Head construction with features

Now I am practicing putting face features on a "ball". If your ellipses are at the right places adding features is easy.

Head construction: problem solved!

If you studied head construction by Andrew Loomis you'll understand the issue I'm talking about in this post.

On page 21 of Drawing the Heads and the Hands Loomis describes his method of constructing a head using analogy with a ball and a nail. It looks very simple and easy to understand...until you actually start constructing a head yourself.

My problem was with the "ear" line. I could not figure it out.I gave up and moved on.

A few days ago, I was reading a ConceptArt forum and came across the post called "How to correctly establish ellipses using Loomis head construction?" Needless to say how happy I was to discover that someone had asked my question. But the real treasure was ahead. There was that JohnB who shared his method of establishing ellipses. It was answer to my prayers! Thank you, JohnB!!!

Here is a link to the entire post: click here

JohnB has his own blog, interesting and very informative.

And this is John's tutorial I recreated:


1. Draw a cicle and mark the center (A)
2. Think about position of the face: is it looking up or down? turned to the left or right? Add a point (B) to where a "brow" cross will be
3. Connect A and B
4. Draw a brow line as per step 2
5. Add a line running through the center that is parallel to brow line
6. Add tick marks perpendicular to the line in step 5
7. Draw ellipse that starts and ends at tick marks you did in step 6 and passes brow point (B)
8. Draw a middle line (face line) that is tangent to the ellipse you just drew. This line determines the tilt of the face plane. This line and line you drew in step 4 are what Loomis calls "the all-important cross on the ball".
9. Draw a line that is parallel to the middle line from step 8. This is what Loomis refers to as a nail in the ball
10. Add tick marks that are perpendicular to the "nail" line
11. Draw ellipse that connects tick marks and goes through the brow point. This is a brow line.
12. Add tick marks that are perpendicular to AB line
13. Draw ellipse that connects the tick marks. This is "ear" line.

Inspiration: Matisse

I was in my twenties when I saw this painting at the State Hermitage Museum.
I still remember the impression it made on me: I felt as if I was standing in the middle of the circle engulfed in heat of the dancers moving around me. It was breathtaking!

iPhone doodles

iPhone doodles

To kill time I sometimes draw with my fingers on iPhone.

Proportions of the Male Head

From "Drawing The Head & Hands" by Andrew Loomis.

Value Studies

From all objects flowers were hardest to paint: changes in values are very subtle. Besides, I have not learned how to simplify yet.

Value studies

One sunny week-end I asked my sister to take pictures of me for tonal value studies.I noticed that values on photos appear a bit darker than in real life.
It is easier to study values in still life setting because you can observe value scale in a direct way.

Value scale blocks

I painted these blocks to use them in simple still life set ups to study values and how they change under different light conditions. To create 9 value scale is challenge on its own. I am still not happy with the results, but for the time being they are good enough because I am planning to use no more than 5 values in one set up.

Simple Value Plan (continued)

Today I was practicing with figures. I am trying to simplify as much as I can.

Value Plan

Simple Value Plan

For start I picked "Simple Value Plans" lesson, because I read a lot about how critical it is for a successful painting.

I watched the DVD and questions started popping up. Peggy decides to do a four value plan in her fist demo, but does not say why. Inside the disk "jacket" you can see examples of her value plans and notice that some are painted in just 3 values, while others are in 4. I wish Peggy explored this theme in the lession.



When I was doing the assignment, I noticed that sometimes you want to change the values of the background to improve design or get an effect you are after.

DVDs from Peggy Kroll Roberts

I bought a set of 6 DVDs from Peggy Kroll Roberts. I like her high key paintings and brushwork.

The DVDs are based on a single assignment.You work on one task at a time and that makes the difference.

I read recently Vilppu's "Drawing Manual" where he writes about the pace of learning and what his approach is based on. In the book Vilppu refers to Alexander Marchack who was commissioned by NASA in 1963 to write a book to explain how man reached that point to make it possible to land a moon. Marchack's research allowed him to make a conclusion that "one of the basic elements that distinguishes man from most other animals is his ability to think in sequence....in his discussion he talks about how impossible the task of sending a man to the moon is when considered as a whole, but taken as a series of small steps or problems, it becomes possible"

I could not agree more.

I am looking forward to doing the assignments.

Sketches from Samana

I had a great vacation in Samana, DR and spent almost all the time on the beach...

Drawing a head: basic shape

After unsuccessful attempt to memorize the ball at various angles (see previous post), I decided to move on.
As a next step I chose Andrew Loomis. The studies below are aimed to draw basic shape of the head turning it to sides and up and down. I call it 'first cycle of evolution of the ball'.

Planes of the head. Part 2

John Asaro instructs to rotate the ball and draw it at all angles until you can draw it correctly from memory. You do not realize the difference it makes when you actually start drawing from memory. I've got so many questions popped up in my mind when attempted to draw it without looking at the ball. It made me think and analyze how lines change and move. I am learning tons!






P.S. September 20, 2010. I have discovered a way of drawing a ball at all possible angles without having to memorize it. You just construct it using Andrew Loomis's method. See this post

Planes of the head. Part 1

I started my studies with this book by Asaro:


In the book Asaro instructs students to take a ball about 3 inches in diameter, draw lines, glue ears and a nose. The ball is then used to practice drawing it at different angles (see picture below).



This is the ball I made. The mouth line was first drawn too high. I had to redraw it.

John Asaro

This is my first post about artists that inspire me most and I want to dedicate it to John Asaro. When I came across his recent paintings of female figures I instantly fell in love with them. After 50 year depression John Asaro decided to paint what he always wanted to: female figure. His work is stunning and I believe this happens when you follow your heart.

The artist's website

Back to basics

I've decided to put on hold oil painting for some time and go back to basics from academic point of view. I never attended any art school and whenever I paint or draw I always feel "shaky ground" under my feet because of that. May be lack of formal training is not an issue with any other artist, but it's definitely a problem for me. So it is time to go back and build a solid foundation in a traditional way - learn how to draw first and then paint.

There tons of books on drawing available today. Thanks to the Internet you can learn from other people what worked best for them and why.
This is my list of selected books to start with:

- John Asaro: Planes of the Head
- Andrew Loomis: Drawing the Head and Hands
- Andrew Loomis: Figure Drawing for All It's Worth

Note: you can download these books in PDF files for free or any donated amount here

Some old stuff

...from the book by Andrew Loomis.