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Let me show you how to draw in proportion
with this proportional divider.
I have a teacup sitting on this table in my shadow box.
I'm about 4 feet (1.2m) away from it.
You want to be as close as possible without
being underneath the still life light.
You need to be out here, under the studio light.
I'm about 4 feet away.
I have this yarn hanging down,
and the yarn is exactly in the spot,
where that if my chair is in my comfortable spot
over the tape on the floor — I've already determined all of this —
this is where I want to be sitting when I'm painting,
and when I'm looking at my still life.
So, I've already positioned my chair
perfectly on the floor, relative to my canvas,
and once I've done that, and I've put a piece of tape
underneath the center of it,
then the next thing is,
with my arms straight and my shoulders square,
this is where the yarn is.
Position yourself in your chair first,
hold your arm out,
and that will determine where this yarn should hang.
So, there it is. It's exactly...
If my arm is straight, it lines up exactly right.
That's where I'm going to take all my measurements from.
The screw is in the right hole.
Before you even start penciling,
you have to determine where this screw is going to go,
and I've got it there so it will magnify my
cup a certain amount.
Which if I measure the height of my cup like that,
it gives me a cup that's going to be about that big on my canvas.
Which is bigger than life-size, but that's OK.
I like to be a little bigger than life-size.
But you could pencil it any size you want.
That's just up to you, for you to determine.
I tend to paint things a little bit larger than life-size,
because it's easier.
So, I've figured out where this screw is.
I'm happy with that.
I'm happy with the amount of magnification that I'm getting.
Now, I'm going to measure
the height of my silver cup.
And I don't know where I want to position it on the canvas just yet.
The very first thing is to just get some sort of measurement.
Then, I can use that to position it.
These first measurements are always the most important.
Whenever you start a still life,
especially if it's a big, complicated still life,
pick the largest, most significant object first,
and draw that, and make sure you get that right,
because the rest of your measurements will relate to that.
You'll see what I mean as we go along.
So, I'm going to take my time
and really go slow on this first one.
Make real sure that this is lined just perfectly
with my yarn, and my shoulders are square.
If you ever need to be really, really accurate,
you can always use something to support yourself.
This is really just for these first ones.
Once I get the height of this silver cup,
and the width of it, then rest will fall into place.
So, when you first start your still life,
make sure those first measurements are just perfect.
I'm just using this to support my hand,
making sure I'm still
square shoulders, straight arm,
lined up with the yarn,
and I'm going to take a perfect measurement
on the height.
This really helps if you can steady it.
And I just do it for those first ones.
OK. That is just perfect.
That is my height,
and I'm going to just go ahead and position this
up or down, wherever I want to put it.
Put it more or less in the middle,
and a little bit above center,
because I want to get this table line down in here.
That's the top and the bottom.
Now I've got the height, I'll measure the width.
Always re-checking myself with the yarn,
and making sure my shoulders are square.
So, there's the width,
and I'm just going to sort of center it here.
It's not critical.
Now that I've got those four marks in,
I'm going to put a line right down the center.
And you do this anytime you draw anything symmetrical.
A vase, or whatever.
Anything that's symmetrical, put a line down the center.
It will really help you.
I'm just going to try to find the center by dividing this in half.
And that's about it right there.
Then I'll draw a vertical line
right down the center.
And that really helps,
because now, with that line, I know that this right here,
at this point, is going to be going straight, flat, horizontal.
Same thing here at the top.
That should be flat, and that should be flat
right at the centerline there.
Let's measure the ellipse at the top,
the height of that ellipse.
So, that is the height of the ellipse.
Now, we'll measure the width,
and the width goes a little beyond these lines.
In fact, let me go ahead and put those lines in.
I don't know how high or low they go exactly,
but I can put them in, at least some of the way,
so I can start to see this silver cup.
Anything that you know you can draw in,
that you know is right, go ahead and put it in.
Again, this line helps me,
because that way, everything stays in check.
That is the two lines on the edge here.
Now we're going to measure the width of the ellipse.
That's about it right there.
Center it on these lines here.
There was one other line I'm going to put in
before I draw the ellipse,
and it'll really help to have a "T" right in the middle.
See? That already helps me, because I know that
that is where the bullet nose on the end of the ellipse
is supposed to go.
We can go ahead and draw our ellipse in there.
Let me show you something about drawing ellipses.
I see ellipses like this all the time,
with pointed noses like that,
and all ellipses have rounded ends.
I didn't even draw that one very good.
The point is, don't put these sharp points on the front.
They always have a little bit of a bullet nose.
Because at some point, right here,
that ellipse is going to get going vertical.
So, it has to come around, and curve.
And you can see how this plus really helps me,
because it keeps me in check.
See how I'm just slowly getting closer to the line?
Straight here.
And then it comes in like that.
A little sharper than I've got it.
Same thing over here.
Start off here,
and you know it's going to get slowly closer to the line,
and then round.
It's like it's going to a point, but right at the end,
it's got a little rounded nose on it.
OK. So, there's our ellipse.
Not perfect, but good enough.
But see how the plus...
I can look at each one of these quarters and compare them.
And if one is fatter than another, like this one's
slightly fatter here than that one is,
then I can bump it, and move it.
So always put those little crosses
inside your ellipses before you draw them.
The other thing we can do is we can measure the angle
coming off of this right here.
I'm going to make sure this one is vertical.
This stick here is vertical — dead vertical — and then
the other one I use to check the angle.
That's about right.
So, this one is vertical,
and the other one represents the angle.
I'll just eyeball that one.
OK. So, there is the top of our cup.
And now, let's go ahead and put the bottom in.
If I hold out a ruler or a straight edge of some kind,
and look at the bottom line,
and just set the ruler right on the line,
it gives me a real good visual on how much of a curve is there.
I'm going to start with the shadow.
And it's like this one, but it's actually even more curved,
because you're looking down on it slightly more.
So, it's like this curve, but just a little bit more.
This is the shadow.
And then there's a little bit of a dark area here.
And again, I can put the ruler here and look at my line,
and then I can look at it there, and compare the two,
and ask myself, "Which one has more curve to it, or less curve?"
And I think that is about right.
So, now we need the shadow,
which comes right out of the end there,
and traces around.
Let's go ahead and put in the handle.
I'm going to measure the point from the left-hand side of the cup
to the outside, as far left as the handle goes.
The width of it, I guess.
I don't know exactly how high it is,
but that's about as far out as it goes.
We know that top, flat part there is roughly
slightly under the point of the ellipse.
So, right there.
And we know that it comes out here.
We can measure the angle, the slope of the handle.
Just the general slope of it.
Again, we're keeping this one vertical.
So, there's the angle.
And I know that it comes in–
It comes out right above this point right here.
That's just the general slope.
I could measure the width of it,
but let's go ahead and put in this outside curve,
so I know it has to go through
from there to here.
And it's got a little bit of a curve going up.
Now, let me measure the thickness of it.
Then, we can see that the shadow doesn't get out
quite as far as the handle, but almost.
That's about it for the cup.
There's this shadow line in here,
but it's just sort of general. It's not specific.
There's some shines that I could put in.
But again, those aren't really critical or anything,
so I think I've done enough.
I'm going to go ahead and put the back table line in,
and the front edge,
and where the fabric comes to in the back, and that's it.
As far as the table line —
and this is why I say the more you get put in
the easier it is —
now that I have the cup here,
I don't have to measure and figure out where this back line goes,
because I can see where it cuts through the handle.
And it's about right there.
So, I'll just take a long straight edge
and just continue that line all across the back there.
Then, I'm going to measure from the bottom of the cup to the table edge.
And that tells me where the front edge of the table is.
And the fabric in the back.
I can measure for that from the left edge of the cup.
That's where the cloth comes in.
And it goes up at a slight angle.
And that's all there is to it.
That's basically how you draw in proportion.
The only other issue is
if you're going to do multiple objects in your still life,
then I would draw in 2 what I call "golden lines".
I've already got one here which I could use.
But if I had six objects,
instead of trying to relate them all to each other,
if that's difficult, especially if it's something abstract,
and it's got a lot of curved surfaces,
and you've got these objects,
and they're curved and abstract — flowers, whatever it is —
and you're trying to relate everything,
you can put in a golden line horizontal along one way,
and one going vertical, that way.
And in this case, I've got a perfect golden line,
which is the front edge of the table.
But if I didn't have one, I could lay a skewer,
or a thread...
tape a thread, and stretch it, and put it across the front.
Or, I could lay a couple of skewers like that.
This if I didn't have a front horizontal line, like I do.
That way, you'll have a strong line,
and you can measure anything,
and position anything in your still life
by measuring from that bottom line.
If you want a vertical line,
like if I want to have one where I can measure
left and right, going up and down,
you could use a thread.
Let me show you how to do that.
So, I've got this thread here,
and if I just stick it like that,
that gives me a vertical line.
That way, if I had five or six objects,
I can position them all relative to this.
I guess that's pretty good.
If I don't like it, if my measurements are slightly off
once I start painting it,
if I think it's too fat, or too tall, or whatever —
in fact I don't think this ones perfect, but —
I can easily bump it around a little bit when I paint it.
A lot of times it is a lot easier
to see shape and volume once you get shadows in.
When you're looking at these flat lines,
there's all kinds of optical illusions.
That's one of the reasons I recommend
using a proportional divider to learn to draw,
because it's going to force you to do it right.
You're still going to see the lines,
and have to make a judgement about this.
That's close enough for me.
So, that's how you draw in proportion.