Thursday, July 3, 2014

Week 26 of 365 Days of Art Challenge

The year is half over!! Can hardly believe it's July already! Time flies when you're having fun! I'm continuing my dragon studies from J. "Neon Dragon" Peffer's book, DragonArt Evolution: How to Draw Everything Dragon (for more info, see post from June 10, 2014) this week .

In Week 24 of the 365 Days of Art Challenge, I started working on dragon limbs. I've continued that study this week with bipedal dragons. These would be dragons that walk upright like t-rex and velociraptor dinosaurs.

Bipedal Dragon Arm - pencil on mixed-media paper.

Bipedal Dragon Leg - pencil on mixed-media paper.

This week's study was a challenge for me. I had a hard time with the arm because the shoulder is included in the sketch. As I was working on it, I kept wondering where the extra joint came from and had to keep reminding myself - it's the shoulder!! Lol! The hand seemed so large, too, until I remembered that velociraptors and t-rex have puny arms, but large hands with claws.  The leg was a bit easier to sketch - I had to think about a dog's paws to draw the foot elongated with only the ball of the foot touching the ground.


Bipedal Dragon - pencil on mixed-media paper. 

I am happy overall with the dragon.  However, I don't like the way the shoulder muscle attaches - how it connects to  both the puny arms and the wings. The neck also needs more work - it is rotated some, so I should have a 3/4 view of the head, instead of the side view.  That's the purpose of these studies - to learn and improve!

I struggle to get the musculature and proportions correct. This year of sketching weekly is a big help! I'm drawing more consistently and am able to critique my work more honestly.  I have all these thoughts and ideas, but need to continue to improve my technique to get them on paper (fabric, canvas, or whatever other medium takes my fancy for a particular project).


Thank you for stopping by! Please, leave a comment. I enjoy reading what you have to share.



2 comments:

  1. Ha ha. That arm does look like it has too many joints. But you did a fab job with it. I'm glad you are still sticking with me through the weekly sketches.

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    1. Thanks, Deb. The challenge is a big help in improving my drawing skills! So glad you started it.

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