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It’s great to get into my Hot Shots again!!!  If this is your first time here, this is where I share my tips on sketching! I call the tips-Hot Shots! This Hot Shot has a very long title-and that’s the only way I could put it!

I say this to art students and sometimes I get that ‘look-back’. They look back and say, “but I know that!” But it’s one thing to know it and it’s another thing, to make sure one practices what one knows!

So lets get into it but if you missed HOT SHOT 10 which focused on the structure of whatever you plan to sketch, click HERE

I still fall into the trap of sketching what I know about something than sketching entirely what I see to the best of my ability. It’s a battle and I keep doing my best to overcome!

 

HOT SHOT 11

 This one may sound really obvious but it’s not. From my experience I would always advice anyone to sketch what they see, even if it doesn’t make sense.  It would always end up looking like something else if you sketch what you know about something, rather than what you see. You have got to trust your eyes. It’s very important. Naturally we are not wired to see this way- but for the sketch inspiration to flow you have to change from what you know to what you see.

 

The Know and See Demo- This is the demo with a little more additions after the recording.

It’s a bit hard because we naturally don’t see this way. We store a lot of information and make assumptions about how things look. But when it comes to sketching from life, we just have to forget all we know and just go for what we see.

Sketch of Kev- There's no way you'll fully concentrate and put your whole life into a sketch, without the sketch breathing life back to you. There are times we can take liberties but even though we sketch, lets really throw ourselves into it with all our hearts!

REASONS WHY I FALL INTO THIS TRAP
Sometimes I just feel lazy to really concentrate and give what I am sketching, my best shot!
Sometimes I lack a bit of confidence in my ability and that’s not a good sign while sketching. You have got  to be confident when taking on anything- that it’s going to come out great!
It’s easy just for me to just scribble a few lines and jumble them up all in the name of sketching but the reality is, I am not really in the right frame of mind to take the sketch on.

Sketch of Kev in Progress-I added this picture so you could see right behind my head. It gives you a feel of the model and the sketch in progress. I place myself in such a position where almost only my eyes move back and forth and not my head. This helps a bit. But the key thing is not to make assumptions!

MY SOLUTION
One way I combat this or one of the ways I keep myself disciplined to do this is by making sure I don’t move my head too often but just my eyes.
It’s the eyes that need to see and ‘feel’ the object or subject and translate it to our brains, then our brains transfer the message to our hands. We must trust our eyes!

Sketch of Sean- This demanded full concentration, he wasn't very stable too. But whenever you determine and have the right mind-set to nail it in one go it helps-There was limited time but that helped me avoid or edit out the things that didn't really matter.

In this post, I  have shown a few sketches I have made with the models for you to see the resemblance. This resemblance only comes through serious concentration. You almost have to find a way of solving what you see, to simplest strokes of lines or shade so it looks like what you are sketching. You may not really take on figures. Your subject matter could be anything that interests you! But this same rule applies!

Sean with Sketch- This is another guy pleased with the sketch, I had a very short time to spend as he was in a hurry but that made me focus more on the essentials.

I think it was the great artist, Harley Brown that said, “Whenever you get into the conflict of drawing what you know against what you see, you need to trust your eyes and just draw what you see.”

Sketch of Chan- You can see the resemblance and how pleased he looks with the sketch-this is a result of sketching in full absorption, of what I saw in front of me and no more.

It was quite hard to do a perfect demo to illustrate this, but I managed to do the one of my son reading. I hope it made sense and I hope you gained something.

Sketch of Chan in Progress- Even when I am on the street, it has to be a full blooded concentration. There are going to be many distractions but none of the distractions must stop my full concentration on the subject. One has to give oneself totally to the model!

When next you are sketching or drawing- remember to ask yourself these questions as you go along: Does it really look like that? Have I made that up? Am I just rushing to complete this? Am fully absorbed in this drawing or am I just casually sketching?
Even though it’s a sketch, it’s going to look more convincing with 2 minutes of concentration than 5 minutes of casual looking.
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Filed under: Inspiration to sketch • Sketching Tips

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