Crankshaft's Sketchbook

More tech tips: everything gets flatten near the horizon which makes it very hard to get perspective accurate for complex objects. Everything becomes a flat vertical or horizontal line. Be careful about placing anything that may require mirroring, measuring etc.

-Stay within the COV when placing ellipses or else they get impossible to plot.

Design sketches and one quick mech.



Learning to keep values consistent to ensure readability.



How different values affect cast shadows. Study of the halfway to black rule.



Avoid contrast creep.

Understanding value is a good thing, but sometimes it can be a bit overwhelming trying to practice everything at once. My suggestion is that you might want to try simple drawings. I mean, looking at your latest value diagram, it is really scary. I for one never think about any of these stuff when I paint... it feels like a chore with all that technical stuff.

Different types of lighting and how that affects values.



How design can affect readability and form.



Design sketches from imagination. I can draw most cars from imagination.



How contrast values can impair form and the 123 read.



Keep forms simple to ensure instant read.



How detail can impair form or instant readability.



Anatomy study and balance of weight, how to counter balance using the 3 main masses.

Thanks Yian! Someone mentioned to me that it look more like en engineering blue print than art. That made me chuckle but I now realized the mistakes in it. So yeah I'm doing value studies now.

My suggestion is not to do value study. You should try drawing more. If you can't get your drawings down correctly, there is very little point in know all the intricacy of values. Besides, like I said, your value study is way too advanced. If you fill your head with calculations and geometry, you will never draw well because drawing and painting has to be done naturally. This is probably why you have done very little work on organic forms and this is precisely the area you need to focus on - being able to draw with ease before you jump to getting the tiniest detail of value right.

For now, just know the five values: highlights, mid-tone, core-shadow, form-shadow, and cast-shadow, and you are good to go. All the other stuff is not going to help you right now.

Study of cylinders in sun light.



Design sketches.



Study of light falloff.



Improved that tower now that I understand values a bit more.

Thanks for the advice Yian! You have a very critical eye. My thinking:

-I'm following Scott Robertson's book How to render. If he's teaching it via his book and at Art center it must be important. Plus I can see a lot of this applying to my work and I'm learning lots.

-This is how I learn, by following a guide then coming with my own questions and answering them.

-The more fundamentals we know the easier it is to design and make decisions. Once I understand all this I'm definitely not going to apply it to the letter, especially to organic stuff.

-My quick design sketches will my main source of natural drawing. It would to be tedious to create nothing but personal pieces and apply my theory only there.

-We expect technical things to have precision and finesse unlike organic forms and hence they require a technical approach. This is probably why most people prefer organic stuff.

-My SB is misleading, I can do organic forms. It's the figure I can't do at all.

-I'll definitely apply your last bit of advice. That's very concise and to the point.

You're welcome. The reason most people are interested in organic stuff is because ships and locations are designed to serve people. This is why actors get paid way more than concept artist.

Updates.

Anatomy and casting shadows.



Strong local light of a cylinder.



Explanation of local light of a cylinder.



Weak local light of a cylinder.



Design sketches.