Shadow Creek Falls

I have enjoyed working on this beautiful landscape. While there is probably a lot I could still work on, I think I'm going to call it done. Leaving portions of it unfinished leaves the eye content to stay in the center of the gorge...as it should be.

Enjoy

Diane

Shadow Creek Falls - WIP4 & 5

Wip 4: Here is a small update. I am slowly working

my way down the cliff. The tree on the right will eventually blend into the cliff behind and won't be as prominent.

Wip 5 : I'm bouncing a bit between the lower left area and the area around the tree on the right. These two sections will need to balance each other in both detail and darks. I'm also starting to tone down some of the highlights on the rocks. The whites need to be retained for just the brightest highlights.

Shadow Creek Falls

Shadow Creek Falls is nestled in the southern portion of Yosemite and is part of the Ansel Adams Wilderness Trail. This continues a series of drawings from my son's hiking trip to Yosemite last fall.

Part of the challenge to working with an impressive vista is to decide what to include and exclude. I am posting the reference photo to show you just how complex of a scene this is. Matt does an excellent job taking reference photos. He takes full scene shots as well as zoomed-in areas. He has a great sense of balance and composition that makes his photos a pleasure to work with.

My goal is to minimize the complexity and to emphasize the inter-play between the shadows, the tension of the boulders lodged between the crevices and the water finding it's way under, over and round the rocks.

The first step is to crop the image eliminate much of the 'extras' in the scene. Just this small change makes quite a difference.

Wip 1:

I have started with the distant background of the the mountain range. Snow is still visible on these glaciers in September. The tree line diminishes as it reaches to the top of the range.

Drawing Specs:
Paper: Fabriano Watercolor Hot press
Size: 11x17
Pencils used in the background: 2H flat chisel point clutch pencil and F .5 mm mechanical pencil for the trees.


Wip 2 - This scene has a number of background drops or layers. The mountain range creates two layers, one overlapping the other. Then another group of rocks fall between the range and another grove of trees. These have more form and definition to them but mostly drawn using negative drawing. This means drawing the dark space between the trees instead of drawing the actual trees. Once the tree shape is formed, detail is lightly drawn in to give the tree texture. Pencils used at this juncture are: 2B and F .5 mm mechanical pencils.


Wip 3: The Fabriano paper offers the ability to build up many layers of graphite. Starting with 4H - 2H flat chisel point clutch pencils allows large 'blocks' of shading to be done. Then alternating B and 2B creates subtle darkening. The darkest areas demand a strong application of 2B.

This is just over 1/2 of the image as the falls will continue to emerge down on the paper. I believe the image will remain unresolved on the edges, so the focus of the eye will remain on the falls itself.

Shadow Creek Falls - Sketch

This is a prelimary sketch of a drawing that I am currently working on. I wanted to explore the shadows and the shapes of the rocks/boulders as they envelope around the water falls.

Lake Ediza

My son will be keeping me busy with all the beautiful scenes from California. Over Labor Day weekend he went hiking in Yosemite. As they entered an opening in the trail, this is the view they were welcomed with. This is part of the glacial area. Snow is in the mountain all year round. They just reached Lake Ediza as the sun was setting.

Human Portraiture

There is a small group of artists who belong to a yahoo group called "Drawing Line to Life". We started the group to study Mike Sibley's book of the same title. I am the moderator and over the last few months have started to review Mike's book again. We have reached Chapter 8 where Mike demonstrates drawing his granddaughter Charlotte. We have decided to expand the topic to encompass human portraiture.

This is such a big topic that we have decided to it break down into smaller segments. As we finish up on our first topic, eyes, I thought it might be beneficial to layout the schedule for the next few weeks. I would like to welcome anyone interested in exploring the topic of drawing human portraiture to join us in our discussions, step-by-steps and sharing of our progress.

• Feb 1-13 Eyes
• Feb 14-27 Nose
• Feb 28 - Mar 13 Mouth
• Mar 14-27 Ears
• Mar 28 - Apr 10 Hair
• Apr 11-24 Head
• Apr 25 - May 8 Hands
• May 9-22 Clothed Figure Drawing

I am the first to admit that I am not a portrait artist, but I am using this opportunity to stretch my skills and I hope you all join me in this journey into human portraits. After we have exhausted this segment on portraiture, we will resume our study of Mike's book with Chapter 9.

I would like to invite you to join us.......

http://groups.yahoo.com/group/DrawingLinetoLife/

Diane

Editor's Choice

I am so excited! I made Editor's Choice on Mike Sibley's Starving Artist site. It has been 5 years since I've had this honor. It is a hall of fame that I feel very priviledged to be a part of.

I have had a gallery on Starving Artist for 5 years. It's a great site for exposure, as Mike gets well over 10,000 hits per month. Walter Foster and Quarto publishing both "discovered" me from his site and it is an excellent match with my own website.

I can't thank Mike enough for all his support and encouragement over the years. He's been the greatest influence on my development as an artist as well as my success. Thank you Mike.

www.starving-artists.net