I can easily overwork a drawing. After years of drawing blondes, I now tend to concentrate on darker hair types and by starting the hair first and establishing a datum for "darkness" it allows me to not overwork the drawing, although I still get it wrong quite a lot! I tend to shade in the image using a liited range of pencils fromm 3H to 2B, rarely do I venture out of this comfort zone. I almost always shade above my initial 45 degree bottom left to top right shading with small circular motions, blending the graphite as I move down the page from top to bottom.
Next I tend to work up the edges of the body, trying to give it more of a "rounded" feel.
Fig 3
After, this stage I tend to put it in the portfolio, or back into the sketch pad and leave it for a few days [or weeks, or even months.......]
All to often I find that my problem of overworking a drawing is caused by too much concentration on a single piece, and leaving it to one side allows a bit of scope to reflect on what is needed or not. More recently [since the website started] I tend to work on more than one detailed sketch at a time.
Knowing when to stop is a big factor in being happy with the finished result, and I've spoilt many a half decent image by picking up a 2B pencil and going too mad with the lead.
Fig 4 - 4th stage image with detail and shading added
In fact I think that in terms of knowing when to stop and not over-do it, I'll leave it there for now and come back possibly with part two in a week or so, and show you how it develops the image as it progresses.
All the best
Pat Kent
© Pat Kent 2007 – All rights reserved. Pat Kent exercises his right to be identified as the author.
