Attempt to copy demo

My ears practice with an apple pencil

Drawing from following the demo. I find when I follow the demo, I lose sight of the reference and the basic shapes, which results in some areas that aren't clear or as defined as maybe they would be if I focused directly on reference. On other assignments, I've tended to like my own drawings from reference vs the outcome of following along. Regardless, relatively happy with this after attempting to fix a couple areas. Will do some more studies over the next couple days. I feel like I'm pretty self aware on this one, but, as always, open to feed back if anyone has thoughts for me.

After doing the portrait of Nicolai yesterday, I decided to revisit the lessons of the features. I had done them before, but never in charcoal. I had either done them digitally, or in another medium I felt a bit more comfortable in. Upon reflection, I think that was a mistake, however an understandable one. It was a mistake because getting out of our comfort zones is precisely where real learning occurs. We should lean into that feeling of being on artistic shaky ground. It was understandable because it wasn't just a lack of experience in drawing with charcoal. There were more fundamental skills I was missing that was going to make drawing with charcoal (or more precisely a charcoal pencil) endlessly frustrating. The root problem is that I didn't know how to properly sharpen a pencil. Now this is embarrassing to admit in that I've been a professional artist for decades, but when you look closer it's easy to see how such a glaring flaw in my skills could arise. Namely, I work primarily in ink or digitally. I'm more of a cartoonist than a fine artist. While this experience helps me with some fine art skills--like structure and gesture--it doesn't help me with others--like drawing with charcoal and controlling edges. Even an experienced artist needs to shore up fundamental skills when attempting something completely new. What has been helping me is the Drawing Basics Course. In that course, Stan is making the assumption that we're all at level zero. And while I'm certainly not at level zero for everything Stan is teaching in that course, it's helping me find the cracks in my foundation so that I can shore them up. I mean, I'm fifty-one and I just learned how to properly sharpen a pencil. The thing about fundamental skills is that they get used all the time. Any improvement in your foundation will ripple through the rest of your art because it gets used over and over again. It's improved my line quality as well as my enjoyment of drawing generally. Before, I didn't care about the pencil stage. It would all get erased anyway when I brushed in the ink. Now, I love the pencil stage and am am finding it immensely satisfying. The Drawing Basics Course is also making the Portrait Course more useful to me. I suspect this would be true for a lot of us. We all have different cracks in our foundations, but Stan is being very thorough in his coverage of the basics. Whatever our fundamental struggles, the Drawing Basics Course is a good place to address and conquer them. Anyway, for what it's worth, I thought I'd put it out there why I think the Drawing Basics Course is one we would all benefit from.

My attempt to draw an ear following the video. I had some trouble with the shadow mapping. I was lost because there was a lot of lines for the shadows. Anyway, after a lot of time, this is the result. First time drawing an ear with that much detail, so I guess it's not too bad.

drawalong following the video

Hey Stan thanks for the lesson its was a great refresher here is my submission! Thanks Will

Great lesson and shapes are well explained. My attempt

Great lesson! A couple of attempts from me any feedback appreciated. I think I'm struggling with defining the forms still looks a bit flat I think.

My attempt of an ear, thank you for great lesson.

Great lesson! This session's focus on shading and shape helped it click that the focus is often to think about the planes of a 3d object. Here's an ear. Would love any and all feedback :)

Ears!!! The first is the Proko assignment; the other two, I did from pics online. Any feedback is welcome.

2021/2/26. Hi everyone. Ear again. maybe e little bit better than the one I posted few days ago... I hope.

Hi everyone. Here's my today's assignment for this section. Thanks for any comment or advice. Goodnight.

Ear assignment. Feed back requested on composition, values and gradients.