DR - Drawing What You See Module Overview

Module Title

Drawing What you See

Can you learn to be an artist and to draw what you see? What if you weren't born "talented"? Learning to draw is not a magical process but a series of sequential steps that can be learned. Yes, some people are born with some natural talent and can draw naturally but may not be able to explain the concepts you will learn in this module. Learning to draw can be achieved through a series of exercises that when practiced lead to you perceiving like an artist and then having the ability to recreate that on paper to communicate with others. In this module, you will build on your new skills of seeing like an artist and using the elements of art and principles of design to create art and will learn the drawing techniques of contour line, perspective, mark-making, shading, and pulling it all together to draw a still life.

 

Essential Questions

• How do you use the Elements of Art and the Principles of Design to create a drawing that looks three-dimensional?
• What is contour line drawing?
• What is perspective?
• What processes do you follow in order to create a drawing?
• How does your visual verbal journal promote new concepts and open up your creativity?
• How does art use information from other subjects?
• How does self-reflection help my creative process?

 

Key Terms

• Contour lines - Lines that surround and define the edges of a subject, giving it shape and volume.
• Cross Contour - Cross contour lines are drawn lines that travel, as the name suggests, across the form. Cross contours may be horizontal or vertical or even at varying angles to represent volume.
• Blind Contour - Contour lines that are drawn without looking at the paper while only studying the object being drawn. This technique trains the eyes and hands to work together.
• Perspective - A graphic system that creates the illusion of depth and volume on a two-dimensional surface.
• Horizon Line - Where the sky meets the ground, a horizontal line.
• Vanishing point - The place where all lines meet or "vanish," it is located on the horizon line.
• Horizontal line -   A line that goes left to right, it is parallel to the horizon line.
• Vertical line - A line that goes up and down, it is perpendicular to the horizon line.
• Orthogonal line -   Lines that create the sides of an object in one-point perspective, these lines are drawn to the vanishing point.
• Cross-hatching - A method of line drawing that describes light and shadow. The representation of light utilizes the white or openness of the page, while shadow is created by a density of crossed lines.
• Hatching - The most basic method of creating value in drawing is linear hatching. Fine parallel lines fill an area so that from just a slight distance, we have the illusion of value. The closer the lines are, the less white paper shows and the darker the value appears. Heavier line weight (pressing more firmly or using a bigger nib) also gives a darker appearance.
• Stippling - Stippling uses tiny dots to create value. The closer together the dots, the darker the tone. Larger dots create a denser tonal value more quickly but can look coarse.
• Thumbnail- A small one-inch square, quick drawing to experiment with composition.

 

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