Drawing the Skull Part 1 February 2005.indd

Drawing

Newsletter

February 2005

Michael R. Britton

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1-800-427-2468

An interesting question I often get asked by prospective students

is; Which is better: studying in a class-room or from the Master-

ing Portrait Drawing DVD workshop?

There are pros and cons to both. As a teacher who has taught for

many years in the classroom I am well aware of the limitations

of the classroom, or studio, environment. First, there is the time

limitation. The course material must be presented in the number

of hours allotted for the course, whether that be 18, 24, or 36

hours. If you missed, or did not understand a lecture, there simply

is not sufficient time to re-present it. At most, a quick review will

have to do.

Also, most students need to take a course at least a few times to start

getting a grasp of the skills and knowledge required, while others choose

to take the course every semester to continually improve their skill under

the guidance of a master artist which can be very costly in both time and

money. That’s all well and good as long as you live in a major artistic

centre that has a master artist teaching realist portraiture and you can get

a space in the class.

Many of you have a passion and drive for art and drawing and want to learn

correctly at a serious level, but live in small towns or cities or countries

that just don’t offer classical realist courses of study, or even, just a good

portrait class. So that is the real beauty of our DVD workshops and

newsletters. We have people studying the workshops up on remote weather

stations in the Arctic, and we have had several people buy them who are

heading off on holiday or to live overseas and want to continue studying

while they are gone, not to mention people who are housebound or who

have small children or work obligations who just can’t make it to a 3

hour class.

With the DVD workshop you can replay and study a particular lecture at

your convenience as often as you need, until it is fully understood, at one

low cost. The convenience, the cost, the lifetime reference material, the

privacy, and the unique content of Artacademy.com’s DVD’s can certainly

be an essential part of your learning arsenal, because very few teachers,

books or videos currently cover this valuable material.

With a DVD Workshop some people worry about the lack of direct teacher/

student interaction. This was one of my prime concerns with the feasibility

of putting out a workshop on DVD. But the results coming in from students

studying from the DVDs has been more than I thought would be possible

and has been incredibly gratifying as a teacher. In a class situation you

really don’t get more than 30 seconds to a few minutes with the teacher

while they try to see everyone’s work and make the rounds and that can

be frustrating for both the teacher and student. That’s why I filmed and

structured the DVD’s just as though it were a private lesson from me to

you.

The fact is the DVD’s cover the material in a succinct logical sequence

that I don’t have time to cover in a workshop or course with all the chatter

and interruptions which often consume a large portion of a class. Every

conceivable question has already been answered and if there is something

extra you are not sure of just fire me a quick email. This is like my

dream class, the opportunity to cover everything I have always wanted

to cover in the classroom but which usually takes quite a few semesters

of courses to get through, (which is another reason people keep taking

the course).

But here’s the very real issue. To really learn portraiture well you should

ideally be drawing from life a substantial portion of the time. Drawing

from a photograph is only a substitute, although it is better not drawing.

Not having a ‘live’ model to work from as you would have in a class-

room is not an ideal learning situation. This can be easily rectified by

asking your family or friends to sit for you, doing self portraits in a

mirror (think of how many Vincent Van Gogh did), or hiring a model if

you prefer. Find an artist friend(s) to have drawing sessions with and

take turns drawing each other or share the cost of a model or join a

life-drawing group in your area.

Working from life the classroom is not always an ideal situation either,

especially if you are in the far corner of the class-room peering through

a forest of easels trying to catch a glimpse of the model. Also, when the

instructor is demonstrating (which they should be!) only a few students

will be able to see the same view that the instructor is drawing from. For

example, the instructor may be demonstrating a full, frontal portrait but

if you are seated off to the side you will see the model in a profile view.

And that’s a different lesson. This isn’t the case in the DVD Workshop,

you see the model in exactly the same view that I do.

Another issue is that to significantly improve your portrait drawing you

must know the anatomy of the head. That’s the skull and the musculature.

Well, about a month ago, I found the manufacturer of my favorite skull

while doing research on the internet. Most manufacturers only sell to

whole-salers and distributors, but I called them anyway and asked if

they would be willing to sell directly to artists and art-students. And

they said yes. And before long I had a whole new Anatomical Supply

division added to my web-site (www.artacademy.com).

Classic Human Skull

$90 + shipping

Human Skull with Cervical

Vertebrae with Stand

$198 + shipping

The skull that I use is the Human Skull with Cervical Vertebrae.

When I originally purchased mine, about 6 years ago and paid

$278! it came without a stand. I had to make my own stand.

Fortunately, it now comes with a stand which makes it ideal

for drawing. (If you choose to buy the less-expensive Classic

Human Skull you can make your own stand.)

The very real benefit of drawing from a good skull is that you

are drawing from ‘life’ and learning the anatomy simultaneously.

Nothing, but nothing, will improve your portrait drawing skills

faster than drawing from the skull. Draw it in full frontal, 3/4,

7/8’s profile. Set up your light in as many variations as you can

possibly think of.

However, avoid drawing from a novelty or cheap, knock-off

skull. They are poorly proportioned and detailed and will only

re-inforce your symbolic preconceptions. Thus doing more harm

than good.

Now how to draw the skull.

For more details visit our new Anatomical Supplies for

Artists section. Just click on the skeleton!

Drawing the Skull – Part 1

The images used in this article are

still-frames from the Drawing the Skull
DVD.

To gain the maximum benefit

your drawing should be life-

size, approximately 10” from

the top of the skull (the calvar-

ium) to the bottom of the chin

(the mental tubercle).

Begin by striking the arabesque

using straight, architectonically

sound lines. Don’t premeasure

the width, just take your best

guess. This is how you train

your eye to assess proportion.

Once you have struck your initial arabesque you then

need to verify its accuracy. To do this ‘sight’ the width

of the skull by holding your pencil horizontally at arm’s

length (elbows locked!) so that the point of your pencil

is at the far edge of the forehead and adjust your thumb

on the pencil so that it is at the back of the skull.

Keeping your elbow locked and without moving your

thumb, turn the pencil so that it is perpendicular and

your thumb is now at the bottom of the chin at the

mental tubercle. Note where your pencil point is now.

It will be a small distance below the top of the skull.

You now need to take your best possible guess at where that point is

below the top of the skull. It takes practice and training (Mastering

Portrait Drawing goes into the particulars of sighting indepth), but the

assumption here is that you will better adjudge a small, short distance

than a long one. Always use the shortest measure!

Now check that the proportions of your drawn arabesque correlate to

these measures and make whatever corrections are necessary.

Once the correct proportions of the ara-

besque have been established, the critical

landmark of the skull (or portrait) must be

placed. That is the brow ridge (the supra-

orbital eminence, or prominence) which is

highlighted here in neon green.

Again, take your best guess at where you

believe the brow ridge to be then check it

by sighting.

First sight from the mental tubercle to the

a point on the brow ridge (your choosing,

but you have to stick with it). Now raise

your pencil so that your thumb is now

on your point on the brow ridge and

note where your pencil point is. It

should be a small distance above the

top of the skull.

Mark on your drawing where you

can best place that point above the

skull. This is called the ‘check point’.

Again, the smallest measured distance

will be the more accurate. Your point

on the brow ridge should, if it was

placed correctly, be exactly halfway

between the mental tubercle and your

check point. If it isn’t – then correct

the placement of your brow ridge.

Now you can fix the width of the

face. In the 3/4 view the hinge of

the jaw (condyle) is the critical land-

mark. Again, take your best guess

then check by sighting horizontally

from the condyle to the far edge of

the cheek bone (zygomatic arch) and

vertically relating that measure from

the mental tubercle.

From my view point, that measure takes

me up from the mental tubercle to the top

of the bilateral nasal bone. Since we have

already established the brow ridge we now

only have to estimate a small distance to fix

the top of the nasal bone.

If you placed the condyle correctly, it

should equal the measure from mental

tubercle to nasal bone. If you’re off a bit,

then correct the placement of the condyle.

Always assume that the short distance esti-

mated is the correct one!

Now that the primary elements of propor-

tioned and placed you can further work

out the arabesque. I find it best to further

resolve only the back, least intricate, part

of the skull at this early stage.

Before placing the internal elements of

the skull’s face you need to establish the

facial angle which is the center line of the

face. Draw a slightly arcing line from the

middle of the mental tubercle up through

the center of the brow ridge. The place-

ment of the facial angle is very important.

You have to feel your way through this as

there is no way to accurately measure it.

Once the facial angle is established

continue resolving the arabesque care-

fully observing the shape of the muzzle

(the mouth area), the zygomatic pro-

cess and arch, up through the external

orbital apophysis to the forehead.

Now we’re ready to map the size

and placements of the skulls face and

teeth. The will be covered in Part 2

in the March issue of The Drawing

Newsletter.