How do you get from photo to canvas?

[Mike McCarty]

I have done some very complex drawings in this fashion, including hands and difficult perspective renderings.

One thing that helps me a great deal in this regard is the ruler that I use. It is a 16 inch ruler measured in tenths of an inch. Along with each tenth being indicated with numbers up to 160. I will typically measure to within a half (20th of an inch) of the indicated marks.

I will also create a spread sheet with the calculations to the scale I am working on with a precision to a twentieth of an inch. So as I make my measurement on the photo, I can glance over at my printed spread sheet and quickly get the translated equivilent. If I'm working from an 8x10 to a 16x20 I can do the math in my head but if I am going up by 2.37, well, my mind just isn't that quick.

Within an hour or so I can complete a drawing and be very confident of the accuracy. But, as mentioned above, the drawing gets screwed up, and this is where this method comes in handy. You can be as bold as you want with your paint onto the original drawing knowing that you can get back to any point with confidence.

[Michele Rushworth]

Instead of creating a spreadsheet for scaling up from your reference you can get what is called a "proportion wheel". It does the calculations for you and has been used by illustrators for decades.

Another useful measuring device is a pair of calipers. This is especially helpful if you blow your reference up to painting size. You can measure the distance between the eyes on the reference and then move the calipers over to the painting. You don't even have to make a mental note that it's 17/20ths of an inch or anything like that.

[Jean Kelly]

I use basically the same method as Mike. As a drafter and designer of ductwork (haha) and boiler systems I easily think and draw to scale. But I only mark the most important landmarks and use a very rough sketch, and I still screw up all the time.

Jean

[Geary Wootten]

One of the easiest/best methods on the transfer of larger images comes from the training I got as a sign painter. It's the method, I understand, that came by way of Michaelangelo as recorded in his procedures of transferring images for the work at the Sistine Chapel. It's called a Pounce Pattern.

A pounce pattern is when you make perforations in paper by pressing into the paper a small pointed wheel (or an "Electro-pounce" which burns tiny holes in the paper) around the outlines of your image. You then take the paper image full of tiny holes and tape it to your substrate and bounce and rub powdered charcoal in a cloth bag, through the holes onto the area. You take the paper away....voila!....nice dotted outlines for you to spray fixative or redraw in permanent sepia pen. You can make registration marks from where you taped the paper and go back and re-pounce if necessary.

To make the best undistorted pouce patterns on the planet...is to print them out on your printer. You can blow up your image to any size you want....even a billboard size.....and "tile" the pages together and your in business.

Dick Blick, whom we all know and love, has been an excellent provider of sign making materials since day one.

Here's there page on pounce wheels.....http://www.dickblick.com/zz289/11/pr...m=0&ig_id=2724

And pounce powder and a nifty pad they sell. (in lieu of just wadding up a pile of powder in a rag and tying it off) http://www.dickblick.com/zz289/10/pr...m=0&ig_id=2720

Blick used to sell the Electro Pounce...but I couldn't find it on their site....so here's what it looks like - http://www.pacificcoastsignsupply.com/catalog/pg_75.htm

-Gear

[Mike McCarty]

Another useful measuring device is a pair of calipers. This is especially helpful if you blow your reference up to painting size. You can measure the distance between the eyes on the reference and then move the calipers over to the painting. You don't even have to make a mental note that it's 17/20ths of an inch or anything like that.

Michele,

I don't understand how that works. If you are creating a canvas 2.5 times the size of your reference, how does the caliper know that.

With the method I use I only make measurements from the edge of the reference, I would rarely take internal measurements like between the eyes.

BTW - If I need a spreadsheet, because of some odd ratio of say 2.35, I only change that one determining factor in my spreedsheet then print it out.

[Mike Dodson]

Mike,

I use a measuring tool that is called proportional dividers. You simply check your reference with one end of the dividers and make your mark on your canvas or paper using the opposite. The center screw can be adjusted to what ever ratio you desire. Attached is a commercial set. I use a set that I made. I typically mark a vertical and horizontal line across the center of my reference and then do the same on my canvas. I then measure everything from the center of the two "cross-hairs" and transfer the measurements over. You just simply use the opposite end of the dividers that you are measuring with to make your mark on the canvas. The accuracy is dead on.

[Mike McCarty]

I can see benefit to this cross hair method.

Also, I can see that your method could give you a true "distance," but, how does it give you direction?

It's true I have to take two measurements for each point but this gives me both distance and direction to a specific point. Triangulation, I think it would be called.

[Allan Rahbek]

Originally Posted by Mike Dodson

Mike,

I use a measuring tool that is called proportional dividers. You simply check your reference with one end of the dividers and make your mark on your canvas or paper using the opposite. The center screw can be adjusted to what ever ratio you desire. Attached is a commercial set. I use a set that I made. I typically mark a vertical and horizontal line across the center of my reference and then do the same on my canvas. I then measure everything from the center of the two "cross-hairs" and transfer the measurements over. You just simply use the opposite end of the dividers that you are measuring with to make your mark on the canvas. The accuracy is dead on.

Hi Mike.

I believe this is "The Tool".

I am working on one too. Since you have made one yourself I would like to ask what size you think is the optimal. The length of the legs ????
I have measured on my model, and think that about 15" is close to what I need.

Allan

[Sharon Knettell]

Hi,

I work both from life and photos.

I use the grid method for photos as I like to elongate my figures, especially the standing ones. I use an 8 head reference as opposed to a 7.5 head measurement.

I use the head length as my basic unit of measurement and create grids relating to that size. The head is one grid unit, the armpits two, the waist three, the crotch four, mid-thigh five, kneecap bottom six, mid-calf seven, weight-bearing heel eight. I extend the grid horizontally as well.

This way of measurement is usefull for standing figures from life as well. For figures that are seated, I use the sight-size method. I find photos really distort seated figures, even with good portrait lenses.

I do my initial drawing smaller than the painting I intend to do as I work rather large. I do an accurate outline of my study, and have what is known as a "shaco" made. It is a linear enlargement, it is what architechs use. It is not a blueprint, but a nice black and white outline on paper. They can print it on transparent vellum as well. I then trace this to my canvas or panel.

I hope this helps.

[Joan Breckwoldt]

"I use the grid method for photos as I like to elongate my figures, especially the standing ones."


Sharon, what do you mean by elongating the figure? Do you mean the height proportion is exaggerated? Hmm, this is an interesting if I understand your meaning correctly. Thank you for that bit of information.

Joan