Lesson Info
5. Tracking Figures in Fast Motion
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Lesson Info
Tracking Figures in Fast Motion
So we've worked with a slow motion figure inside, then we moved it outside and did some drawings of celeste at a medium speed. But now we're going to go a little faster. We're going to attempt more of a medium fast speed motion and really try to track the figure gestural e on location with a faster speed. And this is something that artists have done through the centuries. If you look at this Luca cambio. So drawing of figures in motion appears that they're walking um you know and and there's a sense of action and motion going on. There's a lot of examples of this. So it is a really daunting in a way but really fun practice and the things that I would say would make it easier. One is to use a drawing tool that has some impact that has some flow to it. So I've sharpened up to charcoal pencils, I've sharpened too because um you know I'm gonna be moving my pencils so quickly that it could wear down quickly or it could break and I don't want to stop in the middle to sharpen my pencil. So ha...
ving a couple pencils sharpened up can be a really great thing also just sort of testing it out on your paper to see if it feels like it might be a flowy kind of feel because you want a sense of flow, you want a sense of the pencils moving as the figures are moving this type of drawing because they are going to be moving constantly, will be sort of a continuous motion drawing where I'm not really going to take a break between figures. I'm just going to allow the figures to um to move and allow my pencil to move and we get what we get and we don't get upset. Um It's a really, it's really a practice, it's really about process and over time you'll find it becomes easier and easier. So let's get started. Um celeste and her friend Avery are playing spike ball and I'm going to attempt to draw them doing that as they work in a faster motion. So I'm gonna turn to the table. I'm gonna support my drawing pad like this so that I have a sense of you know, being able to work um you know with it propped up a little bit and a little bit on an angle because when I do that I feel like I can look at them and my pad at the same time and I'm going to leave one of my pencils on the table and start with the other. And you know, this is just everyday life in our backyard and they are playing and I'm just gonna start to draw them as they move. And I'm going to just really work with as they as they move, letting my hand, you know uh move along with them. So there might be like several arms, several legs to one figure. And I might skip over to celeste on the right here as she's working and playing, trying to establish one leg and then the other and as she comes back to the game, playing again and then she's down and she's moving further down. So you can almost see this really amazing sense of motion and the beauty too of working with charcoal is that you have the possibility of almost like sort of smudging in between. So standing, reaching, slamming the ball down and it's fun to actually have two figures to draw because you can work back and forth between them and you notice I'm not getting all caught up in, oh, you know, I don't quite have the proportion right or you know, what are her eyelashes look like, right? It's really about being very much in the moment in the physicality you could even relay, you know, I could, I could put in a little bit of a sense of the spike ball in the middle, if I'm kind of taking a break from the figures, you could even have a sense of what the ball is doing, you know, a little bit to give more of a sense of motion. I find myself with this size paper, often shifting the page quite a bit because I find a sense of, you know, things are getting full, but also, you know, filling the page with the drawing and just really taking the time to establish multiple attempts, multiple drawings as a figure, might bend over, reach down, this is, this is tracking, this is this is really um essential drawing as as things move in space and layering not really caring about, you know, things overlapping each other, but really going for the core movement. And I'm actually watching them much more than I'm looking down on my page much more. And sometimes it's just kind of like getting the motion happening right, getting the motion of the body and it it might end up looking kind of like a scribble. Um It may not, it may end up looking kind of abstract, but you're feeling the motion and you're really attempting to capture it in a very um physical way, because they're doing something physical right there, doing something physical, there's no time to try to establish uh really establish the clothing very much, because there is such a quick, quick movement. So it's much more about gesture, it's much more about structure. And I I enjoyed I enjoy seeing like how the page starts to get filled and now my pencil is running out, so I'm really glad that I have a second one on hand that I can work with. So I'm making again and again, the sort of slapping down of the ball, it's like, like this motion is really what we're after, we're after capturing that action. And even if if the ball goes out of bounds and there's a sense of having to go out into the back to pick it up, that's also kind of fun. Mhm. So artists that, you know, work in this way, There are a lot of people to look at and um there's a sculptor named Giacometti who is does these incredible, very active, very searching drawings and paintings as part of his sculpture process. And then there's also a whole tradition of italian artists called the futurist um like bala and johnny who create images that have um this sense of continuous motion um which are which are really actually very inspiring and wonderful to see where there's this almost sense of like rhythm and motion happening in those drawings. And I highly recommend checking some of those out too. So, these pages of drawings that I've created each one, if we look back a little bit, each one has its own personality. Each one has its own energy based on the movement of the figures. I particularly like this one because you really feel like the repetitive action and the energy of the line and the fact that it's okay to make many, many lines to describe, you know, this idea of fast motion over and over again and layering it over and over again. So, I highly recommend, you know, working quickly, Maybe you want to warm up to start with like a slower action movement than a medium action movement as a warm up to ultimately trying something on location like this, that's what I tend to like to do to warm up to this event, but absolutely, this is a way to track the figure in space and over time. It's a really exciting way to build your bravery and confidence with drawing on location.
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