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Founder of Proko, artist and teacher of drawing, painting, and anatomy. I try to make my lessons fun and ultra packed with information.
LESSON NOTES
Alright guys, let's jump into the deep end and see how you do! I feel like we've been talking a lot and not drawing enough. So, before we move on to learning about Lines, I want to give you an opportunity to spend some time doing a simplified drawing. You’re going to draw a pear or portrait if you’re doing the level 2 project. I know… A fruit isn’t the most exciting thing to draw, but it’s going to allow you to focus on the process I’m going to show you, instead of being distracted by a difficult subject matter.
This will let us see where you're at with your skills. It’s totally fine if you're at zero. Kind of expected actually. But, you'll identify right away what you struggle with. And you’ll be introduced to a lot of the skills that you’ll be working on improving in this course.
You can draw from the photos I provided in the downloads tab, or find your own fruit and draw from life. Pick a fruit that has an interesting shape you like. Put the fruit on your desk and shine a light on it. Move the light around until you like the balance of light and dark shapes.
If you don’t want to draw the photo I provided, or you want to do more than one, feel free to find your own photo. Just make sure you choose a photo with a strong single light source that creates a clear separation of lights and shadows. Many moons ago I wrote a blog post about good photo reference.
Make sure you take a photo of it from your point of view, so you can include it when posting your drawing in the community. If you want to be critiqued by me or others in the community, we'll need to see what you were drawing.
Join us in the premium course to get access to this lesson, full lesson notes, assignments, demonstrations and critiques!
DOWNLOADS
project-simplify-from-observation.mp4
183 MB
project-simplify-from-observation-transcript-english.txt
5 kB
project-simplify-from-observation-transcript-spanish.txt
6 kB
project-simplify-from-observation-captions-english.srt
9 kB
project-simplify-from-observation-captions-spanish.srt
8 kB
ASSIGNMENTS![]()
![@beyondfire94]()
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![@pushchair180]()
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![@molenkof]()
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![Jenny Flannery]()
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![Jon Wong]()
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![Camille Varner Kolafa]()
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![Kevin Moore]()
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![Tomas Gallant]()
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![Camille Varner Kolafa]()
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![ayan Maji]()
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![Yeabsira Digafe]()
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![Yeabsira Digafe]()
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![Camille Varner Kolafa]()
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![@grlpatch666]()
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![Camille Varner Kolafa]()
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![@jlcawrence]()
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![Camille Varner Kolafa]()
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![@georgeg]()
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![Ben K]()
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![@boondra]()
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![Ben K]()
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![Vincent C]()
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![Ben K]()
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![William Jeggo]()
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![Ben K]()
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![miguel hernandez]()
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![miguel hernandez]()
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![Ben K]()
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![@beyondfire94]()
Use the reference photos in the downloads tab or go find your own reference and start drawing! Remember, this project is all about simplifying to clarify.
Make sure to keep these 3 things in mind:
Shapes - Draw your shapes with straight lines
Values - Use only 5 values. 2 in the shadow and 3 in the lights
Edges - Make every single edge sharp!
I'll publish my drawing demos of both levels next Tuesday so you can watch me go through the problem solving process. For a chance to be included in the critique videos, you must submit your drawing to the community by January 26th, 2023, so I can begin filming and producing the critique video.
The pear was on easier side, so I decided to try level 2 and it was insanely hard. I would really appreciate a feedback on how I could improve.
After watching demo and critique videos, I fixed a few things: my nose proportions were way off and some half-shadows were missing. I also tried to make edges harder.
The B6 turned out to be super soft, I'm struggling to cover the paper's structure. I still feel like the proportions a bit off
I did most of Drawabox but tired of it and decided to try this course. I did some projects without an account at a very slow pace earlier this year, now that I've bought access I'll post what I have done and (try to) do it more consistently.
I drew both during this July before watching the demo. My scanner seems to have lightened them a bit and cut off some of the page edges - I used an HB pencil for the lighter values and a 6B for the darker ones.
Did I completely miss the point of this exercise? Yes. But I invite you to consider the possibility that I am NOT a clever man.
Pears! The first was completely on my own and I tried again after watching the demo.
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1d
This looks great! My biggest note for you would be to not forget about breaking all of the values down into simpler shapes with each shape being one of your 5 values! The way you have them right now is more like blended shading. Nice job on using straight lines though!
The circles were very hard and I could have done better on the distinct shades. But I am happy with it for my skill level.
This is my first attempt at the assignment! I have some ideas of what went wrong here. Hopefully my next attempt I can start to correct some of these!
Any feedback would be appreciated, let me know if I missed anything!
I feel that
- My stronger shadows on the body of the pear are too dark.
- I got overwhelmed when it came to shading the bright, main body of the pear. The shading looks disorganized.
- I think the shading in general could use consistency all across the object. Especially the direction that I am moving the pencil.
- I don’t think I have 5 distinct values, only 4.
- The shadowing for the edge of the pear looks too light, the floor shadow’s edge looks too dark (?).
I sort of screwed up the bottom of the pear’s shading 😅
- also the general shape of the pear relative to the reference is quite different.
Thanks!
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1d
Good job critiquing yourself, definitely some valid notes there! On your first note however, I would say it's the opposite. Your darkest value is okay, it's the other values that are too light. When I look at the thumbnail of your photo, I really only see 3 values: the highlight, the light halftone, and dark shadow. You're missing a clear dark halftone and light shadow. I suggest adjusting those and you might actually even be able to darken the dark shadow. Great job breaking the values down into shapes and using straight lines though!
I mess the edge and value bot got angle and proportion my first try so be little less harsh on me . I will be practicing make value scale and nailing the shape more and more visible .
Hi Ayan!
To preface I am new to this platform and would consider myself a beginner so take my advice with a grain of salt!
It sounds like you already know what areas you think you should work on and I definitely agree that practicing your values and shapes would help your growth!
Just a quick tip for values I think he covers it in his video for sharpening the different kinds of pencils. If your able to shave off the wood from your pencil so about an inch of the graphite is exposed you can get more tonal strokes out and less lines! (you might already be doing it but I noticed the lines in the light side of the pear)
Aside from that I think that you did a good job focusing on shape, proportion and capturing the composition of the pear. Great job!
Greetings everyone! This is my first post on the proko platform! After watching the first 7 videos I took a pause to give this first project my best shot(Course of a few days). I still need to purchase some materials but I used what I had, luckily I had some old art supplies from a few years ago.
1. (IMAGE #1 Value) The first image is me seeing what 4 values I would be using for this exercise aside from the highlight value. The graphite pencils I have are pretty old so I don't know how that effected them or if they did but I definitely noticed that something was off. For example my 2b appeared to be darker than the 4b or 5b even though I applied the same amount of pressure for each tonal value. So I just put them all on one page and selected different values from light to dark. (Highlight = blank | Light Half Tone = 4H | Dark Halftone = B | Light Shadow = HB | Dark Shadow = 6B)
2. (IMAGE #2 Pears) I would definitely categorize myself as a beginner although I had some interest in art in the past so I watched a lot of videos but my grasp on the fundamentals and application needs work. The second image I drew all three pear references. (In the words of Proko the more you draw the better you'll get) I struggled a lot with the stem and getting accurate proportions. I also especially had a hard time differentiating between the light and dark halftones. Still getting used to used to drawing with my whole arm. Definitely had some trouble with drawing certain lines at certain angles. ALL CRITIQUE IS WELCOME PLEASE GO CRAZY!!! ID REALLY APPRECIATE IT!
3. (IMAGE #3 Portrait) Like I said I definitely think I would put myself in the Level 1 Category however in spirit of the more in more out philosophy I decided to give the portrait a try. I was on the fence about drawing it at first but one focus I have getting into this course is getting over that avoidance of making mistakes or being bad at first. So I decided to tell myself it will probably be bad anyways and it would only help me to make an attempt. I felt relatively confident in getting a general shape of the head however all that went away when trying to get the actual proportions of the face down especially the brow line and the nose. I felt zero confidence in the ears nose, lips and eyes but I gave my best shot at the anatomy. I did focus on Shapes, Values, and Edges like the exercise requested but it was hard to keep from hyper-fixating on the little things.
I also attached all the reference images just to document everything together. And to whoever reads my essay, THANKYOU!
P.S I could also use some advice on the best methods to upload clear work for revision. I had a hard time scanning the drawings and uploading them with good quality. I scanned with the notes app on my phone, converted the images from pdf to JPG online and then Uploaded them here but I noticed they look a little blurry.
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3d
Welcome, glad to have you here on Proko!
So even though your pencils are old, that shouldn't make them go bad or anything. It may just be the brand/quality that is affecting your output. It wouldn't hurt to try a different brand when you can! I do think the different pencils are somehow extremely similar in value. To me, they all appear as midtones kinda. That being said, for me it could also be the lighting.
On your pears, I think you've got a great start! My biggest notes would be to make sure you're breaking everything down into shapes and giving everything straight lines. Your midtone value (between the darkest and lightest values) doesn't have a defined shape. Work on getting your values to read more clearly in general, I have a little difficulty seeing all 5!
Good start on the portrait as well. You have a great mindset, it never hurts to try, you're getting that practice in! To note for your next attempt, make sure you're getting all 5 of your values in and don't be afraid the darkest value! Proko also has a value tool if you need help seeing the different values! https://www.proko.com/values
When uploading your images, the best and easiest thing I can suggest is just to try and take a good quality photo. It helps a lot to use natural lighting if you can because artificial lighting can make your values appear differently. When I've used the notes app to scan, it never works right for me. I'm assuming you don't have a printer at home with a flatbed scanner, that would be a great option if you do.
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3d
Nice job! Don't forget to try and break the values down into shapes using straight lines, and strive to put in 5 values! This took on Proko is super helpful https://www.proko.com/values. It can help to draw in a value box scale on your page, and you can refer to it as a kind of "key" for referencing your values.
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3d
Looking good! Don't forget to break your values down into shapes with straight lines :)
I dont have the right pencils but thought id give it a go anyway. Unsure if I have done this one right
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4d
Nice work! Your cross hatching looks good! However, for this project, the shading should be evenly filled in to purposefully designed shapes. If you outlined the areas you have hatched, and then filled them in, for example. For the shadow of the pear as well, I'd take another look at identifying the lighter shadow in the darkest shadow. Keep it up! You can definitely do a lot with less pencils, but it can certainly make it easier with more options. Keep it up!
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4d
An awesome first go! Don't be afraid to go dark on your pear! The shadow on the pear should be about as dark as the cast shadow. Your shapes and shading are nice and clean! Keep on drawing! :)
My attempt for the level 2 portrait assignment, the values on my level 1 assignment were not clearly distinguishable so I tried doing this one digitally. The initial sketch was made on paper over which I added the values on my Ipad.
Any advice or feedback would be much appreciated!
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4d
Very nice work on the proportions!
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4d
Nice job! You could push your dark values more on the pear and get those shadows darker. The shadows should be closer to the cast shadow underneath it! Keep it up! :)
second try, after watching the demo. Still need to work on a lot of things but i think it looks a little better.
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4d
The best part about a first try is that there are gonna be sooo many tries after, and after a while you'll be able to look back and see how far you've come! For this attempt, I'd recommend lightening up your halftone that surrounds the highlight, and darken the darkest shadow, and see about defining the darker halftone between the shadows and light. Also keep in mind as you shade to fill in consistent strokes in the same direction to keep it looking nice and clean. Keep it up and keep on drawing! :)
Hi! I've been visiting an art school as a kid looooong time ago, I have given up because I was a teenager with no responsibility and lost my passion. I tried to pick it back up a few times, but felt like I've lost all the joy from drawing. I kept approaching it not like fun, but a grind to a future artist profession or something.
So I'm not a complete beginner. I really hope to stick to the course and finish it. I started to pay more attention to the process than the results and don't hope to get any money from it, only joy.
Here's my pearl😄
