My name is Patrick J Jones.
I'm an author, an artist, and a teacher.
We're going to explore the drawing of the female figure in fantasy art.
We're going to explore what I consider the pencil equivalent of oil paints on canvas
and that is charcoal on newsprint.
Within this workshop, we will draw a few render drawings but most of the mileage is going
to come from the starts.
We're going to start a lots of drawings, and not necessarily finish them.
Most of the life in the drawing is within the first few strokes, and after that is an
uphill battle to recreate and reinvigorate the drawing with further gesture lines because
we fall into the necessary trap of structure, which is to make it look solid.
As an introduction, there are very similar themes that we're going to revisit over and
over.
Structure of gesture is the king of all of that.
We have to master both to get a balance that reads as a figure that's alive but not stiff,
and a figure that's fluid but not jello and therein lies the rabbit.
It's the fight of all artists throughout the ages.
How do we make this look alive and at the same time make sure that it reads as a life
like solid thing...
Now, look at the lovely display of those fingers.
That is a gesture moment between fingers going one, two, three, four.
That's a rhythm and rhythm and gesture are very closely linked.
They are in everything; in music, in the beats of a story and most of all within figure drawing.
Figure drawing is the hardest discipline of all.
We have all these rhythms in nature.
And landscape painters do beautiful work with that idea.
But when we choose a figure, we have chosen the hardest thing in the world to draw.
Or, as I like to think of it, the most interesting thing in the world to draw because the possibilities
are endless.
What I'm going to do is I'm going to implement all that stuff we've just looked at and try
and make this a joyous affair but with thought being encumbered by the reference.
You might think it's strange to hear that the reference is an encumberment, but it is.
We see reference and we think if we don't get into the same as the reference that we've
made a mistake, we haven't done our job right.
Remember art shouldn't be ticking boxes.
It should be joyous.
If it's not, then your art will look like it's not.
I often say that if you draw when you're bored, your art will be boring.
If you draw when you're tired, your art will look tired.
We have drawn with all the enthusiasm that can be garnered.
Use a gesture in the gestureal hand here.
And the holistic of the figure and now we can move down this body knowing that having
plotted out the entirety of it, we can move from side to side and draw as we started with
in streams of consciousness but with more idea of what the forms are going down the
body.
Art is not like anything else.
It's different.
It'll be filled with contradictions.
But when you look closer, they're not really contradictions.
I am still using the method of one side to the other, holistic vision, that tube, shape
and big broad gesture for the twist of the hips all the way down to the leg and moving
over with the streams of consciousness idea.
And The more you draw, the less you'll have to draw and measure at the same time because
I don't think it's that important.
It is to begin with but not later.
Do your due diligence in the background.
Draw many standard figures and measure them until you get really handy at that, and then
in the background keep drawing this.
And say that that navel's too high and it is but it doesn't matter because the joy supersedes
everything.
Confidence supersedes all.
No matter what errors I make and there are none really, there's only errors if that navel
goes above that rib cage.
It's still in the ballpark.
And also I'm only glancing at that reference.
I'm not studying it.
Notice my hand has barely left that page at any point for me to step back and measure.
This isn't how you draw everything.
Could be detrimental or would be to a long finished drawing or what the world sees as
a finished drawing, a very rendered drawing.
But for this beautiful little moment of joy, it's perfect for this.
I have already plotted out the basic size and once again, you can add another proportion
to this.
Let's say the greater trochanter is halfway down the figure and the bottom of the knees is the other quarter
from that, so we got three measurements.
Or as I like to do with the female finger, go from the top of the head to the navel and
then to the top of the knees, down to the foot and we'll get thirds.
And that's a nice little measurement that I use quite a lot, and easy to see it on the
female figure because from the back, we pinch in at that point too on the 12th rib.
The navel being the equivalent on the back of the 12th rib, the end of the rib cage.
The rib cage has 10 ribs on the front and 12 at the back, that's why it's lower and
we can always find out where the rib cage is.
It always makes itself known especially on the female figure and we can always find the
hips on the male figure because it stops immediately at the obliques.
A little trickier the female figure.
So the female figure, I look for the curve in of the rib cage.
For the male figure, I look for the curve out of the obliques against the hips.
But I talk a lot about the destructive nature of photo reference.
As for now, what I want you to do is think about the joy of not being wetted to it for
many reasons or one of them being distortion and we can distort our joints anyway we please
as long as the artistic hand reads that way.
What I'm drawing here is short hand for a lot of complicated muscles, that straight
as the pollicis muscles, that curve is the brachioradialis longust coming around there.
And if we draw lots, that will make sense to us.
But of all the muscles in the arm, the brachioradialis is the most important one to remember how
it overlaps from the lower arm to the upper arm and how it has that big curve run to work
that thumb.
So, a massive big muscle that is seen from the top side of the arm and also from the
underside.
So, it's the biggest player in the arm.
Note how the leg comes inwards at that angle.
Another thing that I'm well aware of and I use that moment to put a straight on it.
And that stops the jello nature of the gestural lines throughout the figure.
Once we have that straight on there, everything solids up.
Everything becomes this magical gesture though also structural shape.
And look how I haven't adhered to the reference.
I put the legs together.
I like the quirky nature of the toes going in there.
Maybe I'll use it in a different drawing.
But for this one, I had an idea of a sense of a little bit more balance but going slightly
off kilter.
I wanted a figure in motion.
I didn't add the ponytail for instance.
And the reason I mentioned any of this is that we are not slaves to the reference.
We use the reference to find our moment in time as artists and knowing when to stop when
on a little drawing like this is actually a tricky business and I'm slowing down to
a crawl here almost as far as - as quick drawing goes to ask myself "Is there any more to be
said here?"
and if there's not then it's time to think about stopping.
I did think it needed a little overlap there for the tendons of the pectoralis because
they overlap the arm from the front and I felt that it helped with the dimension because
there's less dimension and there's less render, remember that and the way to create dimension
with line is to overlap it and so, I've overlap those lines and now we can tell that one thing
is in front of another.
And by putting a heavier dark on that further reinforces that idea as well.
I finish as I started which is to regain the holistic nature of it and just look over the
whole drawing and see what needs a tweak here or there without render, without going too
far into the process of explaining everything that's in the photo, in the drawing.
People will forgive a photograph with all its awkwardness but they won't forgive a drawing
because every line you put there belongs to you.
It was your thought.
So let's leave with that idea that every line should be a thought.
So, I look forward to seeing you again in the next workshop exploring further this world
of the fantasy female figure.
How to bring story into your art.
How to grow the art, and how to fuel the art all the way through with a passion.
How to draw the fantasy female figures is presented in 14 parts and these workshops
will take it right back to the basics.
We'll start with very simple ideas.
Ideas that can be broken into big shapes and fit smaller shapes into them.
When it comes tricky business like, the forearm and hand, I'll slow the process on and show
you my method.
The fact that you'll be drawing along and listening to all my thoughts, all my adorations
will make you a stronger artist.
We'll learn how to draw from imagination and find in the gesture in everything; in the
hair, eyebrows, as you draw along, you too will imbibe these methods and draw with more
confidence throughout your art career.
they'll draw torsos from imagination.
They'll understand mnemonics; how the figure flows, how the parts connect, it's like the
mermaid's tail.
We'll also learn to deal with an idea that's really discussed and that's how to come out
of a disastrous drawing and make it work.
What's commonly known as failure, for me, it's just another way to go forward.
So, this course will build your confidence to approach any drawing and make it work.
These methods I've honed over a lifetime and I've distilled them into simplicity.
You too can draw from imagination with great confidence.
This course is perfect for everyone; the concept artist, the fine artist, the figurative artist
- whether it's a hobby, or a profession, we'll learn from these 14 Rs of how to draw the
fantasy female figure.