continuous line drawings

I love doing these - they have a quality I like very much. Although they are really an exercise designed to improve observational skills they sometimes result in interesting drawings. I do all my continuous line drawings without looking at the paper, but this is optional. Sometimes I add details afterwards, to make a drawing work.

Of course continuous line drawings do not have to be observational - any kind of drawing can be made with a single line - I’ll be posting some other kinds and a ‘how to’ soon -  so keep checking, or send me an email if you’d like to be notified when I post.

For illustration work, more information about continuous line drawing - or just to say hi, email me at: continuousline[at]gmail.com

How to do Continuous Line Drawings

Continuous line drawings are essentially a way of improving observational drawing skills, so you may do many many drawings before you produce anything you actually like. As with all other drawing exercises, the first rule is to let go of the desire to ‘make pictures’. This frees you to engage with the process, rather than be fixated on the idea that you are ‘making art’ and must produce something worth displaying every time you put pen to paper.

The second rule is to expand your ideas about what drawing is . For many people drawing is limited to representation: the drawing must ‘look like’ whatever it is that is being drawn - in fact, no drawing looks like the thing it depicts - we have just learned to read and interpret certain signs and symbols in certain ways. The one thing every drawing does look like is…another drawing, because all drawings are made of marks on some kind of surface. So drawings as physical objects are simply marks made on a surface - whether you enjoy looking at a particular drawing depends on whether you particularly like a certain arrangement of marks made in a certain way or combination of ways. This doesn’t mean we cannot distinguish between skill levels - but it does mean that a drawing made in what some may consider a child like manner, or even an ‘ugly’ way, may have been made so deliberately. Essentially drawing is a language, a means of communication.

But drawing is also process: an act of doing and making - an engagement with the world, either of our imaginations or the external world of objects. In the latter case it is also a form of research - a way of finding out about whatever it is we are observing. And continuous line drawings are very much about research - they will increase your observational skills, but they will also increase your knowledge and expand your perception.

‘There are no lines in nature’ Ruskin wrote, and of course he’s right, there aren’t, so making a line drawing of any kind means looking for like places to impose a line. External contours are the easiest place to begin - and scenes rather than single objects:

Cafes are one of my favourite places to sit and draw, mainly because I like drawing people, but they also provide a good environment for continuous line exercises. If you click on this thumbnail you will see that rather than try and depict one person I have looked for a continuous line around the cafe - from left: a man, his partner (half a face), a chair, a second grouping with a man in profile drinking a coffee. This was a ‘warm up’ a drawing done just to get going. So, I suggest you begin by taking yourself to a cafe - chains are good, because you can linger over a single coffee - sitting yourself down, and beginning by looking for the line which links one person to another - it will be there. You may need, for example, to draw the outline of a head, then part of an arm, a chair back, and leg down to the floor, across the floor, then up the next chair leg and across an empty table…use anything and everything, but whatever you do keep your pen on the paper - double back a little, if you need to, but keep the line going, until you just cannot go any further. Don’t be scared to keep layering over your drawing as I did below- this can produce interesting effects sometimes - effects you might want to exploit deliberately in future work. It’s up to you whether you look at the paper or not - I suggest you do at first, then try without looking and see how you get on.

The above drawing was made at my local train station - it is full of diagonals, and to me very interesting because modern bridges and walkways have been layered over the original Victorian brick bridge and buildings - I wanted to try and capture something of that in this drawing.

I drew the people on a bus whilst I was waiting for the bus to leave the bus station - you can draw anywhere and everywhere: below are more cafe drawings, not all continuous line (I added more lines/details afterwards) - more an attempt to capture something of the characters of the people.

Below are some slightly more complex continuous line drawings - all of these are solely continuous line:

A family on the bus

A car

Some faces

As you practise, begin to incorporate internal contours as well - like these faces and the car, these are more complex - you’ll see why, when you do some!
As with anything it is practise which is important - and space to draw: don’t try and work in a little pocket sketchbook, you and your drawings will suffocate. Use an A4 book, or an A5 landscape so you can draw panoramic scenes - and yes, draw across the two pages - let your drawings fill plenty of space.