Week11 - Musculature

This drawing was made while looking at about 7-8 reference photos of both live people and statues/sculptures. I used the statues references to get an idea of the volume and the 3D position of the parts of the body and the visible muscles and also for choosing the direction of the light. Life-photos came in handy because the shades of the muscles were ...real, so most of the shading around the belly, the neck and right under the neck were based on them.
I decided to have the arms pointing fairly upwards, bended in the elbows, so that the muscles there are more visible. Plus it slightly enhances the twisting of the muscles coming from under the shoulder and going through the bottom part of the arm, towards the inner side of the elbow.
Muscular torsion should also be apparent in the stomach muscles, coming from the top under the shoulders and going closer to the centre of the body downwards.
The drawing is based upon a female character because after doing a male one, I decided that in a female one, I can focus more on the flow of the muscles, and not their shape, like I tended to do on the male ones.
The initial plan was to make the shoulder line slightly rotated so that the left character shoulder is further away and so that the right arm comes closer. In general, I think I have achieved my desired effect, except for the right arm where more foreshortening may have been needed and the shade under the right shoulder.

Week 10 - Directed study on moving figures

Each of the sketches was done for about 10 seconds, sometimes a little more, sometimes a little less. I would usually start from the head going down the body. What i focused on was getting the beginning of the arms in the right place (I didn't have time to think about the shoulders), get them in the correct angle and proportion according to the head. The next most important thing in my mind was getting the curve of the back or the curve of the front correct (usually only one of them and the one that shows more curvature). Next would be the legs. In some cases the person would have already moved behind something by this time so half of the legs were mostly based on memory from a single (and last) peak.
I tried getting more diversity between the sketches by aiming at more interesting movements like people running(2nd from right, bottom), bending downwards, walking with their hands in their pockets or by holding something that locks their arms not to swing as usual.
What I don't like is the way the feet turned up. Usually I would spend no more than 2 seconds on them, so they're with a wrong perspective (2nd from right on the top for example). Plus, sometimes, I had to draw the entire legs by a very faint memory and then they didn't turn up to look good also(2nd from left, bottom)

Week 9 - Life drawing (proportion practice, not from life)

These are the drawings I did for proportional practice. Each character took different time, all were done with charcoal.
Most of the drawings were according to the "Idealistic" type of human body so width was slightly more than 2 head units for the males and about 2 units for the females. Shoulders start about 1/3 unit below the chin. Widest part of the body is 1 unit below the chin, that's where the shoulders have just ended and the arms start. The elbows come 1 unit lower, where the navel also is. That's also the thinnest part of the body. 1 head unit lower is where the mid-point of the body is supposed to be, the crotch reaching to about 1/3 lower than that(same with the bottom of the butt). At this point the body is almost as wide as it is on the shoulders level because of the hips, this is also where the wrists start. Top part of the legs continues until about 1 and 2/3 units lower, getting to a slightly thinner position than the waist. Then the knees start, taking around 1/3 of a unit. The legs continue by getting slightly wider around 1/2 unit lower and than getting as thin as the neck where the heels are, which is about 1/3 above the ground.
When drawing from the sides, the parts going furthest front are the chest/breasts, going slightly ahead of the face. The back of the body first bends outwards at the level of the chest, than inwards at the level of the waist, than backwards again for the but. After all, the furthest back-point is where the bottom part of the legs get wider, about 1/2 a unit below the knees. Front of the lower-legs ends up around the middle line of the character or even behind it.
In overal, the female body shows to have more fluid lines when compared to the male body. This is mostly visible in the top part of the arms, the waist and the entire legs.