A) Introduction to Pastels

Pastels are a great medium to work with because they are in-between drawing mediums like pencil crayons or pencils and paint mediums like oils or acrylics.  The basic technique for pastels is the basic technique for most painting (except watercolors because that is just a whole different painting style).
LessonThe basic technique for pastels is to lay down a base color that is light and blend it together and into the paper.  Once you have an even base color you take a second color that is a tone of the original base color and blend it into the base color.  For example, create a skin color you would lay down a base color of the skin than take a brown and blend it in to the base as a tone.  Once you have the base and tone blended together, than you would use black to add in the shadows and blend it in.
At this point it is important to make note that colors have strengths.  For example, white is a weak hue that can be easily transformed by every other color.  However, black is a very strong color and can not be easily changed.  Therefore, we often start with the lighter hues like white and yellow.  Afterwards, we blend hues like red and blue into those lighter colors and leave black for the last color that we blend into a picture.  You will notice that if you start with black pastels, they easily smudge into every part of the picture.  So be careful and save the black pastels for the shadows right at the end.
Instruction

Assignment
Create this sample pastel drawing for yourself.  Follow the instructions in the video and try the activity a few times until you feel confident in create this pastel drawing of an eye.  Here are some student examples:

Complete this drawing.  It is worth 10 marks.

B) Archetypes & 2 minutes drawings

Introduction

Almost 100 years ago, a psychologist Carl Jung began to notice that his patients had similar characters showing up in their dreams.  He began to categorize the characters and called them archetypes.  Since then, people have used this idea of archetypes to identify and classify characters in all kinds of stories.  These characters that show up in dreams have similar characteristics.   These archetypes or characters have something that motivates them or that they love and something that they hate.  For example, the Innocent loves freedom and hates being punished.  Here is the list of the archetypes and what they love and hate:

1. The Innocent........free...........punish
2. The Orphan..........equal........alone
3. The Hero..............courage....weak
4. The Caregiver......love..........selfish
5. The Explorer........explore.....trapped
6. The Shadow.........revenge.....powerless
7. The Beloved........intimacy....unwanted
8. The Artist............vision.........plain
9. The Trickster.......live............bored
10. The Teacher.......truth..........fooled
11. The Mage..........dream........consequence
12. The Ruler..........power........chaos

Instruction

The activity for this lesson will be something called automatic drawing.  Automatic drawing was developed by Surrealist artists as a means by which to release their creativity locked in their subconcisous.  They would draw for a length of time without stopping.  These drawings would be random markings.  In our activity we are going to adopt the continuous model of automatic drawing, but we are going to focus on the archetypes for 2 minutes.

Activity

For 2 minutes continuously draw each archetypes.  Remember, what each archetype loves and hates.

Now you will have 12 drawings, but there is a last drawing you will randomly take two of the archetypes and merge them into one archetype.  For example, the Shadow Teacher is two archetypes.

Assignment

You will have 13 small drawings.  You will have one for each archetype and the last one will be an amalgamation of two.  This assignment will be worth 13 marks.

C) Visual Research Example & Drawing the Grid

September 20, 2015

Introduction

In the last lesson we created a number of drawings that could be thumbnails sketches for a larger art work.  So below, is my sketch for "The Innocent".  Today we are going to look for images that could help us to create our thumbnails.

Instruction

Go onto Pinterest and search for images that are similar to your thumbnails sketches.  For example, I looked on Pinterest for a girl holding a teddy bear.  Instead of finding a girl with a teddy bear, I found a girl holding a cloth doll.

I only wanted her head and shoulders in my thumbnail, with the doll/teddy bear being larger.  I used Photoshop to zoom into the girl and to put a grid onto the picture.

Activity

Use this grid picture of the girl and make a grid on a 15"x22" watercolor paper.  Use the following video to help you create your grid.

Assignment

Create your grid on the 15"x22" watercolor paper.  This assignment is worth 5 marks.

D) Drawing the Outline

Introduction

In the last lesson, you created the grid on your paper.  For this lesson,  you will take the first steps in completing the drawing part of this assignment.  Below is a video that shows how to do the outline for the picture from the previous lesson.  If you have not already download and printed a color version of the picture with the grid from last lesson, you will need it for this lesson.

Instruction

Activity

Using the information from the video, complete the outline of your drawing and show Mr. Koops before you move onto the next lesson on Drawing the Obvious.  Also copy down the definitions from the video on Positive Space and Negative Space.

Assignment

The outline drawing of your picture will be worth 5 marks.  Copy the definitions down in your journal will be worth 2 marks.

E) Drawing the Obvious

September 20, 2015

Introduction

In the last lesson, we created an outline of the girl.  We now can see that all her features belong inside that outline.

For this lesson, we are going to place the lines and shapes that we can easily see in the picture.  

Instruction

If you have not watched the video Drawing the Outline, you should click on the link and watch that video first.  The video below will not make much sense to you, if you have not see the previous two videos.

We are using the picture of the little girl from the post called Visual Research & Drawing the Grid.  By drawing the outline first, this allows me to see where the girl's features go.  Watch the video below to see how I start drawing the details that are obvious shapes and lines first.

Activity

Assignment

Once you have the pencil drawing completely done of the little girl at the end of the next video, show me and recieve 10 marks for having it done.  We will then spray your pencil drawing with a workable fixative so that you can do your pastel work overtop of your drawing.

F) Drawing the details

1. Introduction
This can be the hardest part of drawing is getting those details right.  My "cheat" for this is to outline the original picture with a pen or marker so that I can clearly see the lines to draw.

2. Activity

3. Assignment

Once you have the pencil drawing completely done of the little girl at the end of the next video, show me and recieve 10 marks for having it done.  We will then spray your pencil drawing with a workable fixative so that you can do your pastel work overtop of your drawing.

G) Limit Your Palette & Skin Tones

1.  Introduction
Once you have completed the drawing part of this project, you now can start the pastel work.  I like to start with the skin tones of the little girl.  A major tip I have for Pastel Drawing is LIMIT YOUR PALETTE.  In other words, only use two or three colors in an area.  For the skin tone of this drawing, I will use the peach pastel, the brown pastel, and the black pastel for shadows.  The peach will be a base color, the brown will be the shades of skin tone, and the black will be the dark shadows in the skin.

2. Instruction 

3. Activity
.....a) Lay in the base tone of peach and blend
.....b) LIGHTLY lay in the brown shade town into the peach and blend
.....c) LIGHTLY lay in the black for shadow and blend
.....d) Complete the skin colours for the face and two hands.  

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