#5

Realistic Geometric Abstraction

Triple It Up...

This lesson blends 3 different styles into one illustration; Realism, Geometric Shapes and Abstraction.

Realism

A realistic drawing is an art style that focuses on making the subject/object/pieces look as "true-to-life" as possible. Accuracy and details are very important when trying to make a design in this style.

Choosing Your Design Idea

Step 1:

To begin, you have to develop an idea that will be drawn in a realistic style. Remember to think about the composition (the placement of all the objects in the sketch) in this stage. Will the main object be centered or pushed slightly off-center; do you want to use foreground, middle ground and background -or- just foreground and background; instead of drawing many objects would you like to "zoom in" to an area of one object? These are some questions to think about while you are developing your idea for the sketch.

Here are a few examples that some students have done in the past: a ship sailing on a wavy ocean, a large Ferris wheel at your favorite theme park, a garden full of blooming flowers and butterflies, an airplane flying in a sky full of clouds, a squirrel eating a peanut on a tree branch, a city skyline at night (with lights on in some of the building windows).

Example #1

Example #2

Geometric -VS- Organic Shapes

Geometric shapes are shapes made out of points and lines which include the triangle, square, rectangle, pentagon, hexagon...

Other geometric shapes can be made by using curves which include the circle and the ellipse.

Organic shapes are shapes that are irregular or uneven in appearance and tend to have a curvy look to them. Some examples are: a leaf, an outline of a human, a pear, a tree, clouds.

Geometric shapes are often man-made while organic shapes are often found in nature.

Changing Some Shapes of Your Design

Step 2:

Next you are going to find areas of your sketch that have organic shapes. Then, you will change the "organic" shapes into "geometric" shapes. You can experiment with different geometric shapes in order to get "the look" that you want.

For example:

You drew a tree with many leaves in a rainstorm. You are going to substitute (change) the "organic" leaf shape with "geometric" shapes. You might choose triangles, of different sizes to represent the organic leaves. Maybe triangles look to similar to leaves, so instead you draw small ellipses or circles to "alter/change" the look even more.

The small ellipses work out for the leaves because you decide to use sharp, stretched triangles to represent the raindrops; the contrast between the ellipses and triangles worked out perfectly!

Example #3

Example #4

Abstraction

Abstract art is a style of art in which elements of the design are not created with realistic accuracy. There are ranges to Abstract art; from minor abstraction (what we are doing with this lesson) to total abstraction (does not look like anything that is recognizable).

Step 3:

This step happens automatically once you finish Step 2! Your end result, is an illustration that morphed (went from) from a realistic piece to a piece of art that has abstract elements. It has become a hybrid of the two Art Styles (hybrid means, something that is made by combining two different elements, a mixture).

Step 4:

In this final step, you will add shading; it can be in color -or- in black and white. Feel free to have some fun when doing this step. You may want your illustration to have realistic color -or- you can play around with the color and use colors that you would not normally see in reality (this pushes the level of Abstraction a little further).