Shapes and tones

Shapes were better this week but the tones on the longer pose had the usual short sighted approach.

First two quick poses, ten minutes in charcoal.

Long pose in acrylic. Need to add more tonal variation on the painting and also be more consistent in that rather than making everything a contrast of light/dark. About 3 hours 30 minutes.

Clumsy

Two weeks with little drawing too its effect in life drawing with difficulty finding shapes and proportions.

These two are 10 minutes, A2 charcoal.

Longer pose was more of the same. These were about 40 minutes each.

Drop in session

Over 30 degrees C on Saturday. I wish I could blame the poor proportions of the short poses on that. Two 10 minute poses on A2.

Long pose in Acrylics. Wanted to leave it more sketchy so started a drawing. First about 2 hours 30 minutes.

The drawing was in sanguine conte pencil, about 1 hour.

Wax and wane

We were using wax resist for the long pose but first some short ones. Between two minutes and 30 seconds (quickening then slowing). All charcoal on A2.

Long poses were wax pastel and watercolour on 22"x15". 25 minutes followed by one hour.

Whilst the palette was random (yellow ochre, burnt sienna, mauve and lamp blank) I kind of liked it. The mauve probably isn't permanent.

Contrasts

The long and short poses seemed extreme this week with the short being all movement and rhythm and the long all details. First the shorts: 2 minutes, 1 then 30 seconds and then reversed. All charcoal on A2.

For the long pose we supposed to do "in the style of". I chose Raphael or rather an academic hatched approach in conte sanguine. Just over an hour.

Short and long of it

Some very quick ones from last night. There is a 2 minute, one minute and the rest 30 seconds.

Long pose practice foreshortening. 25 minutes and 50 minutes.

Today's portrait

Tried to do something different today. Toned the paper with acrylic and then used coloured pencil and charcoal. The toning maybe was too dark but also the pencil wouldn't stick. Maybe I should have used a bit of gesso.

I tried to push the highlights when I got home with acrylic but I think I made it worse (particularly the flattened shapes in his face.