Developing Drawings from Soccer Sketches

Having scribbled a bunch of pencil drawings during a fast-moving live soccer game, I sat down with ink and watercolor and developed some more careful drawings from those sketches.

You can see here that first, I drew one based on a stick figure.  Then I drew the exact same figure again, trying to flesh it out to be more realistic looking.

Then I decided to work from a photo of my nephew, but keep in mind what I had learned doing the fast scribbles.

On this page you can see I drew and redrew the image four times.

In the center left is the blind contour which I drew first.  I love the wonkiness of blind contours!  And I am amazed that you can actually see what the heck it is!

Second I drew the image directly below it, a faceless contour, working out the shapes a bit more accurately.

Third I drew the image on the lower right, adding a bit of face and uniform detail.  As the notes on the page say, I was working out how the twist worked in terms of the proportion of the limbs and the movement of the clothes.  All very hard for me! But so much fun.

Then finally I completed the big sketch.

I am pleased with the composition of this page--I like seeing the growth of the image through the version.  And the notes add a nice sense of "study" to it.

And though it really doesn't look anything like my nephew, it reminds me of watching him play.