A frustrating exercise for hand-eye coordination

[TonyBKK]

Anyone interested in trying this? It's easy to setup and doesn't take much time, but, atleast for me, it's very frustrating. I've been drawing from memory so long that this is really killing me. I wanna see someone who can do it right..

The exercise (from Creative Drawing, Smagula) :
Take a white drape\bedsheet and cover the back of chair with it. Arrange it so that the creases form sharp continuous lines. The lighting should be strong and unidirectional (window or a fluorescent lamp with a reflector) You should focus on drawing continuous line, not taking your eyes off the subject while your hand is moving. The book says it might help to imagine your pencil moving on the surface of the subject.

My problem is that I find it difficult to follow my eye with my hand, my eyes don't move continuosly in a line, they perpetually jump over boring areas (I find it easier to draw pictures as if arranging a puzzle, moving from detail to detail till the whole picture gradually gets it's shape. long, more or less straight lines are hard to get right).

Give it a try and see how well ur hand moves with your eyes.

Here's a pic of my setup, illustrating the obvious mis-proportionality* and discontinuity of my drawing:
http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z232/Tonybkk/ex.jpg

I don't like this at all, I guess that makes it a good exercise for me.. I think I'll try it again tonight after a few relaxing shots :}

[SgtDirtbag]

In Betty Edward's "Drawing on the right side of the brain" is a similar exercise called "Blind contour drawing".

You have to sit at an angle to your drawing table, to keep you from looking at your paper (if you're strong willed sit as usual at your table, but don't look ;) ).
Hold your non drawing hand extended, form a fist and start drawing every crease and wrinkle of it etc.

This should be a nice alternative if you're not in the mood to rearrange your room. ^^

I might post one of my tries here if you don't mind. : )

[TonyBKK]

So you draw the fist without ever looking at the paper? I can't wait to try this out :tihi: Please do post!

Btw I visited ur sketchbook. I'm in a similiar position u were before. I just started pursuing a BBA in marketing a while back, a shot in the dark if there ever was one.. Kudos on ur choise, u're an inspiration to all of us closet artists :)

[AdamDillabo]

blind contours will really help you start seeing things, but you HAVE TO GO SLOW. its about seeing the contour for its exact line and trying to recreate it. focus on the negative space to help you see it sometimes. but go slow! the biggest mistake that i have seen and used to do is i went way to fast. like they should take 15 mins or so.

[Seedling]

I filled a whole sketchbook with blind contours once. I now consider the exercise to be a waste of time.

[CamiloDragon]

i think blind contour drawing is a good exercise. it helps stretch out one's drawing habits... the drawings may look goofy but so what ... i think then when you get back into drawing from life that you allow yourself to look at there's an appreciation of studying the subject as much as if not more than your drawing itself.... which is a good thing, really. ..

[dose]

i think the blind contour is useful in two ways- as an introductory exercise to feeling the subject through the pencil (Nicolaides uses it in this way as part of a series of steps toward this goal), and learning to not be precious about your drawings and allowing yourself to make mistakes.

I think it's doubtful that you'd ever get to a point where you'd be so proficient that you could draw accurately this way (though legend has it Picasso could do this).

[Flipnastywebby]

I used to hate blind contour drawings because i was scolded for them actually looking like the figure
IM not saying they were by any means perportionate but, you could tell it was a head, an ear, a hand.....etc.
I personally think that they are fantastic excersises especially when going from pencil to wacom. If i do four blind contour drawings then paint on the computer my hand to screen coordination is like ten fold!

I also knew this artist who would work on graphics 360 marker paper and do like five or six of these B.C.D.s then combine all of them( you can see right through the paper) in to one drawing, picking and choosing the best forms and line, to find some amazing compositions out of them. the end result was really quite stunning!

[SgtDirtbag]

So you draw the fist without ever looking at the paper? I can't wait to try this out :tihi: Please do post!

Btw I visited ur sketchbook. I'm in a similiar position u were before. I just started pursuing a BBA in marketing a while back, a shot in the dark if there ever was one.. Kudos on ur choise, u're an inspiration to all of us closet artists :)
It's actually good to hear that some people found my rambling in my sketchbook useful. :)
Closet artists, haha, gotta remember that one. ;)

I couldn't find the BCDs I already did, but what the heck, they're useful so here are 10 blind contour drawings from today. (http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showpost.php?p=1319040&postcount=32)



I filled a whole sketchbook with blind contours once. I now consider the exercise to be a waste of time.
Why do you think they're a waste of time?
Just for you or in general?

I think they have a certain effect, but maybe that diminishes
when you get more and more "advanced", I dunno.

I atleast feel more concentrated after doing some BCDs
and I get more confident when putting down my lines.

Another sideffect (but I'm just speculating here) might be a little more speed
when doing life drawings in an uncontrolled environment
(as opposed to life drawing class where the subject sits still),
so that you can put down atleast some lines without having to
look back and forth between subject and sketchbook.

I'll fieldtest this one next week.

[Seedling]

Why do you think they're a waste of time?
Just for you or in general?


Blind contours may be useful as a shock tactic to break people out of tight drawing habits or not-enough-looking-at-the-subject habits, but I was already into loose drawing and lots of looking by the time I made the decision to try doing a whole bunch of blind contours. Instead of having some blind-contour epiphany, as I had expected, I found myself asking “why am I wasting perfectly good drawing time on this useless drill?” The best part of that sketchbook turned out to be the captions I wrote for the images.

[AdamDillabo]

my teacher is a big advocate of blind contours, it really makes you focus on all those little details and when your doing a real drawing you have more confidence to not obsess over ever single line.

[HunterKiller_]

I approve of blind contour drawing, personally.
I find a good exercise to practice really focusing on the subject.

I think it's also a great exercise for beginners to practice drawing what they see, rather than symbolizing.

[SgtDirtbag]

@Seedling: Thanks for the reply. : )
That's basically what I was expecting when I guessed that you're too advanced.

[Maxine Schacker]

Get yourself a copy of The Natural Way to Draw by Kimon Nicolaides. As far as I know he was the first to introduce blind contour as a beginning exercise.
This is an exercise that helps you train your eye,hand, and sense of touch to work together, as one. Its like doing scales when learning to play piano- its not a performance. Nicolaides description of how to approach this is so excellent that I won't repeat it all here. You can probably find the book second hand. Try going through all the scheduled exercises.

[SgtDirtbag]

Thanks for the hint Maxine, I'll look into that. : )