Happy Halloween

Eye Level, Part 3

In a scene that takes place on flat ground, the eye level (EL) usually intersects everything at about five feet above the ground. That’s because most of us of average standing height look out at the world from that elevation, and most photos are taken from that height as well. You can imply that the viewer is seated or that the viewer is a child by placing your eye level at a lower height.

Since the eye level line cuts through every figure at the same relative point, you can sort of “hang” the figures on the eye level line, just making sure the line runs through everyone at the same height. In the throne room scene here, for instance, the EL is exactly at the height of the top of the dais, or platform. If you carry that line across the scene, it will intersect every standing figure just below the shoulder.

I could have chosen to place the EL at ankle height, but then it would have intersected every figure at the ankle.

On this drawing, by the way, the vanishing point for the edges of all the carpets is just visible on the shoulder of the figure standing just to the left of the leftmost lion.

The drawing above was not drawn as a separate charcoal comprehensive. It is a pencil drawing made directly on the illustration board prior to painting. What you're looking at is a photocopy of that early stage of the painting, with the EL accentuated.

Eye Level, Part 2

If architecture appears in your scene, all the major vanishing points (things like eaves and sidewalks) are pegged on the eye level line. Each vanishing point should be marked with a little “X” surrounded by a circle.

In the line drawing of the archway, the vanishing point is marked on the EL just beneath the circular window of the domed building. All the lines in the ceiling inside the arch and along the waterline inside the arch vanish to this point.

If you look again at the same scene, the arch is flanked by two circular columns. At the EL, the circular cross section of the columns is seen edge-on, so the bases of the columns don’t appear as ellipses. But as you go up the columns, the ellipses become slightly fuller.

So in a sense, every part of the scene is drawn with a consciousness of the eye level, even though in this scene you don’t really see a horizon.

Eye Level, Part 1

The eye level is the height of the viewer’s eye above the ground, usually represented by a horizontal line running across the picture, even if the horizon itself is not visible in the scene.

The drawing to the above is a compositional sketch for a scene in Dinotopia: Journey to Chandara. I drew grid lines on it so that it could be enlarged to the 24x30 inch final painting.

“Eye level” is basically synonymous with “horizon.” They’re one and the same thing in the preliminary line drawing above, where the ocean is in view. But in most scenes, you don’t have such a far vista. Either you’re in a forest, or inside a room, or the view is hemmed in with buildings. But you still have to draw the imaginary line in the same place it would have been if you could see all the way to infinity.

The eye level is the very first line you put into your drawing—even a figure drawing at a sketch group. I mark it with the letters “EL” to remind me what it is. If your scene is more of an upshot, the EL is toward the bottom of the scene. Everything that you draw above the line is something you’re looking up at. In a view that’s more of a downshot, the EL is high in the composition because almost everything in the scene is below your level gaze.

The Mirror Trick for Kid Portraits

The hard part about painting a kid from life is getting him to hold still for more than ten minutes. Here’s a trick. Set up a full-length mirror behind you so that your subject can watch you work. They will be captivated for at least two hours if you’re lucky. That’s how I painted this picture of my son Franklin when he was seven years old.

Square Brushes

Painters of the Newlyn School, a group of 19th century plein-air painters in southwestern England, were known for their “consistent squareness of touch.”

“A Street in Brittany” by Stanhope Forbes shows the characteristic look achieved by brushes that we would call brights or flats. Forbes once wrote home to his mother asking her to bring a “flat sable brush” when she came to visit.

Sir George Clausen (1852-1944) was also known for his square brush technique, which the British critics identified with French juste-milieu painters like Bastien-Lepage, with whom some of the Newlyn artists studied.

The purpose of the method was not just to get that chunky feeling, but to blur outlines and capture an atmospheric envelope. The critic Garstin wrote: “We seek to represent not only the man but, as it were, his very atmosphere, and not only his surroundings, but his surroundings under certain specific conditions.”

Other artists indentified with a square touch are Arthur Streeton, Frank Brangwyn, and Dean Cornwell.
---------
Reference for quotes: Artists of the Newlyn School, 1880-1900, by Caroline Fox, 1979, link.
Images from FreeParking's Flickr stream, link.

Shearing Day

Yesterday Scott Balfe (left) joined me for a day of painting at the Dancing Lamb Farm . It was shearing day for over 100 of the Icelandic sheep.

I set up near the barn to paint the sheep waiting their turn. What attracted me was the contre jour lighting, the mistiness of the atmosphere, the frost on the ground and the turn in the road in the distance.

The sheep didn't really pose; I had to construct composite poses based on a variety of individuals milling around.

Jeanette helped out with skirting (top), the step where the fleece is laid out on a mesh table and impurities are picked out. It was windy and cold in the barn, so we were grateful for the warm meal of farm-raised chicken soup and homemade cheese.

Tone Paper Studies

This scene shows captured prisoners from the Moche culture of ancient Peru, painted for National Geographic.

It was developed entirely from studies from the model, not from photography. (Photography is a useful tool, too, but I'll cover that in other posts.) If you’re doing a reference study of yourself or a model taking the pose, you can capture all the reference information you’ll need by working on tone paper.

In most art schools, the tradition of drawing posed figures on tone paper tends to be regarded as an end in itself, or else purely as a timed practice exercise for training the eye and hand for observational drawing.

But for most of the last five centuries, tone paper drawings were merely a means to an end, and the drawings themselves were not highly valued.

A light gray or tan paper works best for figure studies. The tone of the paper should be approximately equal to the darker halftone—the point where the form turns away from the light just before it enters the shadow.

You can begin either with vine charcoal or with a soft charcoal pencil and draw the pose lightly in line, noting the dividing line of the shadow and the boundary of the cast shadow. Once you’ve got the pose where you want it, reserve the charcoal for the shadows and accents.

The light side of the form can be defined with just a few careful touches of white chalk or white charcoal pencil. Where the form turns more to the light in the brightly illuminated halftones, you can scumble a light tone overall, saving your strongest touches of pure white for the highlights and accents.

As you work on your studies from life, don’t just draw what you see. As Howard Pyle said, “Don’t copy the model, but make a picture.” Accentuate the muscles and tendons that are important in telling the story. Describe to your your model the character you want them to act out. Better yet, act out the part yourself, and ham it up a little. Your model will feel less inhibited if you make a fool of yourself.

Let your imagination guide your eye. This mindset leads to better drawings than ones where you are just copying what you see. The drawings you produce as preliminary studies for a finished work will have more urgency and confidence than the standard 20 minute studies that are done without feeling or imagination.

Mass Drawing

Many art students find the transition from drawing to painting a bit daunting, because there are so many variables to contend with.

One of the best painting teachers was Harold Speed (1872-1957). A sample of work is shown above. His books on both drawing and painting are among the finest sources of classic art instruction. Speed uses the term “mass drawing” to distinguish it from “outline drawing.”

Mass drawing in monochrome oil paint is one of the transitional steps from drawing to painting. The purpose of mass drawing is to bring students “from simple outlines to approach the full realization of form in all the complexity of light and shade.”

In this demonstration, Speed follows four logical steps:

Step 1. The blocking in of various areas in charcoal.
Step 2. Middletone block-in with lights painted into it
Step 3. Shadows added with dark paint.
Step 4. Refinement and completion.

---------
The Practice and Science of Drawing (still in print), link.
The Science and Practice of Oil Painting, link.
Selection of Speed's Portraits in the National Gallery, link. (thanks, Art4Marc)

Paul Warhola

“You gotta have a little humor in your life,” Paul Warhola told me.

Mr. Warhola is the older brother of Andy Warhol. In the early 1990s he took time away from his junkyard business for a series of chicken feet paintings. As I sketched him at his son's house in Tivoli, New York, I wrote down word-for-word the story of his life as he told it to me.

“I got Andy started. We put wax over the funny papers and rubbed over it with a spoon. I got him his first camera. We dug out the basement and put in a red light.

“Shirley Temple sent him a photo, and it said ‘to Andy Warhola from Shirley Temple.’

“I had 150 chickens, and I don’t like to pen ‘em up. One day the chickens got into my paint. They got me started. They did my first painting. Time Magazine called me and she said ‘I understand you’re doing product paintings and copying your brother.’

“I says ‘No, I’m gonna let my chickens do my paintings.

“I’m getting tired of interviews. I go down to the dog track and I have fun. I break even. I don’t get carried away. It’s a form of entertainment.”

If you want to know more about Mr. Warhola, his junk business, and his relationship with Andy Warhol, don’t miss the illustrated memoir “Uncle Andy’s” by Paul Warhola’s son James.
------------
For more about Andy Warhol and the Warhola family, visit warhola.com