L1: Perspective Of Drawing

Remember that a picture, before being a battle horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order. –Maurice Denis

So that was an opening for Figures Studies 3. It was a clear confusion at first to learn about principles design all over again in a figures class but then I realized later on that it was because of the connection that both these subjects hold to the mindset of seeing. I have seen arguable issues on weather to draw what you see or draw what you know and in my thoughts, I presumed that as the main point of what SY was trying to acquaint with. That it is truly important to master the basics of the 8 elements and principles of art and design. From here we were shown with both drawings from the past and present with a surprisingly difference between the perspective. Note that I mentioned the difference, and not the right or wrong. From here our vision are captured with different perspective- a more iconic of a same spacing picture to a drawing that serves more convincing elements such as connecting the lines to square up the form’s angle.

So it this matter, there’s never really an answer for right and wrong does it?

The essential learning of all this principles and elements might seems insignificant to most of us yet it is the only tools to learn how to draw what we see. Because it is only when we mastered the ability to draw whatever we see with the absolute precision then only we can move on and began experimenting with perceptions of line and space. So I think the one important earnest conclusion of this lesson is to learn what the rules is before trying to change the rules. Perhaps from this term of the knowledge’s installments, we would finally be able to draw what we don’t see but know its there. -Zheng Joo

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The lecture started off with a quote by Maurice Denis that defined the word 'picture'. Then the lecturer went on to the elements of arts and principles of design. He showed a few examples of paintings from different eras and explained to us the differences, referring to the photos of sceneries that we can see in our everyday lives. It was explained that in certain paintings the laws of perspectives were not necessarily applied. Then till the end of the class we did life drawing, drawing our classmates. -Yuki

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We were shown a quote today. It’s by Maurice Denis dated 1890. In conclusion of the quote, it conveys a message by saying a drawing on a flat surface is done by arranging elements of art in a certain order to form a certain picture. We were shown examples and then the 8 elements of art, dot becomes a line and lines form a shape, more shape becomes a form, then the values, texture, space and color. After principle of art, it was principle of design: repetition, proportion, harmony, balance, contrast, rhythm, directional movement and emphasis. Art also evolves as pictures drawn during ancient times were arranged in a way where drawings have directions from bottom to top but slowly dimensions are taken into account. To sum up the whole lesson we got, it’s about artistic touch up. Every artist would sure encounter the rules and principals. Drawing is all about arranging elements in a certain principal. –Suet Yee

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Drawing is a creative process. Maurice Denis, who was a French painter and writer, had a proposal for the definition of painting in 1890. He stated, “Remember that a picture, before being a battle horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order.” It carries a meaning that before a great artwork is produced; the original materials are just some common things such as a paper, some color paints and so on. As they are used and arranged in a certain way based on some principles by using the basic elements of art, it becomes a painting.

There are 8 elements of Art and 8 principles of Design. The elements of Art consist of :

1. dot
2. line
3. shape / face
4. form
5. value
6. texture
7. space, and
8. color.

Whereas the principles of design comprise:

1. repetition / pattern
2. proportion / size
3. harmony / unity
4. balance
5. contrast / opposition
6. rhythm
7. directional movement
8. emphasis / center of interest / focus

After explaining the theories above, SY asked us to do one exercise in which we needed to draw more than 2 figures in the class and pay more attention to the space involved. Remember that, the subjects closer will appear to be bigger, and the subjects further will appear to be smaller. In fact, the artists in the past drew subjects in the same size, for example, figure, as if the drawings or paintings are just graphics which do not reflect the real world. However both the drawing in the past and nowadays are no wrong. The main difference is the perspective that an artist holds. We finished drawing and were required to snap a picture of what we drew to post on our class blog.

Lastly, SY reminded us to prepare a picture plane of a A4 sized mounting board or card and a transparency with grids (1”x1”). The border is 2 inches thick. –Angeline Hong

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Having a quote as a kick start for Figure 3 is really unexpected. I never thought much about the quote at first actually. From what I learn last semester, I just draw what I am supposed to draw, never even think about any principles or what ever element there even exists? And prepare for a summary? What the hell is this; seriously, I never see any of this coming. A class blog was unexpected either, but I’m sure this gonna be interesting.After reading through the quote for several times, stare at it for an hour, I realize that we all actually start with nothing. People always tend to remember what they have accomplished but forget how they done it. Therefore, this class actually reminds me about basics. From dots to lines, repetition to patterns all of this are like square no.1.How a picture does looks nice? Tendency and the artistic touch up.

Hm.. How exactly we judge on tendency and the artistic touch up? When a picture and a painting which has no intention on following this two, does is still look good? These questions are still quite blurry in my head. But I hope as I goes along with the class, things will get clearer. And the first class was quite boring to me, so I didn’t really enjoy. Partly because of having 4 hours of sleeping that night. But overall everything SY taught was quite informative. -Jonathan Ng

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An artistic touch up is the process which an artist might experience through out the journey of experiencing or producing art. Tendency is something that an artist has in a very small percent that came from his instinct. both artistic touch up and tendency are the learning process that one must experience in the journey of art, the experiences and practices will lead him into further development and greater discovery, thus also bringing him up to another level of aesthetic as an artist. This is what I've capture in the class. -Kenny Wang

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Hi everyone! I was glad that our lecturers were not bad as I expected. Instead, they treat us well. Our lecturer, SY taught us about those great artists’ artworks in past. The 8 elements of art and design that he mentioned were quite useful to me. By the way, he also mentioned about the space besides drawing people. After that, he gives us some exercise. That is drawing any space in this class. What a free topic… everyone was concentrating on drawing. This was what I drew that day - Vin Sern

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So.... another new semester, yet again Figure Studies, with it being 3 this time. One of my favourite subject. Our lecturer, Sio Yean showed us a slide which consists of philosophies, some important pointers about elements of design and principles or art. He later on told us about artistic touch ups, which was a very good header up. Later on, we were asked to produce a drawing, which needed space shown clearly with of course... figures. Will strive to do better next time. -High Guan.

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Figure 1是肖像，Figure 2是肢体动作，那Figure 3的主要目的可说是把人放在适当的空间里。

前半堂课，很明显的，是要测试大家对人物和空间的拿捏。把自己感受到的空间画出来，其实一点也不容易。一不小心，就很容易犯下“前人”所犯的错误。

在后来的教学上，老师稍微带过以前Design学过的东西。也许是自己对于“理论”这方面有点偏见吧，总觉得有些闷，可能是上了两个Sem的Way Chuan式无厘头，突然转来比较正经的Figure，有些怪怪吧。但不是什么大问题，很快就能适应，因为除了History 2那个蛋散，The One老师给我的印象都很好。
-Raymond-

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Today is our first class for figure study 3. We learn about things which is different from pass 2 semesters. There first came to us is the quote from Maurice Denis which is a French painter.

“Remember that a picture, before being a battle horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot, is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order.”

There are 8 elements of art and 8 principles of design. Elements of art include dots, lines, shape, form, value, texture, space and color. Sio Yean showing us paintings from different countries and all the paintings don’t really space in between. The figure are usually arrange level by level. Figure in front are usually drew on bottom of the painting but figures at the back are drew on the top. The proportion of the figures for bottom and top doesn’t show any different. Due the change of time, people have discovered with such problem and try to find the solution. Whereby, object in front will be draw bigger while object at the back will be draw smaller in order to show perspective in the picture. But, there are no wrong in using both method. –Stephanie Poon

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Basically, what we learned on our first day of class for figure 3 is a recap of the classes we had previous sem and more. Falling short on non, what we learnt on the first day , i believe is what we call the 'core' in which would be the root of our studies for this term.

Yea the principles and what not has already been taught in the previous sems but to summarize it all down what we learn on that day was really how to apply what we learn. 'Artistic touch up' a new word (or sentence) which was mentioned during the class was i believe the result through the comprehension of all the principles which was also mentioned in the class.

Strategically choosing our spot was how we started our first assignment in class. Deciding on where to stand or sit was not based on how tedious the work would be but instead a practice of our very own 'artistic touch up' and so here are my fruits ^^-keith

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yes hey people! SY,our lecturer have taught us about the 8 elements of art and also the 8 principles of design. Dots,lines,proportion,balance,contrast n so on. Well,those are basically important to construct/draw/picture/design a particular thing. It is definitely useful in the process of improving and learning in this figure 3 class. So, we were asked to draw based on what we saw in the class and what was surrounding us. Maybe emphasized on the proportion and also feel the space around us like what we learned in perspective class.

This was my spot, -Queenie Chong :) looking forward for the next class.

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The lecture taught us about the 8 elements of are and the principles of designs before we had our class assignment. Which made me wonder that was i having a design class or figure studies class actually, because my previous figure studies lecture didn`t taught those stuff to us before but the design class did. XD

I have a bad habit with drawing which i will keep on drawing with short lines and keep over-laping them together, which is the reason why my drawing always looks messy.>^<

Anyway, i quite enjoy doing the class assignment, and thanks to the lecture for mention and remind those elements of art and principles of designs to us. :D

-By Jun Yie a.k.a Kong Kuan Yie

Beware, XD

This was what i drew:

*Nathon smiles like a mice.* XD

*My drawing.* :D

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Well well, what did I learn in my first figure studies 3 class? Other than the 8 elements of art, principles of designs yada yada teory-based stuff, I have tightened another notch on improving my observation skills. When requested to sketch out an angle from our lively classroom scene, i had trudged my way to the front of the class to capture a better view. Here is what my pen drew:-Swea Phin :)

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Our first figure studies 3 lesson was quite different from previous semesters, but enjoyable at the same time. We learned the elements of art, and the design principles that would be applicable in our figure drawings, as well as other related work we do in the future."Remember that a painting - before it is a battle horse, a nude model, or some anecdote - is essentially a flat surface covered with colours assembled in a certain order" - Maurice DenisWe learnt this significant quote from Maurice Denis who was a French painter and writer, know for his Symbolist movements. The quote in a way, very bluntly summed up painting and art itself.We touched on the 8 elements of art, dots, line, form, space, texture, value, plane and colour.And along with it the design principles, repetition, proportion, harmony, balance, contrast, rhythm, direction and focus.We were required to draw what we see in the class, as a class assignment. We were told to give emphasis to keep "space" in mind while we made the drawings. Its always a challenge to draw from life, but it is more enjoyable as it requires a lot of improvisation on the spot, and drawing from imagination as well.All in all, the class was very informative. Looking forward to learning more in the coming classes. Below are my sketches from class, and a reference picture of more or less what i drew.-Shaneez Bushree

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The first lesson of figure class was started with a quote by a French painter,Maurice Denis ."Remember that a picture,before being a battle horse,a nude,an anecdote or whatnot,is essentially a flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order."Then the 8 elements of art and 8 principles of design.Besides,SY was show us the pictures that create by past artist.Obviously,the perceive of perspective of past artist and nowadays artist was different .Following we was requiry to draw wat we see in the class, i try hard to draw from my eye level but my work still look like draw from the top view. -Suat Yee

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Like most of my classmates, I found it very refreshing as the basic principles and elements of Art & Design were being mentioned at the beginning of the first class of Figure Studies this semester. The quote by Maurice Denis, which we were told to jot down, was quite inspiring as well. In my opinion, this quote revolves around exploring our creativity through the mere process of creating something out of nothing, and the various stages involved in producing a piece of artwork. This quote makes me aware of taking good care of each phase we have to go through when drawing a Figure or painting a picture. For instance, I have a certain tendency of rushing my proportions for drawing Portraits as my favorite part is the toning or shading. For this reason I often forget that both the proportion and shading are equally important to make the final piece look good. So the “flat surface covered with colors assembled in a certain order” should be nicely done before it transforms into a “battle horse, a nude, an anecdote or whatnot”. Basically this is my idea as to how I interpret the quote, and I found the colorful examples of illustrations being shared with us subsequently, inspiring as well. -Zumra

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-Azlif

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Heya! So sorry for the delay; I lost the paper Zheng Joo gave me with the password and username. I was kinda glad that Sio Yean is our lecturer this semester. I had Way Chuan the last 2 semesters and it was a refreshing change we had SY this time. Not that WC is not good, just prefer to be taught by different lecturers.

Anyhoo, this first class is different than the past 2 semesters. Usually it's all about human forms and all that but this class we learned about design elements, design principles and somewhere along those lines. Kinda feels like a design class but nonetheless, it was infomative and useful in terms of our creativity and skills. Back to basics, and it's usually the most important thing that we tend to ignore and/or forget.

I really need to buck up on my observation skills!


And then there was a life drawing session after the lecturer. I suck in life drawing but here you go, enjoy! Or rather, try not to laugh.




I'm probably the last to post in so on a lighter note of ending this post, here's a picture of Yuki looking bored feeling weird. - YeeWern -



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In Figure 3, I found that the different thing is we are going to draw figure include the space. I felt that is quite difficult for me because i still weak in perspective study. I think I must pay more effort to improve my skill.
---by Heng Kee Poon---
heres my drawing -->