I was struck by the idea of a circular composition so off we went! I dusted out my compass and made my circle. The circle is a nice compliment to the dome of the tortoise's shell.
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| Preliminary Drawing with topography lines |
The original drawing was contained within an 8" square, so the circle is also 8". In the preliminary drawing I spent more time figuring out the topography of the shell, the limbs, and neck than I did working on blocking in light and shadow. I took the reference photo on an overcast day, there was only soft, even lighting. The major shadows were under the carapace.
I started with the trees in the background so I would feel less intimidated by all that blank paper. They also gave me a bit of reference for my darks. Then I started lightly on some of the darkest areas of the tortoise: under the carapace and the forelegs. Start lightly and go darker as progress is made.
I haven't spent much time drawing grass before. Or tortoises, for that matter. I found the grass to be quite a challenge. It took several different YouTube videos at 1.5-2x speed for me to make a good go at it. I think it turned out alright.
At this point I felt the drawing was pretty complete (spoiler: I was wrong). I was pleased with the shell, the neck, and the scales on the legs. I thought the grass was a solid OK. I thought about finishing off the plants in the foreground and calling it done...this is because I have a fear of backgrounds. They have never been my strong point and I have studiously avoided them since forever. But I thought I should try. This tortoise deserved an effort at least.
And so it was that I made an effort and managed to avoid yet another background! Here we have a nice, blended graphite background.
I worked on getting my darks darker and my lights brighter. And truly this is where I thought it was finished. But it didn't feel right. It sat on my desk for almost a week. I'd come back to it with my 4B pencil and fiddle with the shadows, I'd make some blades of grass sharper and some brighter. Add some shadow here and lift out some graphite there. Fiddle, fiddle, fiddle. Waaay back in yon glory days of art school I had a good friend (hi Leslie!) who would tell me to back off of my work when it was finished. That was useful.
All my fiddling and blending and lifting led me here. This is where I think it is finished.
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| Dome-shelled Galapagos Tortoise |