This week, our art class explored different mediums and techniques of art-charcoal, hatching and cross-hatching, scratch-boarding, and white pencils. In each medium and technique, there is a different way to to showcase light values and dark values( shadowing), the result of each one.
Charcoal is a way of using different shades of black to generate a shadow effect from the way the light hits the object. Charcoal blends very well to generate a nice, smooth flow from each shade to the other.
Scratch-boarding is edging away the surface of white clay underneath a layer of black ink. Instead of drawing the shadow, like charcoal, using a scratch-board is a way to represent the light values of an object and let the background of the scratch-board be the shadowing effect. The closer lines represent the lightest values and the farther away lines represent the darker values. These lines are called hatching, a technique with closer lines creating a darker value or lighter value in this case and spread apart lines create more of a light value or a dark value in this case. Cross hatching, which I didn't use, is the basically the same thing but with lines crossing to generate even more of a light or dark value.
Using a white pencil is a way to draw the light values of an object as opposed to drawing the darker values like a regular pencil does. The harder you press at a certain point on a piece of art work, the lighter the value is. The lighter you press at a certain point on a piece of art work, the darker the values
Differences Between the Mediums and Techniques
The main difference between the mediums and techniques are that they use different materials to achieve the main purpose of each one. The other difference is how they use the materials to create art work. When using charcoal, you blend different shades together to create a shadow effect from where the light hits the object. When using a scratch-board with hatching and cross hatching, you edge away lines from the scratchboard with a scratch knife. Instead of edging away to create a dark value like the purpose of charcoal is, you edge away the lines to create a lighter value with the closer lines being the lightest values and the farther spread apart lines being the darker values. When using a white pencil, the purpose is the same as that of the scratch-board-create lighter values instead of darker values. Basically it the opposite of using a regular pencil and white paper. The lighter the shade of white, the lighter the value is, and the darker the shade of white is , the darker the value is.
The One I Like the Best
The type of art medium/technique I like the best was the charcoal. Even though I think I did the worst with this medium, I love the nice, smooth blend from the lighter values to the darker values that creates the shadowing effect on the object.
The One I Didn't Like the Best
While there was no particular medium/technique that I disliked a whole lot, I did have trouble with a couple of them. Since I never done scratch-boarding or use white pencils before, I had a harder time thinking of how to do a piece of art because you use these techniques/mediums to represent the lighter values of an object as opposed using a technique/medium to represent the darker values of an object, which is what I am use to.