Still Life Project
Fish Vine & compressed charcoal on paper August 2021 This Piece is a value study of a presumably old, not particularly well preserved, sticky, Piranha that to me at least, is reminiscent of a Slim Jim. This was my first time working with either vine or compressed charcoal so this piece also serves as a test and exploration of how this medium works. |
Process
First I rubbed a rod of vine charcoal over my paper to make the starting value of the paper slightly more toned down from the harsh white of the paper. Then I started out by mapping out the basic shapes and lines of my subject with a stick of vine charcoal. I usually press down quite hard whenever I draw so I quickly found out that vine charcoal was a much more brittle medium than I was used to. This revelation led me to be much more delicate when I laid down my lines, always careful to consider the spacing and proportions of the fish. |
Next I started experimenting with the compressed charcoal only gently applying it to the darkest areas of my subject. In this stage I was still more or less focusing on shape rather than value so my makings were just spacing indications. This point was where I spent more time brainstorming how the details and shadows should look so I spent less time physically drawing here. |
This stage was when I really started paying attention to value. Most of what you see in this picture is blocked out with chunks of vine charcoal, and just was observed by me plainly looking at it. However as I got farther into this process I was unhappy with how the values were too similar and the contrast of this piece wasn't shining through, so I decided to cover the background with compressed charcoal but that only made me less satisfied with the piece. Then I remembered a simple value mapping technique I use where you just squint at your subject and the darks appear more darks and the highlights become more light, so I used that technique to finish up my piece. |
Reflection
I went into this project with confidence in my ability to observe the lines in a subject and translate them down onto paper, however my confidence shrank a little as I realized this project and medium was selected to zero in on value and clean blending. When I first started rubbing the vine charcoal over my paper in order to give my background a more mid-toned look, the vine charcoal kept snapping on me, leaving me slightly agitated. Eventually, I got into the flow of using the vine charcoal for my basic sketch and found its quality of being easily erasable quite handy. When I started mapping out values I preferred to use the vine charcoal over most of the drawing using the compressed charcoal in the very darkest areas. As I got further into the process I grew unhappy because the contrast wasn't shining through as much as I intended to let it, and started going over everything with my compressed charcoal. My biggest mistake was drawing out all of the details before I had been satisfied with the general shadows and highlights, because when I went back over them with the compressed charcoal, charcoal dust was everywhere. The dust just muddied the overall shading quality of the piece (which can be observed based on the difference between my first picture of the drawing and my last picture of the drawing). If I were to redo this piece, or just if I were to work with charcoal again in general I would make sure to map out my values before my details, and to not let the compressed charcoal get everywhere. Overall I'm dissatisfied with the end result of my drawing, and prefer the look of the third process photo.