February Faces Challenge
Each month Kick in the Creatives hosts a monthly challenge and this month is always February Faces. So I decided to do a month of blind contour self-portraits using their daily prompts list.
I don’t usually like following a list of prompts, but I decided it would stretch my creativity a bit, and also help to keep me on track and not give up on this art challenge half way through. I’m already on day 21 of this challenge, but this is the first seven days of blind contour ink sketches, and the completed self-portraits with watercolour added. Let me kick this off by explaining how I approach my blind contour sketches.
3 Key Benefits of doing Blind Contour Sketches
- Improve your observation skills. When you really look at what you’re sketching, you’ll sketch what you’re seeing, and not what you think you see.
- Build a strong hand-eye coordination. With a stronger connection between your hand and eye, you’ll be able to sketch more confidently when you’re urban sketching people from life.
- Overcome Perfectionism. There’s no way your sketch will be realistically perfect, so you can let go of that quest for perfection and just enjoy the creative process.
How I approach my Blind Contour Self Portraits
I begin by taking a photo of me performing/posing the prompt, and then I use that photo to do the blind contour sketch. A blind contour means you don’t look at what you’re drawing, you look at your source subject.
I always do blind contour sketches in ink. Precision doesn’t matter. Realism doesn’t matter. Likeness doesn’t matter. What matters is training your hand to move in the direction of what your eye is seeing, without looking at where your line is going.
Depending on the level of readability of the blind contour sketch, I may add a couple of extra lines for key areas I missed, and then I add the watercolour. More often than not, I like to ink the pupils in. These lines and watercolour are done sighted (e.g. you look at your sketch for this stage).
My Blind Contour Self Portraits
Day One of February Faces Challenge: Glamorous
Day Two of February Faces Challenge: Baby
Day Three of February Faces Challenge: Hidden Face
Day Four of February Faces Challenge: Bored
Day Five of February Faces Challenge: Sad
Day Six of February Faces Challenge: Hair Style
Day Seven of February Faces Challenge: Make-Up
For day 8 to 14 click here
For day 15 to 21 click here
for day 22 to 28 click here
(these links will be live when I post the rest of the challenge)
