Silverpoint

Thumbnails and value grouping

The same scene with values scattered like confetti, which reads as noise, next to values grouped into three big connected shapes, which reads as a pictureSCATTERED · CONFETTIGROUPED · THREE BIG SHAPESLink your darks into one shape. Link your lights into one shape. Let a mid valuehold them apart.Corot's trees, ground shadow and foreground are one dark. That is why his pictures feel calm.
FigureGrouping values
FoundationLine + Mass

Thumbnails and value grouping

Three arrangements, one winner, and the lie that makes a picture

Design a drawing in three thumbnails, choose by the grouping of values, and enlarge the winner faithfully.

Difficulty
Time
about 1 h
You draw with
2B, 4B, 6B
ThumbnailsGrouping valuesNotan: two, three, four values

Why this one

  • Unit 6 of the program: Composition.
  • Three thumbnails that are clearly different designs, and a finished drawing that keeps its chosen thumbnail's three shapes intact.

From your kit

The whole kit →
  1. 1Grafwood 2B, 4B, 6B 2B, 4B, 6B for the darks. Long points from the Blackwing on everything up to B.
  2. 2Kneaded eraser and the Mono Zero press-and-lift corrections only; the Mono Zero for a single sharp light.
  3. 3Alpha sketchbook 9 x 6 draw at the book's size and keep the proportions; date the page.
In general, this study asks for
  • Copier paper and drawing pad
  • 2B, 4B, 6B
  • A landscape photo with buildings or trees

Watch first

All videos →

Two- and three-value notan, the exact exercise the Mass studies start with.

YouTube
Create great art compositions with these thumbnail sketch techniquesArt Prof · Thumbnails as design, not sketches. Pairs with the viewfinder.Cotman in Normandy at Dulwich Picture GalleryDulwich Picture Gallery · Ten minutes with the drawings on the wall. Watch how few values Cotman uses.

The plan

4 stages · ~59 min
  1. 1

    Read Harlech

    18 min

    Cotman's Harlech Castle, squinted: the castle, its rock and its shadow are one dark shape; the sky and water are one light; a halftone shore holds them apart. Three shapes. Everything he saw was grouped into those three.

    Liber Studiorum: Plate 29, Harlech Castle, N. Wales, Cotman, 1838
    Cleveland Museum of Art

    Cotman, Liber Studiorum: Plate 29, Harlech Castle, N. Wales, 1838. softground etching, from a bound volume containing 48 plates.

    Cotman, Liber Studiorum: Harlech Castle. Three grouped shapes.

    The Cleveland Museum of Art · Bequest of John Bonebrake

    Checklist0 / 1
  2. 2

    Three thumbnails

    18 min

    From your photo, three two-inch thumbnails in three values, each a different arrangement: subject left, subject right, horizon changed. In each, deliberately join the darks into one shape and the lights into one shape. You will have to lie: darken a halftone that interrupts a dark, lighten a dark that breaks a light. That is composing.

    The same scene with values scattered like confetti, which reads as noise, next to values grouped into three big connected shapes, which reads as a pictureSCATTERED · CONFETTIGROUPED · THREE BIG SHAPESLink your darks into one shape. Link your lights into one shape. Let a mid valuehold them apart.Corot's trees, ground shadow and foreground are one dark. That is why his pictures feel calm.
    FigureConfetti versus three big shapes.
    Checklist0 / 1
  3. 3

    Choose and enlarge

    18 min

    Pick the one with the biggest dark mass and the clearest light. Enlarge it to a full sheet faithfully: the thumbnail is the design, the photo supplies the detail. Lay the three grouped shapes first, then develop within them without breaking them.

    Three value thumbnails of the same scene, each about the size of a business card, exploring three different arrangements before committing to oneTHREE THUMBNAILS · 3 MIN EACH · VALUES ONLYA · tree left, farm rightB · tree right, framingC · two trees, farm centredB wins: biggest dark mass, clearest light shape, distance framedRules: no detail, no lines, three values, two inches wide, pick one and commit.A thumbnail that does not read at two inches will not read at twenty.Ten minutes of thumbnails saves two hours of a drawing that was never going to work.
    FigureThree arrangements, one winner.
    Checklist0 / 1
  4. 4

    Self-check

    5 min

    Tick each item honestly. If one is a no, the session is not finished; go back to that step.

    Checklist0 / 3

What it should look like

  • Three thumbnails that are clearly different designs, and a finished drawing that keeps its chosen thumbnail's three shapes intact.

Where it goes wrong

  • The enlargement drifted back to the photo and the shapes broke up. Detail pulled the values apart. Squint at the thumbnail and the drawing side by side every five minutes.

Log this session

Start the clock when you pick up the pencil. Stop it when you put it down. Log it. Every session counts toward the box.

00:00of ~60 min

Status

How did it go?

Up nextFocal hierarchy and edges