around you. I would recommend you first of all just take a walk in your neighbourhood or local park and look at the basic shapes of buildings, trees and flowers and consider them from a new viewpoint. How would you start sketching that flower, say, as simply a shape? Spend time on this activity by just observing and working out in your head the shapes of various things you see. Then, on your next walk, take your sketchbook with you and make drawings and written notes to reinforce what you have observed.
Once you have trained your eyes to look at the things around you in terms of shapes you will find that you can look at your pet more objectively. For instance, notice how cats and dogs tend to curl themselves up when they are asleep or sitting, and you will soon start to see them as spherical shapes. Forget about any detail at this stage; the idea is to capture an impression of the animal that allows you to recognize its basic form. In doing so you may also surprise yourself as you start to draw typical poses that capture the spirit and character of the animal.
| Acquiring the skill to recognize basic shapes will enable you to capture the form and outlines of the animal at the outset. | ||
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| Simplify drawing an animal’s head by using basic shapes. They will create an underlying structure you can build on. | ||
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HEAD SHAPES
When you focus more specifically on a portrait drawing of an animal you must observe it carefully, looking for the component shapes. The head is always a good place to start, so make a study of it. Simplify the exercise by using basic geometric shapes such as circles, ovals, cylinders and cones, and forget about detailed outlines. Place yourself at different positions around your subject so that you are looking at it from all angles. Figure out if the basic outline of the head full frontal is square or round. It may change as you move to a different viewpoint – a head can be cone-shaped if you look at it in profile, for instance. Practise these head shapes for different animals in your sketchbook over and over again, drawing them routinely until the pencil becomes an extension of your hand.
Remember that each animal is an individual and that you must observe and consider it as such. Getting the overall shape of the head right will enable you to add further guidelines for the features. The animal’s features, too, can be drawn as geometric shapes at this stage and unless you observe them correctly you will have difficulty in making a realistic portrait. You can use a triangle within the circular head shape to line up the eyes and the nose, and the ears can be just simple little triangle shapes.
BODY SHAPES
Take a look at the body now and figure out whether it is cylinder shaped, oval or otherwise. Again the body of an animal will look different when it is sitting or lying down from when it is standing.
Then move on to the limbs. They too are made up of a series of smaller shapes. A paw can be a lot easier to depict if you first of all draw an oval shape, closely observing the particular cat or dog. Although paws can look fairly simple, they can be tiresomely tricky to get right at times and if you use this principle of basic geometric shapes you will have a foundation on which to add detail later.
Some knowledge of animal anatomy will also be helpful in enabling you to place shapes to represent the muscles, for instance, which give the animal its build and control its movement. By drawing these shapes initially as a routine feature of starting a pet portait you will find that your powers of observation increase too and you will be recognizing and placing shapes more quickly and accurately the more you draw.
It is also helpful when you are planning a composition to place a shape around the animal. Drawing a cat or dog inside an triangle can enable you to see the negative spaces of the shapes, helping you to check the overall proportions.
| Use shapes to indicate joints, hindquarters and paws. Draw a shape around the animal to confirm the outline of the pose. | ||
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MOVING SHAPES
Sketching moving animals can be quite daunting at first, but it is useful to do so to increase your general observational and drawing skills. Visit the park and notice the dogs on their walks. Your outlines need not be detailed. Just get used to sketching the cones and circles that encompass the head, and the triangles, say, for the ears and quickly pencil in the bodyline while the dog is running or bounding about. You will have to be quick because the shapes will be constantly changing.
Horses can be especially challenging. They look complicated to draw, but if you remember that their bodies are simply a series of shapes in motion and in different positions then you will find that your time spent drawing them is both rewarding and enjoyable.
Take yourself off to the local zoo! Have some fun sketching the elephants or giraffes. Take a big sketchbook and observe those lovely simple shapes. You can use cylinders for the different sections of the legs and a big oval shape for the body.
Keep your