$125
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Full course
Learn the basics for how to draw a variety of clothing and drapery. Master the 7 basic folds and understand how fabric interacts with the human figure.
$125
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Educator, painter, and art historian. Author of Figure Drawing: Design and Invention and Gesture Drawing: Dynamic Movement and Form.
LESSON NOTES
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We are moving into flag folds, the final active fold type. This fold gives you the practical skills to show force and movement when fabric extends from a figure. I will show you how to set up your figure's armature first so you have a solid template to build on. You will learn how to use line weight to separate airy materials from heavy ones. We will focus on tension points and the action of the pose so you can avoid getting bogged down in unnecessary details. Finally, we will combine flag folds with the other five fold types and break down how to handle different clothing layers and textures.
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DOWNLOADS
drawing-flag-folds.mp4
433 MB
drawing-flag-folds-transcript-english.txt
16 kB
drawing-flag-folds-transcript-spanish.txt
17 kB
drawing-flag-folds-captions-english.srt
26 kB
drawing-flag-folds-captions-spanish.srt
28 kB
COMMENTS![]()
![Steven Michael Hampton]()
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Drawing dynamic fabric requires tracking force through the material.
Flag folds are the ultimate tool to show active movement. Anchoring cloth to a tension point lets you capture the exact direction of an action without getting lost in random wrinkles.
I think the piece I find trickiest with flag folds is the boundary between gesture, form, and design, particularly how much to simplify vs copy with something like this and then understanding the form it creates. I’ll definitely need more practice of these.
Man, Flag folds are just so easy to get lost in. They really need some careful consideration and editing. Finding solid analogues seems to help. Using a fans for the two sets of pipes on your references screen right arm, and a bird's wing for screen left helped keep me honest but I definitely felt the pull trying to design this one.
Something else that came to the fore is maintaining the models intensity and solidity without losing it to stiffness. She has such a bold posture, challenging and fierce and I love that but I had to redo my mannequin a couple times, using FORCE gesture to help keep the energy alive. Hey, did you all know that this drawing stuff is hard? lol. So much to keep in mind while at the same time, so much to let go of!
