Art History Self Portrait

The assignment was to pick a pick a picture of ourselves, which is the subject of our drawing, and edit it to be black and white. Then we cropped it to 8x11 and printed it out. We then gridded the photo and then the paper we were using. Using a viewfinder, we drew square by square, focusing on value. We had to make the picture look as much like the photo as possible, making sure there were no visible pencil lines. Graphite of varying value were used, and tortillions and erasers were used to darken or lighten the pencil.

I used the element of value in creating the whole picture. Since we were only allowed to use graphite, which created a black and white drawing, you needed to have the value to show the dark and light spots. I used line to help sketch out the subject of my drawing (myself), but then erased it to make it look more realistic. I used texture to make the chicken's feathers look more real and look different than the rest of me. I changed the lips and glasses several times. At first, the lips showed the line instead of shading. But I eventually figured out how to shade them and make them look apart of me. The glasses had to be adjusted several times too, to make them look proportional.

I took this picture in my barn, with one of my favorite chickens. She's usually one of the more photogenic chickens, and cooperates more. I've always loved chickens and drawing chickens, so I thought this would be a fun picture to draw. I'm proudest of the chicken. I think it looks the most realistic and I spent a lot of time trying to make it look right. I'm also proud of the shading on the face. Drawing faces has always been hard for me, so it was a good experience to draw my own face, focusing on it and taking my time. I really struggled in making my nose and lips in proportion and shading them in. I practiced drawing lips and eyes outside of class, and that helped me to get the lips and nose right on my drawing. If I could fix something, I would try to blend the colors more. Looking at my drawing, you can see where the individual boxes were, which kind of annoys me.