{"id":800,"date":"2026-05-23T13:40:55","date_gmt":"2026-05-23T13:40:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/gaelle-artstudio.com\/plog2026\/?p=800"},"modified":"2026-05-23T13:41:15","modified_gmt":"2026-05-23T13:41:15","slug":"exercise-4-5-studies-of-moving-figures","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/gaelle-artstudio.com\/plog2026\/exercise-4-5-studies-of-moving-figures\/","title":{"rendered":"Exercise 4.5 \u2022 Studies of Moving Figures"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
Exercise brief<\/summary>\n
Aim\nFill several pages of your sketchbook with quick sketches of moving figures. \n\nMethod\nTry to fill at least a page a day, using a range of media - pencil, charcoal, ink. This will be a rich resource for future work as well as improving your figure drawing through regular practice. You\u2019ll have to work quickly. Don\u2019t worry about details but work instead to capture the energy of the figures. The subject matter might be individuals or groups of people.\n\nHow well have you managed to create the sense of a moving figure or figures rather than a static pose?\n\n\u2018People watching\u2019 is a good way to understand human movement and interaction. This might be at the supermarket, on a bus or train, in a pub or caf\u00e9, cinema queue or takeaway. Night or day, observe different kinds of people \u2013 how they stand, how they interact, what they carry, what they\u2019re doing with their hands, and how they dress. If you can do a few small and quick sketches on the spot, that\u2019s great. If not, take a few discreet photos and try to keep the atmosphere of the scene in your memory until you return home, then try to recapture the colour, movement, drama, noise, etc., in your sketches.\n\nReflection\nHow successful were your attempts to retain an image of a scene to draw later? Did your drawings become more fluent as you worked through your sketchbook, perhaps becoming more confident with working in this way? Make some notes in your learning log.<\/code><\/pre>\n<\/details>\n\n\n\n
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Even though ultimately I would love to work with the figure, I have felt rather unconfident working on the moving figure. Partly, I think, this is because I cannot hold onto the figure in my mind’s eye. So I’m loosing it as I draw since people move constantly. The first few sketches are sketches of my daughter and spouse: she was crocheting and he was reading and writing. I didn’t ask them to pose, and they were constantly fidgeting.<\/p>\n\n\n\n