UNIT 2 _ "I Notice" Diary

Today in class we made accordion sketchbooks to use for our Unit 2, "I Notice" Journal. Please refer to your handout for specifics. 

Week 3 _ Student Examples

Hi Everyone,

Below you will find a series of photographs of students in the process of working on the same drawings that you are as well as some examples of finished pieces. Note some of the different strategies they employ. (Value inversions, shape repetitions, staggered continuity of line where an image is broken by structural divisions, etc.)

Process Images

Completed Works

WEEK 3 _ Prescribed Actions

Consider today's power point presentation discussing Cubism and the fractured picture plane as well as the variety of pictorial strategies that we discussed in the work of subsequent artists. (A copy of the power point may be found on Canvas, Files > Unit 1, if you wish to go back through the images.)

 First Reincarnation : Increased Scale/ Prescribed Actions

Step Four:   

• A.) Students will use their erasure with line drawing as a model, replicating the structure   of their drawing directly on the surface of their enlarged charcoal drawing. This structure will be neither exclusively foreground nor background, but rather a device for fracturing the picture plane, and substantially reorganizing the overall composition.  
• B.) Students will also introduce 1-3 new patterns or textures into their composition.   Added patterns/textures must cover at least 50 percent of the composition and cannot   be exclusively foreground or background. 

 

Begin in class and continue for HW. 

DEADLINE: WEDNESDAY, Sept. 17

Due for Critique & in-class submission: All elements of this project > original drawings (x3), erasure with line drawing that you selected (x1), Resolved Large Charcoal Prescribed Actions drawing (x1) 

Week 3 _ Erasure with Line Exercise

Today in class we did the Erasure with Line exercise. If you were present then please complete one additional version of the exercise for HW.

If you were absent, you need to create a minimum of 2 drawings following the directions of this exercise. Adhere to the material and scale requirements. 

Please complete the following exercise by drawing along with the video. Instructions are delivered in real time as I follow the process. It's an exercise by the artist George Rush designed to emphasize drawing as an event rather than an outcome, which emphasizes material experimentation and compositional balance. The exercise itself took me about 12 minutes and there is a brief discussion of results at the end of the video.

Adhere to the material and scale requirements. 

Materials: 

• 9 x 12”  paper 
• charcoal
• white plastic eraser
• kneaded eraser
• paper towel(s)

Real-time instruction video.

Accelerated companion recording to the real-time instruction video.

Tips on Documenting your work and File Preparation

 Goals

Your primary goal is to create an accurate reproduction of the object, as close to the experience of seeing it in person as possible.

This entails:

• image quality _ creating an image with high resolution
• even lighting across the entire picture plane (avoid cast shadows and gradations caused by directional light)
• framing _ keeping the picture plane parallel to the viewer pov (the lens)
• making sure that Focus is consistent and clear for the whole drawing
• getting a full representation of the drawing but cropping extraneous information
• providing “details” when you’re working on a large drawing to show minute information or surface/mark-making quality

Most of this can be achieved in the initial photograph if you set up the right conditions. Even so, I always end up bringing the file into photoshop to fine-tune certain aspects and prepare it for professional standards of presentation and file sizing.

A scanner simplifies all of this and is the preferred method in most cases. However, the size limitation of most scanner beds can make this impractical depending on the size or medium of your drawing. I don’t expect that all of you will have a scanner, so let’s first address how you might approach this with a digital camera or most likely, your smartphone. 

Documentation with a Smartphone

Camera quality and software capability will vary depending on the generation of phone that you have. I don’t intend to discuss particular hardware, but rather general guidelines in terms of DOs and DON’Ts. 

Image Quality 

On some phones and digital cameras you may need to specify the resolution that you want. HD was an option that you had to manually designate in earlier iPhones, though it now seems standard in current iOs. It’s best to start with the highest resolution that you can achieve and then reduce the size for sharing after editing.

Lighting (*the flash is not your friend*)

Let’s look at examples from a few different lighting situations. (All shot using iPhone 11, no editing.)

1. Laying on my drawing table. Overhead LED Strip lights + natural light flooding in from window.

In order to keep from casting a shadow, I have to photograph from farther away, making parallel framing harder and sacrificing a little detail. Also, I will have to adjust for color a little more during editing as a result of the competing temperatures of light. 

2. Hanging on the wall. Overhead LED Strip light.

Notice how this situation creates an image that is lighter at the top and darker towards the bottom. Also, it’s subtle but there is a horizontal cast shadow (of me) about ¾ down the image.

3. Exterior light. Overcast day. In my carport.

This is optimal for getting the most even lighting and accurate color. Because the light is not directional (from above) I can hold the phone over it pretty close without casting a shadow. This doesn’t work nearly as well when the sun is out and casting warm, directional light.

Framing 

You want to frame your photo to keep the picture plane parallel to the viewers point of view. A lot of cameras have an option to impose a grid as part of the viewfinder which can help you achieve this. 

This image is fine for a studio process shot on Instagram. (#wip)  

But for your class submissions framing should be more like this. 

Focus 

This should be pretty good as a result of getting your framing parallel since there will be no changes in depth of field. However, shooting in low light conditions requires a longer exposure time which is ok if you are using a tripod. Much more challenging to hold your camera/phone still for long exposures.

“Details”

Detail shots are good for zooming in on more detailed areas in larger, complicated drawings.

They are also good for giving the viewer a sense of the surface and material quality of the object. i.e. How the drawing was made.

Documentation with a Scanner

Scanning drawings removes most of the challenges described above. However, it can change the feel of a drawing and sometimes washes them out. I like to scan my drawings as tifs at 300 dpi. This serves as my original and then I edit and reduce file size or optimize for web from there. 

Another limitation of using a scanner is the size of the bed (usually 8.5 x 11” in most home All-in-1 scanner/printers). This can be overcome by scanning in sections and stitching together in photoshop but requires a little more time and software familiarity. 

PREPARING FILES FOR SUBMISSION

This short video shows how I typically approach editing, sizing, and saving photos of my work.  

WEEK 2 _ Project 1: Iteration x Evolution x Reincarnation

Today we watched the first part of a film called The Five Obstructions and discussed the nature of the project that the two filmmakers have embarked upon. We will continue to watch this movie over the next several classes as a companion to your process/progress in developing work for Project 1.

Project 1: Iteration x Evolution x Reincarnation

“a little gem that we are now going to ruin” – the five obstructions

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Project One involves obstructions or iterative directives for the re-imagining of a drawing. 

 

Detailed instructions will be introduced for each iteration as we come to it.  

 

The new ‘drawing(s)’ re-imagine a first drawing: your “original”. 

 

* Please keep all components of everything we make during the course of this project.  

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Iteration:

- the repetition of a process or utterance.

- repetition of a mathematical or computational procedure applied to the result of a previous application, typically as a means of obtaining successively closer approximations to the solution of a problem.

- a new version of a piece of computer hardware or software.

 

Reincarnation: 

- the religious or philosophical concept that the soul or spirit, after biological death, can begin a new life in a new body. This doctrine is a central tenet of the Hindu religion. It is also a common belief of various ancient and modern religions such as Spiritism, Theosophy, and Eckankar, and is found as well in many tribal societies around the world.

___

 

First Reincarnation : Increased Scale/ Prescribed Actions

 

Step One:             Select one of your 3 drawings to serve as your “original.”

 

Step Two:             Re-draw your “original” as is or with slight alterations, on the large paper provided (19x26" or 22x30” Rives BFK). Use only the provided charcoal and erasers. 

 

      This should be a primarily tonal drawing. By this I mean that you should use a range of value in your drawing. This can be modeled tonality based on lighting and/or simple value shapes assigned to distinguish planes and surfaces from each other.

 

* Expect that this drawing will change over time in response to new “prescribed actions” that I will distribute in subsequent classes. Don’t get too attached or fussy at any given moment. Leave this “open” and don’t spray it with fixative yet.

DUE: The enlarged charcoal version of your "original" is due Wednesday, Sept. 10.

SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS

 

Where: CANVAS > Assignments Unit 1

 

When: Digital Documentation Submissions are due Weds., 9/10/24 by 9:00am. Bring your large charcoal drawing and the erasure with line exercises with you to class.

 

File size/dimensions: 72 dpi. 1500 pixels on the longest dimension. Jpeg.

 

File naming: Please use the following format for designating your files. 

LastNameFirstInitial_Project1FirstRE_SubmissionNumber

 

For example: HeadT_Project1FirstRE_01.jpeg