Week 3- Material and surface properties

 

The aim of the task this week was to create a piece of work that really focused on the material and the properties of those materials in a still life setup. The objects we were given to draw from consisted of a range of metals, plastic, glass and natural materials in the fruits. This range of surfaces was to be accurately recreated suing shading techniques learnt from previous weeks and through the videos shown. I wanted to really emphasise contrasting values within this piece as this is one of the key properties that both metal and glass have. I must focus on how light reacts to these surfaces differently and ways to convincingly convey them through tonal ranges.

Before starting my final piece I did a series of primary sketches just to make sure I achieved an appealing composition and to ensure that the piece had dimension as this will ultimately add to the overall aesthetic of the finished piece. I moved some objects around slightly to create different levels and dimensions. I didn't want all the objects to be on the same level as it would end up looking flat. At this point I did not add any tonal range onto the objects.

In order to make it easier for me to convey my composition into an enlarged final sketch I added a grid over it so that I could get the placements of the objects correct. After this I then went on to drawing my final sketch being careful that I watch the symmetry and ellipses of each objects since for this piece a lot of the objects require me to do so. I still struggle when it comes to drawing cylindrical shapes as they can be hard for me to draw accurately. I tried my best to observe the perspectives of how the spatula sat on the pan. it took me a few attempts to get those particular objects accurate since it is sitting at a strange angle. 

I began rendering in the details of the objects carefully looking at how the light was reacting to each surface. The bottle in the centre was challenging since the glass was tinted and very dark, I straggled to make the highlights and shadows look clean and realistic. I started with this object since it was the darkest and I wanted to ensure that the piece had a wide variety on tonal variation. The highlights on the glass were very sharp and crisp unlike that on the lemons which were a lot more graduated. At this point I was also considering the line weight of each objects. Making the lemons at the front more sharp to get a sense of perspective. Looking back I think I could have done this a lot better since the piece somewhat lacks dimension. 

This was my piece before feedback and as you can see it is lacking a lot of dimension. The whole piece looks very monotonal and flat along with some of the elements looking 2D once again due to the lack of drop shadows. I also needed to blend some of the highlights and shadows in a bit more since it was looking over bitty and liney. I wanted to do this whilst also retaining the level of detail and contrast that was needed to make the surfaces look different. I also want to make the values on the pan a bit darker since it is looking to similar to some of the other objects unlike in the actual set up where it is more a midtone object. 

This was my finished piece with the corrects. I added drop shadows on the objects that needed them in order to create a more 3 dimensional look to the piece. I also decided to shade in the ground a bit more so that the objects would stand out and the piece would have a more aesthetic look. Overall I am a lot more happy with this piece than I was before I added the corrections. I particully paid attention to how light and the surrounding objects were reacting to the surfaces of the other objects.