A 3 1/2 hour portrait drawing by Jeff Hein reduced to 8 minutes.
It's pretty amazing watching this drawing come to life. I hope to be this good someday!
watch on youtube: http://youtu.be/7qpq3hOoMpo
Wednesday, April 18, 2012
Monday, February 27, 2012
This Little Piggy
This is one of my favorite drawings because I love the adorable Asian piggy bank I got in Cambodia. Up to that point in my drawing curriculum I had mostly drawn from white plaster casts so I was curious to see how I handled a darker subject matter. I decided to use black charcoal as well as white charcoal for this one, which made it feel more like a painting with the blending I did for the correct values. Jeff suggested I find another object that was a different kind of material and lighter in color to draw with my Asian piggy. I perused my house and found the perfect little white porcelain bank to be friends with my Asian pig for the 39.5 hours they got to model for me while gathering dust. I'm pretty sure they're BFF's now.
Sunday, February 12, 2012
The Feat of a Foot
There is a blog for the Hein Academy of Art which isn't updated often, but about a year ago one of Jeff's assistants was posting on it fairly regularly. She did a short post about me and this drawing of a foot. You can check it out here:http://heinacademy.wordpress.com/2011/03/18/a-feat-of-a-foot/
I spent 37.25 hours on this one.
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Shape Up or Ship Out
On my second day at the Hein Academy I started a series of assignments to practice seeing and copying simple shapes. When I thought my first drawing looked good enough, I asked Jeff to take a look. He told me some minor changes to make on a couple of the shapes. I was a little surprised at how picky he was being, but he explained that the foundation to a good drawing is getting every shape as perfectly accurate as you can. If you're doing a portrait of someone, those small discrepancies will determine whether it looks like the person or not.
After that first critique I realized "good enough" was not good enough. The standard to which I had previously held my work was no longer satisfactory. If I wanted to progress in the curriculum and really improve as an artist, I had to raise my standard to Jeff's...which is basically perfection. No biggie.
I practiced seeing the basic shapes on the model or object I was drawing, which meant simplifying the form and value to only black and white. Here are two drawings I did using that technique.
A year and a half later I'm constantly reminded that the foundation to every drawing or painting is the underlying shapes. It doesn't matter how beautifully the marks are made or the colors blended. If the drawing is off, it won't look or feel right. Sometimes I will notice a drawing error after I've spent weeks on an assignment. I often can't believe I was able to stare at the drawing for hours on end and not notice the nose was too long (or whatever the problem is)! I have to constantly remind myself to check the drawing, over and over again, especially because an adjustment in one place will necessitate an adjustment in another place, which affects something else, and so on.
At the Hein Academy each student progresses in the curriculum at their own pace. After about four months and 241 hours of studio time (not ALL of which was spent drawing, but most of it was), I moved on to drawing in "full value," which basically meant I could draw all the variations of gray in between black and white. Yippee! This was one of my first full value assignments, costing me 25.75 well spent hours of my life.
After that first critique I realized "good enough" was not good enough. The standard to which I had previously held my work was no longer satisfactory. If I wanted to progress in the curriculum and really improve as an artist, I had to raise my standard to Jeff's...which is basically perfection. No biggie.
I practiced seeing the basic shapes on the model or object I was drawing, which meant simplifying the form and value to only black and white. Here are two drawings I did using that technique.
At the Hein Academy each student progresses in the curriculum at their own pace. After about four months and 241 hours of studio time (not ALL of which was spent drawing, but most of it was), I moved on to drawing in "full value," which basically meant I could draw all the variations of gray in between black and white. Yippee! This was one of my first full value assignments, costing me 25.75 well spent hours of my life.
Monday, December 26, 2011
Three Gifts of the Magi
Last July I completed this drawing using black and white charcoal. For the assignment I wanted to draw something more interesting than the casts of Beethoven, Roman guys, Lincoln, and others, that I usually choose from at the Academy so I found some items at home. The wooden box on the left has been sitting on the bookshelf in my parents' home for as long as I can remember. I recall using it as one of the gifts presented to baby Jesus during my childhood Christmas nativity reenactments. That memory prompted the idea to draw three objects of differing materials that could represent the three gifts of the magi. It was a fun challenge drawing the varying surfaces of wood, brass, glass, and silver. To continue the theme of my blog, I'll mention that I spent 43.75 hours on this drawing (which was less than I expected going into it).
On Saturday my nieces and nephews reenacted the nativity story as my dad read the account from Luke. The three wise men used the three gifts from my drawing. I particularly enjoyed our two little lambs, and we were surprised to discover that sweet baby Lia didn't mind lying in the manger.
Monday, November 14, 2011
How long did it take you to draw that?
While I was studying drawing and painting at the University of Utah I recall one of my professors making a point about the amount of time it takes to make a drawing (or painting). While the drawing may have taken me 15 hours to do, it also required all the skills I've developed and the experience I've gained in my life up to that point. So that particular drawing would have actually taken me 15 hours, plus 31 years. (I think this was a concept from a famous artist, but I'm not sure who. Do you know?).
That idea has stuck with me and it's proven more true over the last year and a half as I've begun a more serious pursuit of drawing and painting at the Hein Academy of Art. I'm more dedicated and consistent with my art than I have been in the past, and I'm receiving great instruction from Jeff Hein who is helping me train my eyes to see and understand how to accurately depict a 3D object or person onto a 2D surface. Jeff is very talented, but he's also put an incredible amount of time into perfecting his craft.
I've learned about the 10,000 hour rule, which basically states that it takes a person approximately 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to master a skill. A few weeks into my studies at the Hein Academy I started keeping track of the hours I was spending on each assignment. I've decided it would be interesting (for me...not sure if anyone else will find it interesting) to start a blog of my progress and the amount of time I've spent on some of my drawings. I've enjoyed reviewing the progress I've made in the last year and a half and will begin posting some of my previous assignments over the next while.
The drawing below, on the left, is the drawing I did on my first day at the academy (June 2010). To be fair, I probably only spent a few hours on it and my more recent drawings have taken months to complete, but that has been part of the process. Understanding the amount of discipline I need to have to really draw something right. On my second day I learned from Jeff that our goal on each drawing is perfection...that's not asking too much, is it? Well, I'm learning to make my drawings as perfect as I can, which is a higher standard than I've ever held myself to.
The drawing on the right is my first model drawing at the academy.
In May 2011, after 60.75 hours of pure drawing time, I completed the skull drawing below.
I don't keep track of the time I spend on the model drawings, but I would guess this was about 6-9 hours. I wasn't able to finish it because we changed the model's pose.
That idea has stuck with me and it's proven more true over the last year and a half as I've begun a more serious pursuit of drawing and painting at the Hein Academy of Art. I'm more dedicated and consistent with my art than I have been in the past, and I'm receiving great instruction from Jeff Hein who is helping me train my eyes to see and understand how to accurately depict a 3D object or person onto a 2D surface. Jeff is very talented, but he's also put an incredible amount of time into perfecting his craft.
I've learned about the 10,000 hour rule, which basically states that it takes a person approximately 10,000 hours of deliberate practice to master a skill. A few weeks into my studies at the Hein Academy I started keeping track of the hours I was spending on each assignment. I've decided it would be interesting (for me...not sure if anyone else will find it interesting) to start a blog of my progress and the amount of time I've spent on some of my drawings. I've enjoyed reviewing the progress I've made in the last year and a half and will begin posting some of my previous assignments over the next while.
The drawing below, on the left, is the drawing I did on my first day at the academy (June 2010). To be fair, I probably only spent a few hours on it and my more recent drawings have taken months to complete, but that has been part of the process. Understanding the amount of discipline I need to have to really draw something right. On my second day I learned from Jeff that our goal on each drawing is perfection...that's not asking too much, is it? Well, I'm learning to make my drawings as perfect as I can, which is a higher standard than I've ever held myself to.
The drawing on the right is my first model drawing at the academy.
In May 2011, after 60.75 hours of pure drawing time, I completed the skull drawing below.
I don't keep track of the time I spend on the model drawings, but I would guess this was about 6-9 hours. I wasn't able to finish it because we changed the model's pose.
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