Perspective Grid Comics And Drawings

  • My late foster brother Rafael had a Cuban proverb he used to quote to me: “El vago trabajo doble”, which translates to “the lazy one works twice”, which I take to mean that if you’re lazy and skip steps, you’re going to have to work twice as hard fixing all your mistakes later. For me, this proverb comes up a LOT, because I am by no means a systematic or methodical worker. The latest proof of that is today’s subject, a series of posts I’ve been putting up over the course of the last few years on my Patreon page.

    David Chelsea is reading: She Said: Breaking the Sexual Harassment Story That Helped Ignite a Movement
    by Jodi Kantor & Megan Twohey

    These are drawings and comics drawn over perspective grids which were included as a bonus disc with my second perspective book Extreme Perspective! in 2011. Where I screwed up is in not treating them as a proper series from the beginning, and including links to navigate through them in order. ¡El vago so yoy!

    Perspective Grid

    So, I spent a few hours this weekend rectifying my mistake, and now you can view the entire perspective grid series free on Patreon, beginning with the first (actually it begins with a plain grid, so don’t be thrown):

    I usually include three stages of work in my posts: the initial perspective grid, the finished drawing over the grid, and the final art with the underlying grid removed, as in this fisheye view:

    Most of these were drawn in Photoshop on my computer because I was recording video of the drawing process for my perspective instruction series, and it was easier to get clean-looking results recording from my screen than shooting video over my drawing board. However, now that I have a spiffy new iPad and a ring light, the videos I shoot look good enough that I’m switching to paper for the foreseeable. Here’s the most recent:

    As I mentioned, these drawings usually have an accompanying speed demo video, though not always. Perspective videos stay behind a paywall on my Patreon page for about a year before I release them for free on Youtube.

    Here are the perspective grid videos that are up as of today:




    Oh, and check out Extreme Perspective! to see the full selection of perspective grids.

    After you read through the perspective series, maybe look at some of the other comics I’ve posted to Patreon, like Call Slip Comics, End Strips , and Dream Stuff, a long story based on my dreams. If you’re feeling flush, maybe from your COVID check, maybe sign up as a supporter and see all the stuff that’s behind a paywall, including sketchbook pages, work in progress, and all the most recent speed demo videos!