ONLINE ART COURSE – EAGLE IN CHARCOAL
Several months ago I completed the charcoal module, and was heartily glad to do so, and I put my charcoal away in the dark recesses of my Spare Art Materials box, assuming they would not see the light of day again.
However… we are now in the second part of the course, and have moved on from media-themed projects to subject-themed ones. The first module in this second half was landscapes, and we have now progressed to animals.
The first project is an eagle in… wait for it… you’ve guessed it, charcoal! I hate charcoal! It’s so messy and smudges all over the place, and tends to look dirty.
However, this picture is extremely arresting, being of the head of a fierce eagle, and I was very keen to draw it. Initially I thought I might do it in a different medium, but decided to stick to the brief and do what I was told!
One thing about charcoal is that it is very forgiving. You can easily move it around and correct errors, even if it makes a mess everywhere!
In addition to the charcoal and charcoal pencil, we also made constant use of the blending stump, the kneaded eraser, and the Tombow Mono Eraser. All these tools can be used as drawing implements, removing charcoal, or blending it. The Mono Eraser is very useful for adding fine detail highlights, and you can also use the blending stump as a drawing implement, making use of the charcoal it has picked up on its tip.
The initial drawing
First of all, we mapped out the main shapes of the eagle, concentrating on the relationship between the parts to get the proportions and angles correct. We did this initial drawing with the charcoal pencil.
The eye
Before starting on the eye, we blocked in some background, using the flat of a thicker piece of charcoal.
Phil, our teacher, explained about “lost and found outlines.” I had not heard of this before. Since starting to learn to draw, I have moved on from the beginner’s error of slavishly outlining everything, and instead looking at shapes. We tend to see the world in terms of outlines – the edges of things that separate them from their environment – this is the way our brains are wired. However, often a shape such as a facial feature like the nose, doesn’t have a hard outline, but it is indicated in a drawing by appropriate shading. Then perhaps the outer edge of an object might be the same colour and value as its environment, and not be determined by a hard visible line. This is a “lost outline.” The object is feathered into the background. The “found outlines” are those harder, sharper lines that determine the definite edge of something, in this case, the beak of the bird. Getting the “lost and found outlines” right in a drawing will add to its sense of realism and give the subject dimension and body.
Starting with the focal point
The eye is the focal point of the picture, so we began with this. Most of the work was done with the charcoal pencil.
Here is a detail shot of the completed eye in my drawing.
I must say that the charcoal was lending itself very well to this subject! (Not to say that I am being converted, though!)
The beak
This is the other area of the picture which is sharply defined. We were to keep the feathers and background deliberately less detailed in order to draw one’s eye to the main focus of the drawing, which was the eagle’s facial features.
I soon realised I’d got the top of the beak too high, which made it much too thick. Here the charcoal came into its own, as I was able to correct the error by adding more charcoal and blending it in with the blending stump, and erasing a bit of the bird’s forehead to make it fit. Sometimes I can be quite far on in a drawing before I realise I’ve got the proportions wrong!
Finishing the drawing
To finish the drawing, we needed to add some shading and detailing to indicate the feathers, and then to add a bit more variation in the background. We also emphasised some of the “found outlines” with the charcoal pencil. Afterwards I went around with my kneaded eraser and removed the various smudge marks that I’d made.
The final step was to give it a really good spraying with fixative – three coats to be exact! It is definitely not going to smudge now.
On the whole, I am quite pleased with my charcoal drawing. I did quite like my rhino and elephant from the charcoal module as well, but I didn’t like the landscapes which looked too messy and dirty. If I were to pursue charcoal, I think I would concentrate on animals. However, there are other media I much prefer working with, and would probably stick to those.
