The New Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain - Betty Edwards [92]
6. Next, carefully erase the lightest parts of the hat, the side of the neck, and the coat. Your toned ground supplies the middle value of the hat and coat (Figure. 10-8).
7. Using your #4B pencil, darken in the area around the head, the shadow under the hat brim, the shadows below the eyebrows, under the nose, under the lower lip, the beard, the shadow of the beard, and the shadows under the shirt collar and the coat collar. Carefully observe the shapes of these shadows. Keep your tones quite smooth, either crosshatching or working a continuous tone or combining the two. Ask yourself: Where is the darkest dark? Where is the lightest light?
Fig. 10-7. Drawing with an eraser.
a. A rubbed graphite ground of middle value
b. An eraser trimmed for precise erasing of light areas. Then use a #4B or #6B pencil to darken shadowed areas
Fig. 10-8.
Fig. 10-9.
Notice also that there is almost no information in the shadowed areas. They are nearly uniform tones. Yet, when you turn the book right side up, the face and features emerge out of the shadows. These perceptions are occurring in your own brain, imaging and extrapolating from incomplete information. The hardest part of this drawing will be resisting the temptation to give too much information! Let the shadows stay shadowy, and have faith that your viewer will extrapolate the features, the expression, the eyes, the beard, everything (Figure. 10-9).
8. At this point you have the drawing “blocked in.” The rest is all refinement, called “working up” the drawing to a finish. Note that, because the original drawing was done in charcoal and you are working in pencil, the exact roughness of the charcoal medium is difficult to reproduce in pencil. But also, even though you are copying Courbet’s self-portrait, your drawing is your drawing. Your unique line quality and choice of emphasis will differ from Courbet’s.
9. At each step, pull back a little from the drawing, squint your eyes a bit, and move your head from side to side slightly to see if the image is beginning to emerge. Try to see (that is, to image) what you have not yet drawn. Use this emerging, imagined image to add to, change, reinforce what is there in the drawing. You will find yourself shifting back and forth: drawing, imaging, drawing again. Be parsimonious! Provide only enough information to the viewer to allow the correct image to occur in the viewer’s imagined perception. Do not overdraw.
At this point, I hope you will be really seeing, really drawing, really experiencing the joy of drawing. Later, when drawing a person from life, you will find yourself wondering why you never noticed how beautiful the person is, noticing perhaps for the first time the shape of the nose or the expression of the eyes (Figure. 10-10).
10. As you are working up the drawing, try to focus your attention on the original. For any problem that you encounter, the answer is in the original. For example, you will want to achieve the same facial expression: the way to accomplish that is to pay careful attention to the exact shapes of the lights and the shadows. For example, notice the exact angle (relative to vertical or horizontal) of the shadow in the corner of the mouth. Notice the exact curve of the shadow under Courbet’s right eye and the exact shape of that small shadow under the right cheekbone. Try not to talk to yourself about the facial expression.
Fig. 10-10. A copy in pencil of Courbet’s Self-portrait by instructor Brian Bomeisler.
Fig. 10-11. Berthe Morisot (1841-1895). Self-Portrait, c. 1885. Courtesy of The Art Institute of Chicago.
11. Draw just what you see, no more, no less. You’ll notice that the whites of the eyes are barely lighter than the dark shadow surrounding the eye. You will be tempted to erase out the whites because, well, you know they are called “whites of the eyes.” Don’t do it! Allow the viewer of your drawing to “play the game” of “seeing” what is not there. Your job is