Proko - Project - Gestural Torso Boxes

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Project - Gestural Torso Boxes

Stan Prokopenko

in Drawing Basics

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Stan Prokopenko

Founder of Proko, artist and teacher of drawing, painting, and anatomy. I try to make my lessons fun and ultra packed with information.

assignments 173 submissions

Blobs to boxes really helped with this exercise!

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reference-images.zip

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project-gestural-torso-boxes.mp4

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project-gestural-torso-boxes-transcription-english.txt

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project-gestural-torso-boxes-transcription-spanish.txt

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project-gestural-torso-boxes-captions-english.vtt

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project-gestural-torso-boxes-captions-spanish.vtt

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ASSIGNMENTS

Level 1

Imagine the body with the limbs, arms, legs, and neck removed, focusing on the boxy area from the shoulders down to the hips.

The goal is to turn, twist, and lean this box to mimic poses. You can also bloat certain areas to represent the rib cage or hips. This exercise helps to practice intuitively drawing dynamic forms in perspective. Draw these simplified torso boxes from your imagination. Believe it or not, doing this from photos can actually be more challenging because of the anatomy that can be distracting and hard to interpret.

Fill multiple pages with these simplified forms.
Aim for at least 20 different torso boxes.
Experiment with various angles, twists, and poses.
If you struggle with certain poses, try them again with slight variations.

Level 2

I've attached some photos for you to work with, that you could find in the downloads tab. You'll notice each photo is numbered. Please label your drawings with the corresponding photo you're drawing to help me and the community give you a critique. Otherwise it would be very difficult to know which box matches each photo.

Draw the same dynamic torso boxes from the photos. Focus on interpreting the overall shape and gesture rather than copying anatomical shapes. The goal is to capture the essence of the pose in a simplified form.

Exaggeration

If you'd like to make it even more challenging, you can exaggerate the pose. Exaggeration can make your poses more dynamic and interesting. To exaggerate effectively imagine a baseline or neutral pose, observe how the actual pose differs from it, and push those differences further. Be careful not to overdo it. Subtle exaggerations often work best, maintaining believability while enhancing the dynamism of the pose.

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Deadline - submit by July 9, 2024 for a chance to be in the critique video!

Maren

•

Level 2 Submission. The one I couldn’t figure out was #17-it looks like her centerline twists towards the floor but her pelvis stays facing toward the camera.

J M

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level 1 felt harder since it's hard to imagine a box for the rib cage and torso that make sense with one another. Level 2 was easier BUT I couldn't twist some of the boxes as much as I wanted to.

Wieke Pierhagen

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10d

Level 1 and 2 torso boxes. The twist was pretty hard, that's why I drew quite a lot of them. I think being subtle and making small adjustments can really have a major impact and feel very natural. But to become so good at it means drawing a lot more of these. I do wonder (especially since the last assignment of the gestural architecture) how to rotate a box completely, 360 degrees or more. A torso couldn't do that of course, but I tried it with my fantasy house, but got toally lost in which corner connects to where and how does it rotate. If someone can teach me how to draw these kind of rotations, I'd love that!

@yearly7777

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14d

I have done it. Had a bit of trouble with reading & simplifying torsos into boxes.

Melanie Scearce

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14d

Nice! Your second attempt of #6 looks much more dynamic. I think if you did another pass on #16 and #17 you could get to the next level on those too. Think about the pinch and stretch points of the pose, this will help give your boxes a bit more tension. Overall, excellent work!

Aura

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19d

level 2. i need to work on simplifying and going off vibes instead of trying to copy what im seeing.

Lorena Faria

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21d

i tried both levels in this one

Aura

•

22d

i’m baaaaack! torso boxes level one. pls help with the ? ones, i couldn’t figure them out. (feat my toddler’s art on the side)

Carmen Ciumber

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26d

I find gestural torso from picture much easier than from imagination. I am not sure about 6, 9, 19, 15. Would you have a look at these? I used the models from rythms - the 24 pictures. Thanks

Melanie Scearce

•

26d

These look really nice overall, Carmen! There are different ways to solve these; I did my own versions of the first two you mentioned. For #6, since the model's arms are pulling to her right, there is a bit of a twist to her ribcage in that direction, which is why I chose to show that side of her torso in my box. I also chose to show a bit less of the bottom plane of the box, since I didn't observe her pelvis tilting back so much. #9 is really tricky. In my version, I chose to omit that bit of his back that shows for the sake of clarity, mainly focusing on the very dramatic twist and pinch of the left side of his torso. #15 looks pretty good to me, I don't have notes on that one. For #19, if I'm reading your drawing correctly, the top plane of the box should be showing instead of the bottom plane. Her torso is coming towards us in space since she is leaning forward. Hopefully this answers your questions! Let me know if you need help with anything else :)

Wesley

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26d

Super helpful and fun.

Wesley

•

26d

2.1k views but the critique on cross contours had 952 views

@androida

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1mo

Hopping back in after a long break. Boxes from imagination first 5 sheets (set of 20) Boxes from refs given in last 5 sheets. It's a bit difficult to do these completely out of one's head, so I looked at some gymnastics for the last sheets of the imagination part before drawing them.

Mal

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1mo

Eiko Fazio

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1mo

Trying to come up with 21 poses from imagination was not easy. I got stuck after I drew 12 or so. After that, I made a pose on my own and looked at the mirror to get some ideas. I also incorporated yoga poses, which helped me creating more torso boxes. I then started drawing poses from downloaded images. Just finished 7 of them. This exercise is definitely pushing my boundaries, especially for interpretation of reference images and exaggeration of torso without breaking boxes. It's hard but fun.

Wenhan Lee

•

2mo

constructive feedback is welcome. level 1 is the first 2 images, and level 2 is the rest

Arca Ludo

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2mo

Level 1

@l3monhail

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2mo

These are my boxes for the level one "boxed from imagination". I think that somewhere around boxy 6 and 7, something clicked and I started to be able to imagine the forms in space. It was really interesting to be like "oh, I see now". It made the whole process a lot more engaging and fun, like, I wanted to see how far I could push the form.

Nancy Larson

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2mo

For various reasons I have not sketched too much this last month but did make a go of level 2 gestural torso boxes for the challenge. I very much enjoyed the process of interpretation and problem solving. As always, I look forward to getting better.

@hampop

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2mo

My submission of torso box drawings from reference. This was fun and surprisingly difficult.

@justjen

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2mo

I'm at level 1, but I found it difficult to imagine the boxes initially so I used some references (not the ones provided here) to-I hope-get the hang of it. Then I tried some imagined contortions. I numbered them to make it easier for anyone who wants to provide feedback on any of them. Thanks:)

Julia

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2mo

Here is my submission for the gestural torso boxes assignment, imagination boxes as well as boxes from figure reference.