Sara – Big Form Modeling in Charcoal Drawing

Picking up where I left off:
The sooner I convey the illusion of form, the stronger my disegno (design or drawing). Allora, after I distinguish the main tone design, I want to start turning the form with Big Form Modeling. Like other drawing systems, I will work large to small. This means that my first objective is to depict the entire figure as a three-dimensional form. Then I will do the same, within the context of the larger form, for the smaller forms, such as an arm.

I tend to like the brush, thus far, for things such as subtle blending. I get plenty of dust as I sharpen my charcoal sticks against a sandpaper-covered board (a small cutting board or a ping pong paddle work well – something flat and strong). So, I dip my brush into the dust and work my way from darks to light. How quickly I go from dark to light depends of the form I am creating.

In today’s images, I am showing you the beginning of Big Form Modeling on the figure’s head. The first image shows the head as a pattern of light paper with generalized dark shapes. The second shows that I have started to indicate that the head is an egg-like form, becoming darker closer to the bottom of the face, which is further away from the light source above the figure. I can do Big Form Modeling from side to side, as well as vertically.

Sara – A Charcoal Drawing Process

My last day working with the model Sara is Friday. I wish I had more time, but then six weeks seems really long to most 2-dimensional artists.

These next two images were taken on the 8th of November. Here you can see that I have done a really poor job of creating consistent tones. I will work to correct this before moving on to the next step in the system. In the beginning, I only have two tones in my disegno: the light of the paper plus my added darks. You may see in the detail shot what I mean by abstraction of nature. The shadow on the wall behind the model is grouped together with the figure-in-shadow, creating one solid dark shape. I can re-find the line separating the two later – or not. My choice. (You can also see the vertical striping pattern of the textured Roma brand paper.)

The next step is to start to differentiate the darks by averaging together the DARK DARKS (such as the hair and shadows of the legs on the box). Those DARK DARKS get compressed charcoal, so I want to be sure of where I want them in my design. I then have my shapes set in three tones, all determined by the relationships to each other as I decide them.

That last part is important. Each artist makes her own decisions. A good example of the various choices one can make is in the vertical part of the leg. My tone here is not a solid one. That is because with each new sitting, there were subtle differences in the pose, creating slightly different light patterns. That portion of the leg has quite a few areas that are debatable as to whether to group them with the lights or the darks. What you see here is a case of indecision. At some point soon, I will have made that choice.

You also see in the top left section of the front of the box that I had begun to distinguish more dark tones to show the three sides to the box. (And I have lightened the background to something between the lights and the figure-in-shadow.) The sooner I convey the illusion of form, the stronger my disegno (design or drawing).