Drawing: what is perspective?

2024 Author: Leah Sherlock | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 05:25

Before moving on to the question of what perspective is, the first thing to pay attention to is the meaning of the word. It comes from the Latin "perspicere", in translation - "to see clearly." This expression is used both to indicate a better future for a person or situation, and to show depth in the visual arts. The principles of understanding the second option were laid by the architect Brunelleschi from Italy. Since the end of the 15th century, a subject image as a result of visual distortion of size and volume, as well as shadows, has been called perspective. In other words, the perspective in the drawing conveys the subject image in real visual perception.

A related term in fine art is "horizon". In the visual arts, this concept is not something new. As always, the true horizon is the visual line of contact of the Earth (or sea) with the sky. An important aspect for this term in the drawing is the location of the horizon at eye level.

A simple understanding of the outlines of objects in perspective is also taughtat preschool age: everything that is further in the picture is smaller. What is perspective can be seen visually on the example of a road or railways. On the horizon, the sides of the road converge to one point. With the removal of the route towards the horizon, the pillars, the lanterns along its edges become shorter, thinner, proportionally smaller in all respects. The same happens with other objects and phenomena in the everyday world. If you extend all the horizontal lines, they will converge on the horizon line.

The term "vanishing point" is the place where all distant lines converge parallel to the horizon. It should be noted that if you look at the cube at an angle of 90 degrees (on one of its sides), then this side will not be subject to perspective contraction (since its entire plane is at the same distance from our eyes). If we turn the cube towards us with one of the faces, then two sides will be subject to perspective reduction at once. In this case, there are already two vanishing points.

The object can be either on the horizon line or below or above it. The horizon is a conditional line, the object that is closer (in the foreground) is larger. Accordingly, it covers part of the horizon line.

Let's continue to consider this on an object of a cubic or oblong shape, if the object is on the horizon line, in contact with it. As shown in the figure, we cannot see the top, bottom sides, just like the next two. Note one more point: bringing the object closer to the foreground, you can see that the vanishing pointsapproach each other, making the vanishing lines steeper. Accordingly, moving away - the opposite is true. If the object is above the horizon line, there are three visible sides, vanishing point connections, as before, two.

What is perspective, how to convey it in a drawing, many subconsciously understand. Having understood the concept of "perspective" in the picture, everyone will be able to more correctly convey the location and scale of objects in space, for example, the location of cabinets after repair or windows in an extension to their own house.

Next, let's look at how to draw perspective in complex objects. By the principle of the above, the rule applies to all protruding corners (details): the lower the object is below the horizon, the closer the vanishing points and the steeper the vanishing angles. Another important aspect for drawing a room: there is only one horizon for an object, but each object in the drawing can have two vanishing points (on the same line, strictly for this composition).

So, we figured out what perspective is, but to fully convey the idea of what we saw, we need one more tool - a shadow. To do this, we determine the light source, then find the lowest corners of the structure. Let's extend the vanishing lines of these corners to the edges of the picture and, as we move away from the structure, we will reduce the intensity of the shadow. The farther the object is from the horizon and from the light source, the longer the shadow.

Create and enjoy your creation!