[Dekard]

Watching the featurettes on The Punisher movie..

it had a small featurette on how Tim Bradstreet does his art. He shoots the image via photography, then traces the image onto velum? kinda like tracing paper then puts it on paper then inks it.

This suprised me alot for some reason. I thought these guys bled talent, make no mistake his art and covers are AWESOME, and much like alot of folks in this forum, that use similiar techniques and people think they are less talented for tracing a photo and coloring it. Just wanted to bring attention to the fact that tracing a photo and adding your own element to the design is still art.

Art is art it's how you put your personality into it.. I guess.

[Dekard]

http://www.punisher-art.com/artists/bradstreet/bradstreet.htm

[Gort]

It's not uncommon.

While studying illustration in college, my professor (an ACCD Pasadena grad), taught to trace photos as a technique for accuracy. Believe me - we were all a bit surprised by this, but his take on it was that it was a tool. Norman Rockwell used the same technique often (projected a slide on the canvas and outlined the object / subject)
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[UnFocuzed]

My professor for digital art 2d design when i told him i wanted to learn digital painting the first thing he said is. Reference photo and trace. Apparently in painting 1 which i was interested in taking here also they tell u that tracing or projecting onto ur canvas is an accurate thing and said why just sketch the picture when you can trace the image to be more accurate.

[Impaler]

Give two people the same photo to trace, you'll get two different drawings. That's the very nature of artistic expression. The personal human touch is what makes something art, not the means to the end.

Old painters used a camera obscura for portraits and landscapes. I don't see how that's any different than tracing.
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[Gort]

[Capt. Fred]

Legitimate though it may be, I don't like tracing anyway. I like the drawing process, and think the paint-by-numbers approach of drawing by tracing might kill some of the fun. I guess this is commercial stuff, so it's not all about drawing for fun.

I would have thought though that by tracing, slight inaccuracies are going to accentuate flatnes, whereas, by studying/thinking/whatever, innaccuracies will more likely be relevant to the form and subject matter. I suppose my point is a bad trace will look like a bad drawing, but a bad study can just look like an alternative drawing. Which in itself isn't all that relevant to the thread. nevermind.

[eyewoo]

There's tracing and there's tracing... There are so many ways to use it. Below is an example using it to simply and quickly layout an initial composition. Notice in the trace that the child's hand has been relocated so she is grasping the girl's finger. And the woman in yellow has been made more pregnant. Once the trace is done, the painting begins... A stage in that part of the process can be seen in the third panel.



And here is tracing as a final end...



The way I see it, it's a tool to be used in whatever way helps the artist get to a finished picture. And Capt... I don't agree that it is just for commercial use. There are many "fine" artists, realists and otherwise (Eakins, Vermeer, Hockney, etc) who have used tracing as part of their process. I'm sure it depends on the personality of each artist. For example you write that you like the drawing process. I, OTOH, don't like it. I like the color and painting, working with light, etc... so my preference is to get through the drawing as quickly and efficiently as possible.
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[watmough]

as a tattooer,i trace everyday.really,i guess,because its the final product that is important,and not the process of how you get there.
in my personal work,however,the end product is not as important as the process,so....i dont trace.(i have in the past,however)
capt fred,i understand what youre saying,i think,and i agree with you.but,i REALLY enjoy drawing,so it makes me biased.but youre right,when you trace,or even work from a photo for that matter,it does kinda set the tone for the whole piece,whereas if you draw from life,you seem to have more leeway with the shapes.
and eyewoo,i dont mind tracing at all,as i said i do it everyday,but for me in my personal work ,just isnt what i want to do.to each his own.
on a side note,ive seen ALOT of tattooers trace amazingly poorly,so.....drawing skill needs to be there in some capacity.

[Capt. Fred]

yeah, i think because I like to draw, i leaped to the conclusion that if you're missing that part out and tracing then you must have a schedule to keep, and standards that need to be met as quickly and simply as possible. I can see that if you don't like it then you're not going to want to dwell on that stage.

But isn't it restrictive sometimes, if you like to go the tracing way?
If you want to paint something fictional or conveying lots of movement or whatever, or if just for control and freedom, is not made very difficult, or even impossible by requiring some photographic material to launch from?

Of course I'm at a stage where I don't have control or freedom in drawing, but I suppose it would seem disappointing to me if I didn't feel someday i could acquire that freedom for designing and inventing and composing. Thoughts anyone?

[eyewoo]

[Frog]

The biggest problem with tracing is that it leaves little room for interpretation. You can't stylise or elongate figures, something even realists might want to do for creative reasons.

For instance "real" people can look a bit lumpen in photographs, especially since we are so used to seeing tall thin models in adverts all the time. So when drawing a character you might want to idealise them slightly, drawing freely makes this a lot easier, even if you are using reference.
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[eyewoo]

[watmough]

hey,eyewoo........ive been thinking about this ALOT and....okay..when i work on my digital stuff,(and even traditional for that matter)i re-use drawings that i have SCANNED.sometimes,i even print them onto paper and re-work them.
how does that fit into this discussion?(i know it does,somehow)
i know its kind of the opposite of what we are talking about here(no tracing,actual mechanical reproduction to be re-worked).
you know,i use the copier at work,too!

[faB]

edit: summarized my thoughts, hopefully

About fear of drawing...

Something I realised of late is that when you paint and render form with values, it requires the same kind of attention, and precision than a 'correct' drawing. It may be harder to see the values accross the form, but nevertheless if you do not render values with the same dedication than you would render anatomy or perspective etc, your result will be just as flawed. By that I mean not just the value itself, but the placement of values, how you make the transition of values accross a form: that requires the same attention than of making the correct drawing.

Maybe by unifying drawing & painting and seeing each end as the beginning of the other end, the fear of drawing will go. Because right from the start, if you think that painting will be the easier part, that's flawed. That's flawed because in many ways, painting is drawing (i.e. correct placement of value shapes), and drawing is painting (i.e. there is NO line).

I am concerned that if an artist traces a photo, he is missing on the opportunity to select and understand what he is going to render and why. It will be very difficult to simplify like maybe Sargent does. I dont think Sargent even sketched out in details anything, I think he blocked in the main shapes and put attention into painting just as he would if drawing.

Tracing is definitely wrong if it comes from a fear of drawing.
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[eyewoo]

watmough... as I see, that is using the possible applications of the digital medium. Digital is pretty open ended, so yes, it seems to me your comment is quite relative.

faB... What you write is unassailable as long as the discussion is focused in on realism and observation.
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[cheney]

Van Eyck was thought to have invented camera obscura using mirrors, and as a result was the first artist to use tracing as a method for painting details. This would explain how Dutch painters developed a system of painting details that completely exceeded the abilities of Italian painters.
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[stacy]

The easiest way to learn to draw something correctly
by rote is to trace it first.

It's a good way to train your eye, hand
reflexes to memorize the proper relationships
and placement of things in life an nature.

Trace a lot to start, and quickly it will make
sense without tracing.

Go to a museum that shows old classic painters.
If you look closely you can see the remnants
of of grid lines on some of them.

Cheney's example is a prime one.

One of the best portrait/figurative artists I know uses
Photoshop to compose his pieces and sometimes,
(although not always) uses a digital projector
and his laptop to lay out silhouettes for accurate
comosition, and then fills in and finishes manually

I've also seen a friend who's maybe the best painter
I've ever know, move character's drawn on Velum
around utill the composition suited him, then he traces
that set onto another single sheet of Velum, and then moves it to
the canvas. It doesn't diminish him as a painter in
any way. Fer' instance, you can't 'trace' water but
look at this.
http://members.interfold.com/johnlencicki/paintings/pages/25.htm

It's not illegal. NO one will arrest you if you trace. Believe it or not.