Drawing to Teach: The iPad as Sketch Pad (sPad?)

So… Here I am in ART-101, learning field sketching. The Syllabus lists all sorts of supplies for this class, which I’ve all totaled cost $200 at Michaels.

I purchase two books. The book for the class is “The Art of Field Sketching” by Clare Walker Leslie and “Drawing textbook: The teaching and utilization of drawing for educational purposes” by Bruce McIntyre. This book consists of a series of exercises that teach basic drawing techniques.

At this point, I’ve spent a total of four hours drawing with paper and pencil and the iPad with a pressure sensitive stylus. As part of my class, I was required to sketch a small part of various plant. Part of the exercise was to sketch the plant using three different techniques:

Memory: Look at the subject for as long as you’d like - then make the sketch from memory.

Contour: Only look at the subject as you draw using one continuous line, i.e. not lifting pencil from the paper (or stylus from glass).

Gesture: Sketch the object as quickly as possible using a minimal amount of lines.

Differences between paper/pencil and iPad/stylus:

Touch: Pencil on paper gives quite a bit of feedback from the vibrations going through the pencil as it grinds along the paper. The stylus, on the other hand, gives a consistent, smooth drag. The lack of feedback from the stylus makes it harder to accurately draw using contour (continuous line).

Sound: You can hear the pencil on the paper. This feedback also helps when contour drawing.

Consistency: One advantage for the iPad is consistency. The pencil doesn’t change shape with use and the paper doesn’t change feel with humidity.

Price: If you don’t include the price of the iPad, it’s much cheaper to learn how to draw using an iPad than with paper and pencils. The price for all the art supplies was around $200. The price for the pressure sensitive stylus is $80. I also purchased several different drawing apps for around $40. Unlike the pencils and paper, the iPad’s “pencils” won’t wear out.

Size: An iPad drawing is limited to the size of the iPad – sort of. While you can’t make the iPad’s screen bigger, you can magnify the area you’re drawing in, giving you a “virtually” larger area. However, you can’t see the entire page the way you can with an 11” x 17” sheet of paper.