Drawing a Complex Shape
4yr
@figaro_draws
Hello Everyone!
I'm struggling with drawing the flower in the image below. I've tried drawing a circle and adding shapes, but my drawing ends up looking flat instead of 3D. How should I approach drawing this object so that it has more dimension?
Hey !
I find it easier for me to imagine the shapes as lines and triangles and make a more "mathematical" block-out. I made a step-by-step guide of how I would approach this photo. If there's something that isn't clear or anything, don't hesitate ! :) Have a good evening
Hello Urszula! Thank you, so much for this. I sincerely appreciate your detailed explanation and it has certainly helped me with the approach and execution. For some reason, I had forgotten about the use of lines, arcs, and angles and how they can help me map out the image. I'll be working on this throughout the week and I'm eager to see the results!
Simplify the idea. It's similar to a mace: a ball with cones or cylinders coming out. Imagine the "skeleton" of the flower. The center of it is just a dot, and there are lines radiating out from that dot, which creates a spherical shape. Now, each of these lines is the center of a cylinder, so we draw cylinders around each of the lines. Some cylinders will be more of a side view, and others will be head-on. Look for where the cylinders attach to the form, and put ellipses on the surface on the sphere
Hello Peter! Ah yes! Cylinders. This makes sense. I hadn't really considered the shape of the petals and was focusing too much on the contours. Thank you, for the reminder of using simple shapes! I also neglected to think of the circle as a sphere, which was contributing to the rather flat appearance. Thank you, for your advice, I really appreciate your explanation!
I would recommend to try to draw this without lines but only with colors or even only in grey values in blocks and shades. I myself found that I block myself when I try to shape something complicated with lines. I think if you practice to see how the values and colors shape a thing you understand intuitively how to draw 3d objects in 2d.
Often you KNOW something is e.g. long and thin like an arm and you can't ignore that even if you draw a pointed hand that nearly totally covers the arm (like here some of the cones are not cones as all in 2d, looking from the front the edges form ovals).
You have to find a way to trick your brain and aproach the foms in a new way.
And practice drawing basic forms in different rotations. there are tons of practices like this, just browse the courses/videos and experiment with easier objects :).
I think it's quite hard at any early stage to make something look 3d. You could try making sure some of your contours overlap, but I think a lot of it will be down to the light and shade you add later. I would just keep going for now!
Hi figaro,
I can share how I approach such things.
I usually use a Copic to lay a basic structure( a sphere in this case for the head of the flower and then I add the elements like leaves and petals.
This very basic layin acts as a guide for me as I usually use a fine liner to ink it.
I usually focus on the bigger shapes ignoring all the details at this point. I try and draw the shape of petals and other elements focusing almost entire on their contour.
After than what I believe adds the most 3D look to it are contours.
You can be done here if you are practising forms initially otherwise you can go ahead and add the shadows , just separating dark from light.
I will try to upload an example whenever I can till then you can let me know if you found this useful.
Feel free to ask me if you didn’t understand something.
