Lesson 5: Applying Construction to Animals

12:34 PM, Tuesday May 4th 2021

Lesson 5 - Album on Imgur

Imgur: https://imgur.com/a/yhYSVke


This was definitely the hardest lesson I went through and I'm really glad I was able to keep going! My constructions started really poorly but thanks to all the wonderful people on the discord server, I was able understand my mistakes and work on fixing them (I included some of the demos I recieved/saw to the imgur album). I'm still amazed at how kind everyone is, and how dedicated they are to helping others. Thanks to all the amazing people there; not only my constructions are way better than they were before, I'm also more motivated to help others as well.

Anyways, I included my reference images to the album. I went through all the demos (and most of the informal demos) but decided not to include them, hope that's okay!

Thank you so much for taking a look!

2 users agree
3:23 PM, Wednesday May 5th 2021

Hey Goodboy! I'm gonna go over your submission.

Starting out by your organic intersection, you are doing a pretty good job on wrapping your forms with each other, though there are a few things I want to point out:

  • First, remember that you still need to be making 3d convincing sausages, this means, you still need to be varying their degrees as they move away or towards the viewer, also if you look closely to some of your sausages (specially on the first page) they are a little flat- Remember that this are round sausages, so try taking this into account when you are ghoting their contours curves!

  • Second, although it's hard, you still have to draw through your forms, you didn't quite do it on the first page, but then you actually did it on the second and you may notice that they look much better grounded in 3d!

  • You are doing a good job on putting down cast shadows, though when it comes to line weight you are kind of applying it everywhere (I don't quite remember if I've given you the line weight speech already so here it goes anyway)- Now, line weight is a localized tool that we use to clarify how different forms relate with each other in specific areas on a construction (generally where different forms meet!), by applying it everywhere on the different forms, you are undermining the effectiveness of this tool. So, this is also applyable and should be applied on your constructions.

Talking about constructions, let's move on to them: There is a very clear improvement on your lesson, as you progress through it, you are understanding more how those forms you are adding are really 3d solid forms that add to the base construction. Though, there are a couple issues I want to draw attention to so you can keep on the right track.

There are some issues construction related and some specific to the study matter (animals) which are way less important but where things that was teached on the demos. We are, of course, going to start with the construction related issues.

First, I saw that you draw some notes on this but I'm going to say it anyways, sometimes your lines are getting a loosing confidence, now I hardly relate to this, sometimes because of fear or because we are going too fast, we make sloppy and not confident lines. So, the importance here is to always ghost your lines, as we progress through DaB it's normal to forget about the core principles of line quality, but I hardly recommend you take a little time to go back and read them from time to time since we tend to forget them!

Moving to another topic we've already discussed, line weight- Remember that even though we save this step for when we are done with the construction, it's still a very key part of the actual construction, since we use it to clarify how those forms we put down relate to each other. So, always apply line weight, and do it with the same confidece as a normal line.

As I said, you did a good job on those extra masses, though sometimes when you are adding them, they are not quite wrapping around your base forms, see what I mean in these examples where the back masses quite not reach the silhouette so they can wrap around it. The main cause for this issue is being a little sloppy with your forms, so as with lines and ghosting, it's okay to take your time to think how that form you want to add wraps around your base. Also, be careful with those degrees on the komodo dragon tail.

On the same note, while you are adding contour curves to your base structure, it's encourage to add them on the masses you add, especially if they are pretty big. Remember that this are tools we have at our disposal to communicate how they sit in space, here are some contours I applied on your constructions for examples! See how in the dragon I added two contour curves because of how big the form is, though remember that contour curves lose strength and utility the more you add on a same form, so use them to communicate specific things. Another thing to remember about this contour curves is that they work on the same principle as the sausages in their degrees, before adding them you need to figure out how much they are facing towards or away from the viewer.

Another thing, even though it's okay to push back some of the animals limbs, remember to try to define their silhouettes a little better so they don't look so rough.

Now, some lesser stuff related to animals: in most of them you are drawing the rib cage as it is directly in fron the pelvis, remember that they have a certain degree of inclination towards the center, see this demo on what I mean. Another thing about your necks is that the reason why they look a little odd is because you are making as they come out of front of the rib cage, while in reality their base is located in a mid way between center and up- This is also visible on the demo I just showed you.

So, you did a very good job on this lesson, I specially liked how you manage to do head constructions while it is still a rough section on the lesson. Even though you've improved a lot since last lesson and on this one, remember to still work on how those forms wrap around it each other, since it will come really handy if you decide to study human anatomy in the future!

But for now, I'm gonna mark this lesson as completed! Keep up the good work and thanks for the help you are giving on the community!

Next Steps:

Feel free to move on to the 250 cylinder challenge.

4:02 PM, Wednesday May 5th 2021

I'm so glad that you were happy with my constructions! I truly do feel like my constructions would be waay worse if I hadn't received the two other critiques you've given me before. Even though it kinda makes me sad that I still have some issues with line weight/confidence I will do my best to work on them as much as possible.

Anyways, thank you again friend. Hope you have the same luck in your art journey as I had :)

6:11 PM, Wednesday May 5th 2021

I'm glad you found this and my others critiques useful! I'm talking from experience when I say that line quality is just one of those things that takes a long time to master in a unconscious way, I still have lots of trouble and trying towards that goal. So, don't get too worry about it.

Thanks and best of lucks for you too!

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