Sketching Goats

I love goats – they are so cheeky and cute. For an upcoming workshop I needed to find a really good subject and found a fab image on a stock ref image website to buy.

I wanted to get the feel of his face and so did a lot of sketches this morning to try him out from all angles.

Lovely to just sit and sketch for a while…

I did a pure/blind contour drawing where I looked only at the image and never at the drawing (I put a partition between me and it so I wasn’t tempted to look).

Pure contour drawing – took 15 minutes – drawing slowly and not looking at all at the drawing as it evolved

Doing this just allows you to feel the image millimetre by millimentre as you draw with no care as to how the result will look.

It’s all about just letting your eye do some observing without the critical brain nagging away at it’s efforts.

I love to do this to warm up before sketching.

In her book “Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain” Betty Edwards explains how and why to do this – brilliant drawing book for all those who just want to draw well and enjoy the process.

Using a partition to stop myself looking at the pure contour drawing 🙂

Then I did a few more – all on tracing paper because then if I manage to do a good one I can then transfer that original freehand drawing onto my watercolour paper with no rubbings out. That way the surface of the paper stays perfect – ready for watercolour.

Each drawing allowed me to see where I was going wrong and right.

Finally I have settled on this last one. It could be improved – but I like the feel and attitude of the goat and so will use this as the basis for my painting – can’t wait to get going – rev the engines and go!