Dive right into... Shading?

Okay, so today I'm going to try to make light of this post because next to our attempts at drawing faces I'd say this assignment made me laugh the most afterwards. (Drawing faces still holds onto its title as drawings that I could not do with out laughing endlessly) But also because, thats the type of person I am and I want to see if that can translate to a blog..

So on Tuesday we were instructed to actually practice various techniques for shading with some still lifes (is that even the proper usage should it be lives??). Now granted at the time I was very frustrated and saw absolutely nothing good in any of the following drawings. Now that I've had some time to not look at them and even forget that they existed I dont HATE them, granted I dont exactly think their fantastic but I do see what the intention was. I now understand why they just as the post suggested, threw us into the pool with out our floaties so to speak. Now 2 of these 3 are actually an attempt at the same scene, that being a still life made up of a tripod, a box and a hodgepodge of other items including a shagrug, although that one disappeared quickly.

This paticular drawing was done with a combination of smudging and a diagonal method, not really sure how to describe it. My favorite part of it is the fact that I got the shadow the tripod left on the box to actually look abit like I saw it. And while something went horribly wrong with the foam thing and the clock seems to just be radiating light from an unknown source I am still glad I tried it.

Tried smudge again and it was going well until those really dark areas inside, but I'm not lying those darker areas were there! If you could read my mind right now it'd be asking you to move on to the next drawing...

Oh yes! now this one is a... its a umm, a teenagers cane? (someone actually said it looked like some sort of modern cane). Suzanne said a collapsible toothpick and while both are excellent ideas for future products and good guesses, I'm afraid that it is just a lonely leg of a tripod and then that same leg blown up to Enormous size. This was done with the diagonal hatching method Jake showed us and my only complaint with it is just the fact that not all the lines are the same size but I guess thats more my fault than his...

So did I drown or triumphantly doggy paddle my way to the side, I dont know, but I'd say either way I'm off to some sort of start, I know I'll be playing with this when the sudden urge to draw strikes again later..

Cheers!