One of my students in Art 300

This is a quick, unfinished charcoal (soft vine) of Diana that I did for my students to show them how to sketch a very light contour drawing and then go in (lightly again) with a few value SHAPES. I squint big time as I do this to eliminate a lot of similar mid values. It is like turning up the contrat "dial" in photo shop...high contrast leaves you mostly with dark and light shapes. Sure makes life a little easier and allows you to render a likeness quickly. You can always go in later and add more subtle value shapes if you so desire. The sketch ends up being a combination of light and dark shapes, soft, hard, and lost edges. The contour lines are no longer there, because as we all know, there are no lines in life...only demarcations between contrasting value shapes. Those initial contour lines were only there in the beginning to define the shapes. By the way, I did not start with any of the facial features. I first loosely rendered (lightly with contour lines) the head, cap, neck, and some of the shoulder area. Only after I was satisfied with that did I contour in the eyes, nose and mouth. After that process, I played off dark against light values. If I ever get the time to finish this sketch, I'll post it. Go onto Youtube and search for "The Face of Lincoln". Its an old black and white elementary/high school (circa 1960's) movie that I saw when I was about 12 years of age. It made a deep impression on me and shows a similar concept utilized in drawing and painting. It delightful and mesmerizing...nuf said!