This drawing was my attempt to draw a dried up grasshopper found in the classroom.The intention was to practice using charcoal as well as drawing from a perspective.
Process
- I started with toning the paper by rubbing vine charcoal all over the paper like instructed. Looking at the grasshopper I choose a more close up angle of the grasshopper with its body filling most of the paper.Then I started with a vine charcoal sketch of the grasshopper I didn't have much time to do this so I did the most basic outline of the grasshopper.
Here is when I started using the compressed charcoal to make more permanent lines and make shadows and depth by smearing the compressed charcoal. I added more details on the body by adding lines to show the ridges on the outside of the body. The grasshopper also had dark dots on back so I started adding them in here with the compressed charcoal. I also added shadow to the to the face and eyes not yet using any highlight. There is also this crack on the side of the exoskeleton of the grasshopper I was referencing so I added it in here.
Here I added shading to the ground to created shadow so its not floating in a void it also gives a bit of contrast. I added highlight using a eraser make the eyes pop out more. I also added highlight to the body near where parts of the exoskeleton meet. Looking back I should have added more highlight to the body. The legs had more shading added to them. Under the grasshopper there are more sections and I added them here using the eraser. This is the finished drawing.
Reflection
Looking back at this project I don't like a lot of aspects of it. What was challenging for me was the head of the grasshopper, specifically it eyes and face shape looks wonky and a bit cartoonist, not as realistic as I wanted. Also the grasshopper was a bit shiny which I had trouble putting here. Using charcoal does have its advantages with the vine charcoal being easy to erase by just smearing it with your hand and, because it easy to erase you don't need to remove the bottom sketch when you start using the compress charcoal which I really like. Other advantages is that charcoal spreads easily making it easier to shade and depending on what charcoal you get you can turn it sideways and cover a large area, or you can just use one end make thinner marks. Some of the disadvantageous was also how easily vine charcoal eases because it erases easily, one wrong move, and you have erased part of your piece. There also a disadvantage to compressed Charcoal being that its very hard to erase and get completely off your paper. Your also limited by the fact that you can mostly only draw in grayscale with charcoals if you want to use color you have to use chalk or some other material. The work I made I do like how some of the shading and shadows turnout but overall I personally don't like the piece mostly its the head the eyes don't look right and the stubs were the antenna on were look like weird nostrils. I also feel Like I should have shaded the rest of the head darker. I learned from this process was how to use the charcoals to bend and shade. I also learned to spend more time on shape since I really dislike how I did the head and spending more time would have helped.