Sighting tool drawing

Hold your sighting stick parallel to your body and rotate your wrist to the left and right, windshield wiper fashion, until you are able to make the stick align with the subject. I will make a distinction here between actual and implied angles. An angle in a drawing subject is the general direction of movement suggested by a subject. For example, the edges of a roof sit at a particular actual angles. For example, you could imagine a line running along the top of a picket fence.

Dot-to-dot drawing puzzles we do as children work because of our ability to do this. To measure an actual angle like the edge of a roof : Look at the subject, hold your sighting stick at arms length and align it with what you are trying to measure. Hold the sighting stick at that angle and make a mark on your paper that traces the angle.

To see if you have it right, check the angle and compare it to the one you made. Hold your sighting stick out, aligned with the subject.

Analyze the degree. It might help to envision a clock face and think about what numbers the sighting stick at that angle would run through. Compare the real life angle to the angle on your paper. Here is an example of a way to visualize using an imaginary clock face to help analyze angles. The image is from a book called Drawing Essentials by Deborah Rockman. Pingback: Sighting Beginning Drawing. Pingback: Sighting Beginning Drawing Fall Imagine a second straight laser-like line going from your eyeball, through the window, to the bottom of the person's feet.

Now imagine placing some tape where the first line intersects the window as well as where the second line intersects the window. You will have marked the visual height of the person as they appear on the window. Now imagine taping a sheet of paper to the window, next to where you see the person and have placed the tape marks.

The crux of the sight-size method is getting the person to 'fit' on to the paper you have taped to the window and having the distance between the tape-marks correspond to the size of the drawing you wish to create on the paper. In a studio setting and drawing a model, the position of the model would be fixed, but your position would be movable.

To get the model to fit on your paper, as you moved away from the model, the model's visual size would become smaller. Plus, the distance between you and the easel can be varied to alter the size of the drawing corresponding to the model.

As the easel is moved closer to the model, the size of the drawing would approach the actual size of the model. The tools needed are a long ruler or T-square, string, easel, drawing paper, and whatever drawing medium is desired. The drawing medium can be anything: pencil, pen, pastel, or paint. In this case, it was a charcoal drawing, so I started using soft vine charcoal and switched to harder and harder grades of charcoal as the drawing progressed.

For this cast drawing, I built a wooden stand with a platform about five feet high. I draped the stand with a black cloth and attached a large board covered in gray paper behind the cast for a background.

I purchased the cast shown from the Giust Gallery in Boston, and I was extremely pleased with the quality. I mounted my paper Canson Mi-Tentes on a large flat board and placed this on an easel. I created a plumb-line by tying a large hex-nut to a piece of string and tying the string to a wooden rod that I suspended above the cast.

This creates a nice, stable vertical line in front of the cast that will be useful in the process of drawing. Another item needed is something to take horizontal measurements. The traditional item is a knitting needle or another long and straight object where a distance can be noted by placing the thumb on the needle.

I've always preferred and used a drafting divider , the type used to measure distances on a map. The first thing to set up in any sight-size drawing is the subject, drawing, and "vantage point" or position from which you will make your visual measurements. For sight-size cast drawing, the drawing and the cast need to be at the same height, and both need to be at eye level.

For my drawing, I mounted my paper on a large wooden board and set the board on a wooden easel. I positioned the board with paper so it was perpendicular to the ground and not tilting forward or backward. I custom built the wooden stand on which I placed the cast so that I could be sure the cast was right at my eye level.

To find the vantage point, I stood in front of both the cast and my drawing and started taking several steps directly backward. I positioned myself so that I could visually take in both the cast and my drawing without moving my head and only minimally moving my eyes. The rule of thumb is that the distance between your vantage point and the drawing should be about 3 times the height of the drawing.

The key idea is that I could comfortably visually take in the cast, and my drawing and both appeared to be the same size. I also pulled the easel forward so that the plane of the drawing aligned with the front of the cast. Once I had picked a good vantage point, I marked the spot with masking tape on the floor.

I used pieces of tape to make an outline of my shoes, on the floor, so that I could return the exact same spot and stand in the exact same position, each time I stood at my vantage point. I also made sure I wore the same pair of shoes every time I worked on the drawing so my eye level remained the same.

Once everything was positioned properly, I was ready to start the drawing. The first task in this set was to establish an initial set of reference lines to aid in the basic construction of the drawing. One can think of these as the scaffolding on which the full drawing will be built. Skip to content Sighting is a strategy for measurement in drawing.

First you need a sighting stick. Sighting can be used for three main types of measuring in drawing. Sighting Techniques Sighting for angles I will make a distinction here between actual and implied angles. An implied angle might be a general directional thrust or an imaginary line connecting any two points in a drawing. Looking at the image above, you can see a line running through the center of the torso of the female figure. This is an implied angle that simplifies what the torso is doing into a simple directional thrust.

The wonderful thing about this is if you begin with the directional thrust—angle—you can build all the other stuff around it. Working up from the angles reduces the struggle for accuracy in drawing. Another type of implied angle that is useful in drawing is an imaginary line drawn between any two points that helps you see where one thing really is in relation to another.

For example: In the drawing below, you can see a diagonal line drawn between the uppermost right hand corner of the lid of the box and the upper right corner of the base of the box. Can you see any other implied angles? When you measure a real-life angle, the angle you make on your paper should be as close to identical as you can make it. Measuring angles and checking them against your drawing is an effective way to achieve greater accuracy in your drawings.

You can use your sighting stick to make comparisons between the size of one thing and the size of anything else. In this image, the artist uses a sighting stick to measure the height of a distant mountain. Let's use a sighting stick for art! Make each still-life very simple until they get better at the skill of sighting.

Once they are used to sighting an object, make each still life with two or more objects, one small and one large.

Instruct them to sight the small object first and compare it to the larger object s. When they are able to compare objects and draw them to the right proportions, introduce foreshortened objects into the still life.

A large doll or stuffed animal that can be place in a sitting position might be a good start. The legs would be foreshortened if you could place the doll up high enough so that the legs are about eye level to the artist.

If you want your children to shade the objects in the still life, set up a light source. Either place the still life perpendicular to a window or set a lamp near the still life. Meanwhile, as your student gets better with using the sighting sticks, add shading to your art lessons. Practice improves shading. Continue with this until the students have greatly improved from their first attempts. Welcome to DonnaYoung. Art- Shading Assignment Suggestions. Read about the two different subscriptions available for DonnaYoung.

You are at DonnaYoung. Thank you for visiting my website. Donna Young. Sighting with a Viewfinder and Sighting Sticks. Sighting when Drawing Sighting is a jump from Drawing Ia because students are drawing from life and they will convert a 3-D object into a 2-D object on their paper.

Viewfinder First you need to make a viewfinder.