hi there welcome back to another drawing video
thanks for checking this out if you're new here my name is Siobhan
i'm a figure drawing instructor and on this channel i post videos related
to dynamic and expressive approaches to drawing the figure i share my own
process and i also offer tips and techniques for
unlocking your own natural and responsive style of drawing so if
that's something that interests you then definitely subscribe and stay tuned i
try my best to post a new video every week
so today i'm sharing a drawing with you that i made using ink and charcoal
these are two mediums that i often use when drawing the figure from life
i thought it'd be interesting to explore them in the studio
working from a photo reference
as usual i'm using a photo reference from the new masters academy youtube
channel and i'll leave a link in the description
below to that exact video with the timestamp for the exact pose so
you can go and check it out if you want to refer back to the photo
that i'm working from and then before we start i just wanted
to show you the materials that i'm using today
this is not exactly your regular run-of-the-mill bottle of ink
what you've got is this sort of flat dish i think it's made of stone
and then you also have this block or this stick of ink
and what you have to do is fill this dish with water
and then stir the block or the stick into the water so that it kind of
dissolves a little bit and the ink makes a really nice wash
it's not dark at all it's not heavy it's actually just a very very light tone
so those are the materials that i'm using here's a short video i'll talk a
little bit about my process and then i'll check back in with you at
the end
working with ink is definitely not easy even though
i'm using it as a drawing tool i think having to work with a brush and wet
media really feels more like painting or
watercolor painting anyway but the effect of ink can also be very
graphic because it fee because it dries so
quickly once it's dry you can't move it around
or erase or wash it out so any marks that
you make are final
so at the beginning i'm actually very nervous to make marks
i'm trying to approximate the shadows of the model
but even that's not so easy to do and in the end i think i just go for a
regular drawing approach
and just try and use the brush and the ink as any other drawing tool
so that involves you know a close observation
sort of a response and just making marks to really try and capture the overall
pose at first and not worry too much about
the details i'm just trying to go for a regular
drawing approach and aim for the shape and the gesture of
the figure
now i know from working with this before with working with this kind of
drawing tool before that i am going to draw
over these initial ink marks with charcoal
so in a way it's okay to be very wobbly at the stage
and just to sort of you know place the brush down
in certain parts and let the ink pull up or push the ink around as much as i can
because it doesn't have to be so definite or
defined at the stage the beauty of working over this with a
pencil is that you can then add definition and add details on top of
these first loose gestural marks
by the way i should say that i don't know what the name of this ink and brush
set is i'm sure it's a very specific setup and
i'm sure it's used in japanese painting or calligraphy
so if you happen to know what if you're familiar with this
sort of ink block and
if you're familiar with this ink block please let me know below in the comments
if there is a specific name i'd love to
know
at this point i'm going to stop using ink and switch over to a charcoal pencil
this is where the tricky part is because what i'm doing here is working
into wet media but i also think it's the most
interesting part of the drawing because this now offers you
an opportunity to make very dark marks the charcoal
in working into the ink is very different than just
either one of those on their own
then there's also the problem that the charcoal if the charcoal gets wet
it doesn't actually tend to draw like it normally draws
so all of that kind of unpredictability i actually quite like working with
so i start at the head and try to work in the shadow shapes around the face
and in particular the shadow shapes that sort of holds the head in place
like under the chin and along the side i find now that i get a lot of variation
in the drawing and to me that's important because i
don't want to have i try to have a drawing that isn't
monotone throughout or doesn't have the exact same mark throughout i'm always
trying to vary the mark in some way or another
i have talked about this a lot in other videos i'm
really not trying to make a flawless perfect representation
of my reference image i'm trying to make a drawing that's more
of a response to what i see and what i understand in the image
and that really comes down to your experience
and how you use drawing as a as a form of expression really
so it's something that's important to me it's not something that
you maybe necessarily like a lot of people are really into sort of a perfect
super hyper realistic drawing they find that very very appealing that's
something that i see as being sort of on the other
end of this of the of the spectrum from where i'm
working one way of drawing isn't better than the
other i'm not saying that i just personally find
this way of drawing is offers a much more profound way of expression than the
other can offer
let me know your thoughts if you prefer a drawing that's more hyper realistic or
one that's a little bit more open and expressive i'd love to hear
hear your opinion on that
ultimately i think an expressive and gestural way of drawing
really does have as much detailed observation
as classical realistic way of drawing it's just that you have a lot more
freedom to respond with your marks based on what
you observe
thank you so much for watching this video all the way through to the end
i'm really pleased that you stuck with me throughout the video i hope you
enjoyed it and that you got something useful from
it maybe even got a bit inspired to explore expressive and natural and
responsive drawing in your own work so i will look out for you in the
comments i hope you have a great week and i'll see you in the next video
you