Gesture Sketches & Clay Moquette

Gesture Drawings Reflection Questions

Degree of Exploration (Stretch and Explore)

–      How well do your drawings capture the gesture of the figure? 

My drawings capture the gesture of this figure because you can see there is a movement being performed, but it isn't obvious what movement it is, giving it an abstractness. I think I captured the gesture pretty well. My original gesture was someone standing up with their arms raised up above their head, and I think that movement can be deciphered from looking at it carefully without it being too obvious or too oblivious.

–      How thoroughly did you explore the process of simplifying and “abstracting” the gestures in order to best capture your intended form?

I carefully looked at the gesture and deciphered ways to involve the negative into it in an abstract way. I made sure the piece wasn't too figurative, but at the same time wasn't too abstract that no one could tell what it was supposed to be.

-      In what ways have your intentions change over the course of your project so far?  What opportunities or occurrences led to these changes?

My intentions have changed over the course of the project so far because I started out with my drawing being more on the abstract side, but then as I made my clay moquette, I ventured more to give the sculpture more dimension and some more figurative qualities so there was a better balance of the two. The opportunity that led to this change was the building and molding of the clay moquette. If we hadn't done that, I wouldn't have been able to see that there was more that needed to be done in my sculpture. 

My container is a pint sized milk carton. It is a good size for my sculpture because my clay moquette is on the smaller side, and that is the way I like it.

Movement Sketches

Final Value Post

Reflection Questions:
I Stretched myself to get good borders on my pictures and I explored different line qualities. I engaged in the class by using up all time available to work on my projects and listen to any advice or critique given. I persisted through the project by keeping with it even throughout multiple mistakes. That I why I have many pencil marks that could not be erased. My persistance and engagement in these in these habits pushed me further to resolve my scales and the way my lines lined up. Mr O. taught me how to use your pencil and an angle and hold it up to see what angle you should draw your shape at. I had to redo the majority of my picture because my lines were off their correct angles, but I persisted through it and engaged in the comments Mr. O gave me to improve my drawing. My habits pushed me because I learned I had to develop new ones, like shading all the object to the way they appear. The photo paper felt more comfortable to me because I like the way that you can do another print so easily if you do mess up. It puts more pressure on me to take my time and make it perfect because I know you can't go back. The paper and pencil allowed me more expression because you can choose the pencil you use, the pencil lines, the pencil pressure, the way you draw objects, etc. You can basically do whatever you want on the paper with the pencil, when however with the photo paper you can only print on there the picture that you took. So you still have some expression with the pictures you take, but not nearly as much as you can with the pencil and paper. In the future, I will take my time more to improve my lines and line quality on the paper. For the darkroom and photo paper, I will also take my time to put it the picture in focus.

Final Value Drawing

In-Process Photography Reflection & Image

Reflection:

1. I developed craft with this assignment by learning how much of a difference changing the time and the apperture could make on the single photograph. I had no idea that you could even change the apperture or that the time would make a difference in these photographs! I also learned how to opperate the enlarger by myself. 

2. I used the enlarger, a manual camera, 5"x7" photo paper, film, the developer, fixer, stop bath, permawash, and water wash in my process of printing pictures. I learned all the times the print needs to sit in each for, and it has become almost natural by now. A method I used was adding constant movement to the developer and permawash to develop it fully and get the best outcome.

3. I had some trouble with focusing my image at first. I ended up doing about 6 test strips before I could move onto the bigger 5x7 image. My prints would always end up blurry. I also had trouble with the light, and I had to adjust by aperture 2 different times than the original setting. Finally, I didn't have the right amount of time on my timer, so I had to change that a few times as well. All in all, I ended up with a good final photo!

4. I solved these problems by opening the aperture more to let more light in, changing the timer to 15 seconds instead of the initial amount of time, and focusing my image as much as possible. My plate thing that I laid the photo paper on had some marks on it, so sometimes it was hard to see if the image was in focus or not. I solved this by shining the image and focusing it on a part of the plate with no marks or scratches on it.

In-Process Drawing Reflection & Image

Reflection:
1. I developed a skill of shading in this assignment. I learned how to turn a view of something into a drawing, and how to exhibit extreme shading and color difference. Also, I learned how to line things up and have everything in the right scale when drawing.
2. A drawing board, pencils, a light, the installation, and a paper were essential for this project thus far. The light was especially important because it allowed us to get extreme shadows on our objects. Some methods I used in my drawing was shading and cross hatching. Those helped me a lot develop my shades and light and show the relationship between objects.
3. A problem that emerged in this so far is that I had trouble getting my rubix cube lined up with everything. I had trouble getting the lines on it parallel and everything straight. Mr. O helped me a lot with it by telling me a trick, which is to angle your pencil the way the line is and draw it from that point of view instead of drawing it by estimating the angle.
4. I solved this problem by using the trick Mr. O taught me by angling my pencil to really see the angle by itself without all the other distracting lines.