Hello my friends and welcome to another Tuesday of tutorial!
I am Leonardo Pereznieto and today I will show you the best exercise to enhance the eye-hand coordination
and to improve the perception of proportion.
It is called ¨contour drawing¨
and our subject will be this beautiful orchid.
Two key things for this exercise:
You should not look at the paper,
and draw very slowly.
We begin by observing the contour of the object,
the contour is more or less the silhouette of every part.
We choose a spot, any spot to begin,
place the pencil on the paper, you can look at that,
then with your eyes very slowly follow the contour, for example of the leaf,
make the pencil draw the same shape.
Imagine as if you were gently touching the leaf with the tip of the pencil.
Feel it, almost.
Don't lift the tip.
Make a continuous line,
and don't look at the paper or at your hand or at the pencil.
Your sight should be focused on a spot on the object
and moving slowly,
and the pencil should be drawing the same thing.
What I mean is don't look ahead with your eyes or don't draw faster or slower than your eyes.
The tip of the pencil reflects what you are doing with the eyes,
which is following the silhouette or the contour.
I just went too fast, I need to further slow down.
Everyone commits two mistakes while doing this drill...
one: they go too fast,
we need to slow down even more
and second, everyone glances at the paper,
don't!
Here I'm doing the contour of the vase,
that is the volume of the shape.
Again feel it as if you were drawing on this volume
on the vase directly,
focus and move your eyes on the object, slowly, and at the same time draw it with the pencil.
If you get to a dead end do not lift the pencil from the paper,
simply back up making an additional line.
And in the case that you get totally lost, like I am right now [laughter]
then lift the pencil, look at your drawing and place the tip where it should be.
Look at the object and continue drawing.
Don't draw while looking at the paper.
I need to slow down I was going too fast again, you need to continuously remind yourself to slow down.
Generally, the word "contour" has a similar meaning to "silhouette"
but here by "silhouette" we mean the outline, it is flat, while by "contour" we mean the same as the silhouette plus any line that you can
follow with your finger
[laughter]
like if you want to feel the three-dimensionality, the volume of the vase
or of the leaf
and you followed it across with your finger, that will be a contour line.
Remember to move your eyes slowly on the object and move your hand
as if tied to your eyes.
This is a classic exercise and it is very efficient improving your eye-hand coordination,
the only thing is you need to do it, you need to put the time.
Like the great teacher Kimon Nicolaïdes said:
"You need to put the time to do the exercises",
"you are not trying to draw, you are trying to improve your skills."
I want to read you something from my new book The Basics of Drawing - The Ultimate Guide for Beginners,
from the section with the instructions for this exercise:
"You are not trying to get a beautiful drawing
or to understand the exercise,
you are working on practicing your perception and coordination,
the time you put into the drill will determine what you get out of it.
Correctly performing this drill will improve your skills,
even if you are more experienced
but don't skip on the time."
In the book you can find this and more exercises as well as tips and techniques,
basically all the fundamentals to learn to draw or to improve your drawings,
I recommend it to you!
It is now available hard copy and on ebook form as well.
You may check it out with the link below.
And if you made it all the way to this point, I would love to know it!
please in the comments write me the secret code:
"Drill for skill"
[laughter].
Very good! ¡excellente!
If this tutorial was helpful please give it a LIKE!
subscribe to Fine Art-Tips if you haven't done so already,
don't forget to order "The Basics of Drawing - The Ultimate Guide for Beginners" book
with the link below [laughter],
and I will see you with more creations and tips on Tuesday ;)
Subtitled By Grethel Trejo