New Drawings

Recently I have been on a bit of a drawing binge, which I find I do at regular intervals anyways.  I’ll go for several weeks without doing a lot of drawing (not stopping altogether, just not doing very much) and then suddenly I’ll find myself doing a whole hell of a lot of drawings, sketches and doodles for a week or so.  For about the past week it has been one of those high drawing production periods.  Last night I took a bunch of my recent works (and some not quite as recent) and scanned them onto my computer.  This morning I uploaded most of them to my Adobe Photoshop Express galleries where they can be viewed along with older uploaded images.  As I was looking at my pictures (both the new and old ones) I found that I like to classify my pen/pencil to paper creations in three categories (which is kind of how my galleries are separated though I think they could use a little reorganization).  These categories are drawings, sketches, and doodles.

To some these may all seem relatively the same but for me different processes go into each and hence I define them differently.  Allow me to explain:

Drawings: For me a drawing is a creation in which I am very specifically trying to represent and make a picture of something.  My drawings tend to take a lot more time than either my sketches or doodles and also often posses far more detail.  I tend to go into a drawing with a very specific goal, knowing exactly what I want to create with my pen/pencil and paper.  Here are a few thumbnails of what I consider drawings of mine:

  

Sketches: Sketches are generally the stage before I attempt to make an actual drawing (and sometimes can come out just as good if not better than some of what I consider drawings).  For me a sketch is an intended creation but is often done quickly and with rough detail.  The main goal of sketching for me is to get down a basic shape and dimension feel for something that I may eventually like to make into a full drawing.  I would say that currently the largest number of works that I do with pencil, pen and paper are actually sketches even though I may occasionally consider them as either of the other two categories.  Here are a few sketch examples:

Doodles: A doodle is an illustration without much aim or goal.  Doodles occur most when I am just bored and need to do something else for awhile.  I also tend to doodle when I am sitting and listening to people talk.  I used to doodle like crazy when I was taking classes.  This doesn’t mean that I am not listening, in fact I consider it a way in which I focus (in classes a big part of note taking for me included the doodling process).  I think I now doodle the most during the periods of times when I am not doing a lot of other illustrating.  While generally quick and lacking much of those aims/goals in sketches and drawings, I think that some of my doodles come out looking really cool.  Here are some examples:

Cool, it is fun to actually sit and think a little about the process of drawing (holistically including both sketching and doodling).  I have two CD covers I have to make for ChipperDemon this week (one’s drawing is pretty much set) so I will probably be doing a bunch of drawings over the next day or so.  I also really like the look and feel of some new portraits I’ve been doing in pen and would like to try and make a whole series of famous historical people in such style (though I may end up doing a first run through sketch in pencil and then ink over so as to get better proportions and shading.  Notice how Einstein’s nose is entirely too small).

~ by Nathaniel on June 24, 2008.