Drawing Activities

 Drawing Activities 

The start of the new semester has brought a strange start to the academic year. Same things needed to be taught but in a completely strange and different way. 

New Covid19 regulations meant we had to split the cohort up into groups of 6 or less. Thanks to the numbers being 36, this was easy to do and we were also able to put them into groups designated for their accommodation as well, which really helped the situation. 

Week 1 saw the students learning to draw perspective around the university Campus and from the top of the Flaxman Building. Teaching in smaller groups outside made the job really easy and fun. Luckily we also had the weather on our side as well!

Week 2 

Nature Reserve

Once again forcing us to change our initial ideas, we looked at other places where the students could drawing with in the safety of our university campus. Who would have know that there was a Nature Reserve around the back of the Campus where the student accommodation is. The students didn't know, and to be honest, working here for 16 odd years, neither did I.  The additional lesson on campus, enabled us to press home the group of 6 rule for students, so when they did leave the campus for the other drawing sessions this was more ingrained into their learning. 

The great thing about the nature reserve is that, last week we had drawn buildings and man made environments  and this week we were looking at natural landscapes 

Week 3 

Stoke Minster and the Town Hall

This week saw the 1st Years leaviong the safety of the university campus and venturing down the road and into Stoke Town Centre. At Stokes Heart in the Minster which is directly across from the Town Hall. This time we were looking for Establishing shots. Earlier we had done a drone fly past of the minster to look at possible locations 

Week 4 

A walk along the Canal

Final, venturing further a field and to check the students abilities to read a map, we sent them out into the heart of Stoke-on-Trent to look and draw along the canal to the marina in Festival Park. The point here was to get them drawing and observing life along the canal which took them past the Etruria Industrial Museum.  

Cymbeline

Drama Drawing 2 

These plays are running slightly out of order than the ones we did them in!. This is another one of William Shakespeare plays Cymbeline. This was drawn during a technical rehearsal and is something that we had never done before. The light was low, so the students were basically drawing similar to blind contour. Which was a good way to go for those who hadn't done it for some time.  

The scene above was made up of everyone's individual drawings that were scanned in to produce this interesting scene above. The idea came from a drawing by Jason Brindley (below) that showed a scene which once again dictated the way the action flowed from right to left!

Below are some of the actual shots from the play, not the dress rehearsal, performed by the Drama Students of 2018 

Drama Drawing

Drama Drawing 

As a different way to look at drawing and sequential art, cartoon and Comic Art students teamed up with Drama students who were rehearsing their final year plays, to draw the action as it flowed. 
Here are some of the Sketches and images from their performances 
Below are the Scenes from 2 Noble Kins Men 

Above shows an amalgamation of work submitted. 

Scenes performed by Drama Students of graduating Year 2018

Below are some of the student sketches to the rehearsal 

                        

Above The image tries to project the flow of the scene, in this case from right to left! 

Below are photos taken of the students who drew the rehearsal 

Drink and Draw with Comic Artist

Comic Artist Come to Town and take part in Drink and Draw!

We were happy to invite David Lyttleton, Paul McCaffrey and Lissy Rainsley to our extra curriculum activity of Drink and Draw. Mainly for 3rd Year students, we did invite other cohorts to join in the fun. After a long day teaching, we introduced a little light relief for both visiting professionals and students alike. Inviting them to the Student Union bar along College Road (The Ember Lounge) 

this was a fun event held for like minded individuals to engage with the visiting professionals on a more intimate level and also allowed the students to experience an more relaxed and informal environment for them to take part in a fun activity. 

students gather in the Ember Lounge to get ready to draw 

First drawing is of me at the Doctor 

Some of the students turn up wearing a bit of a cosplay to allow students to draw something simple. The environment allowed students to drink, eat and chat as they went about their work