Drawing is fundamental to graphic design. Habitual drawing increases the skills of logo designers, page layout designers, and typographers alike. When a designer “makes due” by not sketching on a routine basis, the designer in some ways in shortchanging his or herself. Yes, designers absorb a lot of information from other designers and can “get by” by in the appropriate sense copying the great work of others. But, as some point, all the great design work we should and do borrow from, comes from the hard work of some designer with a good foundation in drawing.
I’d like to encourage every graphic designer to draw every day. It doesn’t matter what you draw. Random is great! To encourage this, I decided to post some pages from my current journal. I use a blank page, heavy spiral bound, #100, acid-free notebook at 7 x 10 inches.
Mixed in with my design work and meeting notes are totally random sketches for fine art projects, studies, still lifes, mind maps and all manner and what not of all kinds. I personally enjoy not only individual drawings from people’s sketchbooks, but all the progress from page to page. In that spirit, I have posted about 30 different scans representing about 50 different drawings and sketches. Some are refined, some are patently not refined. Some are personal, some are strictly business. I personally like that mixed up matrix when I come across it on other blogs, and so I’m contributing my drawings to the crowd.
50 Sketches from a Graphic Designer
Please click any sketch for a larger version.
This is my left hand. Rule: make darks darker and lights lighter and avoid mid-tones when sketching.
Notes from a client meeting about a website and logo over coffee at Starbucks.
Can I draw Daffy Duck from memory? No, I cannot draw Daffy Duck from memory.
"Happy Times" sketch. I doodled this really fast so I could have something to try and color, later, in Photoshop.
Unused sketch for the banner illustration of a technology and graphic design article.
"Bad little kids breaks vase but is truly sorry, so mom is not too mad", or something like that.
Abstract art concept
Several abstract composition sketches. The top left one focuses on patterns of dark and light, while the second focuses on organic blending of dark and light.
Abstract sketch compositons. The lower one is a concept for a larger painting.
Mindmap for the new BonFX.com focus. This was several months before I started any work on the site at all.
Sketched composition for larger painting, "I am the Bread of Life", along with a little chalice.
A few devotional fine art sketches and compositions. One is of the Virgin Mary, and the larger one is a concept for a painting about division among ecclesial communities.
Another set of concept sketches for some devontial art about Mary as Our Lady of Sorrows and other ideas.
Lunchtime sketches: My teabag and a one-eyed, dangerous, spinning, octopus.
Realistic concept sketch of Jesus above an abstract Madonna and Child concept. I don't think abstract approaches to traditional topics work that well, maybe in the same way "Baroque" and "Hip Hop" probably don't mix that well.
Lunchtime sketch: My lunch trash consisting of a paper boat and balled up napkins, giving new meaning to "trashy art".
Lunch time sketch: The furniture near me and my coffee cup. With the cup, I tried to use only black, white, and one gray and in a sense doing a manual "posterize filter" like Photoshop does. Meh...
Lunch time sketch: more trash. I twisted a napkin into a "rose" of sorts, and then tried to draw a detail of the crumpled inside of a foil-lined chip bag. Note: drawing foil is hard.
A series of abstract sketch concepts, some focused on grids and patterns.
More pattern fun. I like effect of patterns with subtle organic inconsistencies. I think when you can tell something is mechanical, your eye knows not to scan them all. But with minor undulations in line and tone, an otherwise boring pattern has a bit more life to it. I'd like to explore this idea in a series of full sized paintings.
Logo design concepts and sketches for the Office of Religious Education in the Diocese of Providence.
Small, detailed study on improvised composition of light and dark slowly built up. This is about 2 inches square.
Improvised street scene sketch. I wondered how repeating certain improvised elements would work in a more realisitc application.
Sketch of a ripped napkin, a simple study in tonal values.
Very loose sketch, a study of tonal values of a crumpled napkin (my favorite lunch time prop) done with quick cross-hatching.
Abstract pencil sketch study of improvised composition, built in layers. I like the idea of transparency of abstract shapes and would like to explore this in a larger work, possibly charcoal.
Well folks, that’s it for now! More to come as I take the time to collect more sketches as the sketchbook fills up! I hope this was, at the least, interesting!
that’s some pretty cool stuff doug. I see everything in low contrast. Is that from the medium used or from the scan. I like your napkin sketches.
Hi Brian: the medium on all these is a #2 pencil, usually a mechanical one. Graphite at best gets to about a 60% black, which is what you see. I could have played with each scan attempting to increase the contrast, but they all would have come out a bit differently and taken a long time. Instead, we have here just the raw scans. My scanner could be better though…
My favorite still-life is the couches…
Some real great stuff here, great for inspiration ! Nice post.
Thanks Erik. I’ll do another batch as soon as enough interesting doodle crop up…