Using these terms in illustrations changes everything, though. Depicting a subject very close up brings it closer to us. It suddenly becomes more emotional and direct, confronting us in a different way than subjects we only draw randomly in the background.
If you deliberately use different shot settings in a series of pictures, such as in a book, it makes the series more interesting. The switch between settings creates accents. Therefore, it is important for artists to know and use the various shot settings purposefully.
Five types of shot settings
Here are the five most commonly used shot settings, from very far away to very close up:
1. The widest setting is the extreme long shot, for example a landscape. Subjects appear as tiny figures, like the cowboy on the horizon.
2. The next setting is the long shot. The subject is much closer, about ten yards away.
3. A knee shot shows the figure so close that it is cut off mid-thigh (below the “holster”).
4. The medium shot is often used in interiors and shows part of the figure, for example seated at a table. The detail goes from about head to waist.
5. The closest setting, of course, is the close-up. It shows the head, the face, or sometimes only details like the eyes.
Attempt to use shot settings consciously in your drawings. For instance, draw the same subject in various shot settings or deliberately switch settings to tell a story.
Extreme long shot
Medium shot
Knee shot
Close-up
Tip:
It can be particularly interesting to combine shot settings within one picture. To keep with our western example, this could be a close-up of a cowboy whose dueling enemy can be seen very small in the background. Try to unite different settings. Zoom in on small details to depict tiny things big. In the background, contrast this with other settings.
Getting a feel for composition
It is impossible to do justice to something as important as composition in one or two pages. The reason I am attempting to do so nonetheless is that I do not believe there is a recipe for learning it.
Of course there are rules, but you first need to develop a feel for good composition. Your sketchbook can help you do just that.
As an artist, you will encounter the format of your open book—a rectangular landscape format divided down the center—quite often. You will discover it in magazines and brochures, in booklets and, of course, in other books. In addition, landscape formats dominate in film, computer games, and websites.
At the same time, you can use every single page of your book for portrait formats. This makes the sketchbook an ideal place to practice almost any type of design, and the more you work with a sketchbook, the better you will develop a feel for image composition.
So when drawing, pay attention to how your subject is positioned on the page. Use the entire area of your two pages and place your subject in an interesting way. For instance, if you draw two vases, it is less interesting to locate each at the center of the page than to stagger and crop them.
Tip:
It helps to start by making mini sketches. Go through a few design options with your subject first and then decide on the composition you want to use.
Weight and balance
Although lines on paper weigh nothing, visually they can add a lot to the scales. Every composition possesses an inner weight; drawings have visual focal points. For example, if you push your subjects into one corner, the balance of the drawing “tips” in that direction. If you draw an object in the opposite corner, your drawing goes in another direction.
Depending on your purpose, this can be very exciting and will enrich your drawing skills. So use this technique deliberately to develop a feel for weight. Don’t stubbornly copy what you see, but arrange your subject whichever way you want. The visual weighting can be easily integrated into the composition. This is particularly true of incidental details such as a shadow, lamppost, or bird, which can often be “shifted” a bit. Take liberties with reality: your drawings will be more interesting when you set compositional priorities.
In this example, the shadow supports the bottle, thus preventing it from tipping too far to the right.
In this example, the lamppost does the same. It provides a visual counterbalance to the church. In addition, the writing in the upper left of the picture supports this counterbalance.
In this example, the crow prevents the minaret from tipping over visually. As the darkest value in the picture, it works against the left lean of the tower.
Tip:
The date, location, or other written comments can serve as compositional elements of your drawing. Sometimes, a date written in the sketchbook is only there to balance out the picture. Always wait until the end to place such “signatures” and choose the position carefully—it’s worthwhile!
Collected works
Collect subjects that, when viewed all alone, are not forceful enough for a picture. For instance, take advantage of a museum visit to fill up a two-page spread. You’ll see, “collected works” can be appealing to the eye and tell just as much of a story as single subjects.
Perspective
You already know the most important thing about perspective: objects closer to us look bigger than those farther away. This is a trick of the eye. The trick of perspective is transferring this phenomenon to paper. It’s not all that difficult, but it took a great while before European art got the hang of it. While artists in classical antiquity were already familiar with the laws of perspective, the fall of Rome and the ancient world led to the loss of knowledge about the laws of spatial representation. Perspective was a mystery to people for nearly one thousand years. Medieval portrayals used rather peculiar solutions: vanishing points lead in all possible directions and figures—although far away—are sometimes smaller, sometimes larger. The problem was not solved until the Renaissance, with the rediscovery of ancient principles and the associated renewal of architecture.
The fact that perspective is often explained using objects and architecture is because the effect becomes more distinct through uniformity. A series of columns of the same size and at equal distances from one another also shortens visually at equal increments. Medieval cities did not possess this regularity; therefore, artists during this time did not often experience foreshortening in their daily lives.
In drawing we work with vanishing points, toward which the lines in the image move. The place where all lines meet is the vanishing point. It shifts with the position of the viewer and does not need to be within the picture, but is always at eye level.
This is an example of a drawing with one vanishing point. On this street, the vanishing point is located roughly at the center. All of the lines in the picture head toward it. This view is called one-point perspective. We encounter one-point perspective most frequently indoors, or, as in this example, on streets.
Tip:
To ascertain the angle of a line, you can measure it as if on a clock. Take your pencil, stretch out your arm, and lead the pencil across the line. Imagine the face of a clock and thus transfer the angle (“curb at five o’clock”). Horizontal and vertical angles are provided by the edges of your sketchbook.
It is reassuring to know that there is no such thing as absolute perspective. It changes with your location. If you move, your perspective changes, too.
We frequently use one or two vanishing points, depending on how many sides of an object we can see. In architecture, for example, this can be two sides of a building. The two vanishing points in two-point perspective always lie on one line on the horizon and, as in one-point perspective, are always at eye level. Here, too, the view and the vanishing points change with the position of the viewer.
We see everything lying below the horizon line from above. Everything above the horizon line is seen from below. To make it simpler, remember that, in most cases, only the horizontal lines move toward the vanishing point, while all vertical lines remain static
. (The exceptions to this rule are the views from very far below and very far above, the “worm’s-eye” and “bird’s-eye” views, respectively.)
Tip:
Shut one eye while drawing. You’ll notice that drawing perspective is easier with one eye, as a two-dimensional picture can be transferred to paper far more easily than a three-dimensional one. Just make sure you always shut the same eye or the perspective will jump.
Tip:
Make a mini sketch in the picture margin, a kind of
visual cheat sheet, before
starting. Then you won’t get lost in the perspective!
Depth and perspective
So much for theory. True, you ought to be familiar with perspective and master the basic techniques. But the most important thing in sketching is not merely the technical approach. Even a computer can construct vanishing points.
Remember, perspective is not just a construct. Depth can be depicted in many ways. You can—as shown here—also portray people in perspective. The closer they are, the bigger they appear.
You can portray depth by making the background disappear in the haze. Overlapping things— having them cover one another—also creates depth. Even colors can be used to produce visual depth. The farther away an object is, the bluer it becomes (like the blue mountains in the background).
The most important thing is that you develop a feel for depth. Don’t lose your confidence. Get going and develop a sense of perspective. Truly great illustrators count on their intuition—not on technique and constructs!
Landscapes
A landscape makes the drawing process easy for us. It doesn’t pass by us or run away. Landscapes are patient. Take twenty minutes and draw a landscape.
Begin like an ant in a corner of the paper and “walk” your pencil along every pathway and every line of the area’s surface. Develop your drawing from small to large, from one side to the other.
Later, when you look at your drawing, you will see how intense the process can be. You’ll remember the weather, the sun, the sounds carried on the wind. Maybe you’ll remember your company and a picnic, an odor, maybe the honking of cars, the chirping of insects, or the hum of a city.
Through drawing, you experience things differently. A snapshot merely documents, “I was there.” A drawing creates the memory of actually being there.
Nature
In a nutshell, the best thing about drawing in nature is being in nature! Unlike in landscape drawings, however, in nature studies we lessen the distance.
Pay attention to the specific shapes of your subjects. Study their individual aspects. Shapes and textures can be seen in trees, symmetries in flowers. In other words, you will discover design principles in nature. Ultimately, your drawings will benefit from the specificity of your observations. Incorporate these design elements into your work.
Tip:
When preparing for a drawing expedition outdoors, don’t forget sunscreen, insect repellent (ticks!), and perhaps a raincoat—not to mention the picnic basket!
Landscapes and time
Often, we only perceive a landscape “in passing.” So why not try this: draw a travel cartoon and include the factor of time in your drawing.
Or, during a journey, draw a panel of mini sketches. For example, draw some striking views seen from a train. Supplement the subjects from memory and note the time each was seen.
Coloring landscapes
Watercolor paints are perfect for coloring landscape sketches. The color harmonies of a landscape are essential for its atmosphere, and can be captured rapidly and confidently with watercolors.
Don’t shy from landscapes just because you think they’re for hobbyists. You create the sketches in your sketchbook for yourself, not for others.
Tip:
Try to include a living creature in your landscapes. Draw a bird or a cat (it will show up on its own somewhere…). Life breaks the stasis of your drawing.
Landscapes in ink
Diluted ink is also good for coloring landscapes.
Ink is available in all sorts of colors, and is practical and inexpensive. Sepia is very popular for drawing, but other shades also produce lovely effects. You can always take along a little pot of ink and a brush, and water can be found almost anywhere.
Ink can be used both for drawing and for coloring. Diluting it with water helps produce differentiated nuances.
Tip:
In place of ink you can also use iodine from your first-aid kit.
Walled town of Monteriggioni, Italy
Desert near Petra, Jordan
Black Forest near Freiburg, Germany
Light and shadow
Shadow is nothing more than the absence of light.
Light consists of a blend of electromagnetic waves that become visible where they fall or are reflected. Where there is no light, there is shadow. Basically, shadow is the default, the original state.
We deal with this original state in drawing. Oddly, we do not depict light in drawing at all. Light is the white of the paper. The light is already there before we begin, thus the act of drawing means omitting the light and creating shadows.
Shadow is at least as important as shape, because shadows define space.
Depicting shadows
In drawing, we depict the grays of shadows with hatching—lines drawn more or less closely together that produce surfaces. They can range from very delicate grays to almost black. Hatching also enables us to convey textures and surface properties.
The second way of portraying grays is with a solid area of tone—using ink, for instance.
A combination of the two techniques is also possible, for example when you color a drawing or intensify it with a glaze.
The most important thing to realize is that what you see is light, but what you draw is shadow. Do not use it too sparingly.
People are not objects
Drawing people is very difficult—or at least it’s not very easy, right? One reason for this is that we have no distance from them. We examine our drawings of people with a far more critical eye than any other subject, since we all know what we’re supposed to look like. We are so familiar with our own face, our own figure, that mistakes are far more conspicuous. In addition, people are not objects. They are living beings, individuals. People feel, people think, people move.
It’s quite possible that a subject will not only move away, but may move toward us. Worse, they might ask, “Is that supposed to be me?”
So when we draw people we must remember that we are not only portraying them, but entering into a relationship with them. On the following pages I will attempt to offer a few tips for solving this dilemma.
Friends
The first and easiest way out of this conundrum is to draw your friends. The advantage is that your friends will gladly sit still for a moment and they won’t be too critical with your results. Also, you can “re-draw” your friends without them taking it too personally.
For caricatures, combine blind contour drawing with drawing and looking. Begin by using the blind contour technique, but after a few strokes, watch what you are doing and revise accordingly.
Passersby
As for strangers, make them your friends. Just ask if they’d mind if you do a quick sketch of them. They usually won’t refuse. On the contrary, most even feel flattered and curious about the result.
However, those who are not so proud of their appearance won’t necessarily thank you for documenting them. For instance, always ask beggars for permission and handle drunks carefully.
In some cases—such as with the pastor giving a sermon, shown opposite—other viewers may feel more disturbed by your drawing than the person you are portraying. Be considerate. Draw, but work discreetly!
Tip:
Always draw a little of the surroundings to give your subject some context.
Performers
Some people work in public and deliberately put themselves on display. They can be rewarding to draw: they often
make good subjects and tend to be less inhibited than most. Possible subjects include street musicians, actors in a theater, politicians and public speakers, ministers in a church, models, parade marchers, and even striptease dancers.
Most of these people share a love for public display and should have few objections to being sketched. But don’t count on it.
Hide and seek
Things can get dicey if you draw people who expressly do not wish to be drawn or photographed. It can be downright precarious, for instance, to draw police officers or soldiers.
The best advice here is: don’t do it, or don’t get caught. Keep your distance and avoid a direct line of sight if possible.
Draw from a hiding place—from a car or a store, over the shoulder of a friend, from behind a market stand, or from the shelter of a café. You can also draw your subjects from the rear.
Dare to Sketch Page 3