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I Teach Creatives
comments 117
Here we are distilling the wisdom of this lesson into blobs. I experimented further with the blob approach, starting by dividing the blob shape into a black and white side to better understand its orientation. It's been fun trying to connect the perspective knowledge from earlier to this exercise!
I created some progress charts to illustrate my thought process—maybe they'll be helpful for you!
LESSON NOTES
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In this lesson, you'll learn a practical approach to drawing in perspective by starting with simple shapes—blobs—instead of relying on vanishing points and rulers. You'll discover how to transform these blobs into forms by adding lines and corners. The lesson dives into how convex and concave curves create the illusion of depth, helping you train your perception and improve your drawing skills. By practicing these techniques, you'll advance in constructing three-dimensional objects confidently.
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The blob approach simplifies drawing form by starting with loose shapes, building depth, and refining perspective.
I tried to warmup with these blobs, they feel so free and give confidence after you dance with them on the paper, actually I used to draw boxes to start my warmup for the day, but this is so much fun, gives me easier persuasion of what I want to be far or close.
Did some blob perspective drawings, due to bad lighting it might be a bit hard to see. Also did some warm-up lines on the same page as the book drawings.
Decided to do the blob approach after the last assignment, That warning at the start made me laugh out loud. Really would have helped me to watch this before doing the last assignment.
This is a much faster approach to drawing boxes than I'm used to! In a matter of a day I was able to draw 2 pages worth, where it would have taken me much longer if I tried to estimate the vanishing points for each and every box. The note of just letting the lines fly for now really stops me from overthinking; I'm really thankful for that.
On the second one I wanted to test myself and see if I could put multiple forms in the same space near eachother. Wasn't focused on making things right anatomically or making any interesting shapes really, just wanted to play around with what I can do with the blob approach and see if I can get the beginnings of stacking form on top of eachother. Neat stuff!
A bunch of boxes, some from blobs, others not.
While it wasn't easy, last year's box exercises from the Proko Basics course helped. Nothing impressive, but it wasn't as challenging as the first time around. I'm hoping this means some improvement, however slow. I so badly want to improve my perspective skills so I can observe and draw forms better.
Until then, one box at a time!
One thing I've struggled with the blob approach is that when I start with blobs, my contour lines are off. As mentioned by someone else in the comments, contours are acutally ellipses..and I've realized that I don't really know how to draw them in perspective according to the kind of box I'm picturing. So drawing boxes straight-up (and not from blobs) feels easier to me. Is this something that I'll get better at once we learn ellipses? Any feedback would be appreciated! Thanks
I tried the blob approach to drawing objects in front of me. The blob isn't that visible but it's there, I swear. The first object is a jar of rusk, the other 2 may be me getting slightly ahead of this course and myself and drawing 2 vehicles at an automobile exhibition I visited.
Hi, these look amazing! I love how you drew from life :)
I'm curious - did you sketch on location or took a photo and drew from it?
Blocky fingers leave me at more angles than I'd have bothered with just bobbing
Learning the ellipse on the blob from the previous video is meant to be a slice/cutoff and not just a contour helps so much. So do the tips about convex edge pointing away and the arrow.
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1yr
Thank you Michelle – I feel the same way: a little key to big form.
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1yr
Thanks for showing, Donna!
Here is my work on this. I struggle with perspective a lot and I was really hoping that this course would help me. I still am struggling with it all, I cant seem to draw a box correctly at all let alone rotate it. I have probably drawn thousands of boxes in an attempt to learn different aspects of it all. what do you suggest I do going forward? Thanks
So while this course is not there yet, it is important to mind your own feelings, if your personal goal and what would make you happy right now is to draw a box correctly, then I highly recommend watching some drawabox videos, maybe following the lessons there too. It's good to look at multiple sources and explanations for things either way, hearing teachers say it in different ways makes the image more complete
Example of drawabox tutorial: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=evGWbjDI6xQ&ab_channel=Uncomfortable
I hope I'm allowed to share this here and it's not disrespectful 🙏
@Anthony DeGennaro
First of all, your boxes look good Wso far! One small adjustment I noticed is some inconsistency in determining which side of the box is closer and which is further away from you.
You can think about the three main directions in which the cube points, represented by its sides. For small objects like a dice or a toaster, we can simplify and assume the lines in the same direction are parallel. However, this isn’t entirely true—when dealing with larger objects, those lines will eventually converge at vanishing points.
To make the concept of these three directions more apparent, I came up with an overly detailed way to visualize it. Imagine a sphere inside the cube with three arrows extending in different directions. These arrows can act as guiding lines to help you draw parallel lines in the same direction.
That said, I wouldn’t recommend constructing a cube this way every time you draw. Once you get comfortable with thinking in these three directions, you’ll be able to eyeball it more confidently. Still, it might be helpful to color-code the sides of a cube once or twice to reinforce this mental exercise.
I know how frustrating it can feel to be stuck on a learning plateau and not see the progress you’re aiming for. Hopefully, this explanation was helpful in some way! Keep going—you’re on the right track!
I think this lesson is more about using blobs as a technique to see our drawings in 3D, and less about perfect box technique. But with that said, this is really cool, @Andreas Kra , so thanks for sharing!
@Sawyer Yes, I think you’re absolutely right. I gave it a shot on my own, and I really appreciate if it was helpful—thanks!
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1yr
Well, first of all Anthony, who said anything about drawing a box correctly, let alone rotating it? We have that coming up much later, and with great rigor.
This is about drawing a box, not correctly, but with some sense of dimension that you have achieved here; and in different, even random, positions, nothing like precise rotations.
This is play! I suggest you keep up the simple sculpting. If you're not learning what you hope to learn, you can design your own custom challenges, or just follow along here. We are headed there.
I’m having a bit of a tough time wrapping my head around how to correctly implement the blobs in 3D. It’s a bit confusing to me when I try to vaguely align the square contour lines with the blob. Please help me with what I am Obviously missing.
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1yr
You're getting it just fine. When you have a page of blocks in all these positions, they must have come from somewhere, and in this case, they came from your mind on blobs.
The confusion of "aligning" the straight with the curved lines is advanced. Don't worry about it yet. For now, it is to get you guessing, sensitizing your awareness of basic directions.
I cant tell if its because this is new to me, or something else, but the blob seems to only confuse me instead of guide me. I appear to be getting better results by just going right to the boxy form.
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1yr
In that case do. The blob is a way to get started. If you don't need a blob and go to the box, great!
Thank you for the blob approach. I don’t know how well I did, but I really had fun.
Not sure that I understand this lesson to be honest. In particular, the box around the blob stuff. Is it to better visualize its form? Because of my lack of understanding, I felt like I wasn't doing much, but drawing the blobs and giving them form was pretty fun, so thats what I messed around with.
My big problem is that I only seem to succeed at this when I'm mindlessly doodling. When I make an arbitrary blob, and add a top plane, side plane and be sure that the contour lines match, I can manage to make a cuboid form.... most of the time. But! When I try to do anything with intention like making something in proportion or wanting to dictate the orientation in a specific way... it goes horribly, horribly wrong.
So I guess my question is, should I keep mindlessly doodling and take the win? Or do I need to switch my brain to 'figure it out mode' even though it doesn't feel like I'm making much progress on that front. Can mindlessly doodling lead to a breakthrough?
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1yr
Mindless doodling is good as a counterpoint to the try-hard stuff. And the try-hard stuff going wrong is nothing new. Work both ways, and congratulations on your awareness of the difference.
I love you, Marshall!
I've watched all the Draftsmen episodes several times over and you have made a positive difference in my life. Definitely one of the coolest people I know. :)
Love both you and Stan and look forward to everything you put out in the world!
my god did I go through an existential crisis during this, I would have a long speech about them but I don't think it's needed, the TLDR is that not practicing blobs hit me like a truck
ah and at the end i thought that all those contours looked like armor plating so I tried to do some of that but I'm not sure how relevant that actually was
My 2nd attempt with drawings objects from blobs in perspective.
I tried slightly harder objects as I did my calculator from a few different angles and then my fan. The fan was kinda difficult and honestly just looks weird but I'm not sure if it's because I didn't put enough detail for it to "look right" or just a weird angle.
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1yr
Not a problem of lack of detail, but a fan is advanced. To simplify, you can think of it as a slice of cylinder - a can. But for this project, boxy is best.
