You Can Draw in 30 Days: The Fun, Easy Way to Learn to Draw in One Month or Less (16 page)

You can see that I really enjoyed myself with this supertall, curving table tower. Now take a look at a few student examples of this same exercise.

Do you have fifteen more minutes to try one of these monster table towers? Sure, go for it! Be sure to note your start time and your end time on your sketch page. I’m fairly certain you’ll end up spending several fifteen-to-thirty-minute chunks of your day doodling these wonderful wacky table towers. Not only are they terrific practice exercises to really nail down the specific skills of foreshortening, alignment, undershadow, shading, placement, size, and proportion; these table towers also are addictively fun to draw.

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n this lesson I want to build on this pivotal skill of drawing three-dimensional cubes. I want you to be able to have complete control of drawing the cube and the ability to manipulate it into many more advanced shapes. You will soon discover in later chapters that the ability to manipulate the cube will enable you to draw a house, a tree, a canyon, and even a human face. “How can you transform a boring cube into a tree or a human face?” you ask. I’ll tell you . . . later, but first . . .

 

 

 

1. Using guide dots (as you will for all the lessons of this book, right?), draw a wellpracticed sharp foreshortened square.

2. Lightly draw the sides down, and draw the middle line longer (sketch lightly as these are just the beginning shape-forming lines).

3. Draw the bottom of the cube using the lines you have already drawn as reference. For the purpose of review, go ahead and extend all of your direction NW and NE lines out as I have done here.

4. Draw the all-important guide dot just below the near corner. This guide dot determines the angle of your foreshortened second layer. If your guide dot is placed too low, it will distort the layer and throw the entire building out of alignment.

5. Using the lines you have already drawn for reference, draw the near edges of the second tier in directions NE and NW. When I am drawing my own illustrations, I still dart my eyes back and forth constantly between my first “primer” compass angles to each line angle I am adding. Think of how many times each minute you glance at your rearview mirror while driving. You do this without even thinking, because it is so deeply ingrained in your subconscious. This is exactly the level of comfort, ease, and habit I want you to form with this constant, vigilant reference to your drawing compass angles.

6. Look at your NE angle at the top foreshortened square of your box. Now, look at all the NE drawing compass direction arrows you drew in step 3. Now, take your pencil and trace over those direction lines lightly to embed the angle of the line into your hand memory. After a few of these rehearsal pencil strokes, quickly move your hand to the left of the cube and draw the direction NE line behind the corner. Repeat this same technique to draw the NW line on the other side to create the top of the second layer of the building. I do this rehearsal shadow drawing all the time, with every drawing I create. I am constantly referring back to my initial foreshortened square source, shadow drawing the angles again and again before dashing off the lines that build my drawings.

7. Complete the second layer of the building. Double-check your bottom lines against drawing compass direction arrows NW and NE.