Purpose: To develop "field" sketching techniques, focusing on the key identification elements of either Chinook salmon or longnose gar.
Outcomes: Students will create a number of sketches, including key aspects of their fish, e.g., fins, mouth, eye area, natural poses that their fish may take, and habitat components to be included in their final drawing.
Subject: Visual Arts, Science, Biology (Ecology)
Group size: Class
Site: Classroom; computer lab
Time: 45 minutes, plus field exploration time
Supplies: sketching materials, scrap paper for journals
Before the activity: assemble journals if students aren’t to do them; do several image searches and list good images for students to see
Reference: See References, Activity 3
A QUICK LOOK
Students will conduct a "field" exploration, creating and keeping a "field journal" of sketches that will be used later to help them draw key elements of their final image.
READY, SET, GO!
Explain that it is now time to start planning their actual drawing or painting of a Chinook salmon or longnose gar. Indicate that wildlife artists often start the way they have, by researching their subject and assembling images. Often, the next step is a field trip to the actual habitat, with field sketches of the habitat and, if they're lucky, the actual animal. Fish artists will don SCUBA gear and explore underwater, sketching on waterproof "slates", taking underwater photos or video and just observing the interactions of their subject and its environment. They will also bring their subjects back with them, keeping them in aquaria for observation and sketching before returning them to the wild.
Suggest that it would be difficult to take a whole class underwater, especially at this time of year. Instead, students will take a virtual field trip, applying sketching techniques to their discoveries as they go along.
Introduce field journal keeping by having students first practice some sketching techniques:
- practice gesture sketching (http://www.artgraphica.net/free-art-lessons/wetcanvas/gesture-sketches/gesture-sketches.htm) in quick, timed (5-30 second) sketches of stationary objects
- try quick behavioural sketches of fish in aquaria, birds at feeding stations, etc.
- introduce contour sketching using hand-held objects, looking only at the object and drawing one continuous line for the entire sketch; gradually increase "peeking" to 25% of the time
- draw generic fish, or fish shapes, beginning with two inter-locking arcs to establish a basic "streamlined" shape¹ ; modify into sinuous shapes using flattened, asymmetrical figure-eights to show fish turning or swimming, or change the shape of the arc to produce various fish body types. Add basic body parts to the better shapes.
Provide or have students create "field journals", which may be as simple as squares of scrap paper stapled together. At the top of each page they should note the date, time, location, and any details about the type of drawing and the source of their work.
Armed with their field journals, the students are ready to begin their virtual trip. Trip "locations" could include:
- Image searches using web tools such as Google and Yahoo, focusing on good photographs of living fish, accurate biological drawings and artwork of fish in natural settings.²
- Image searches in fishing or outdoors magazines (In-Fisherman, Outdoor Canada, Real Fishing, Ontario Out of Doors) - credible fish art lies within!
- Aquaria that contain their own or similar species. Note: fish may be collected and kept for short periods of time using Scientific Collectors' Permits, available from Ministry of Natural Resources District Offices. Speak directly to the Office about the limitations of the permit and likely fish locations. Keeping fish of this type for any length of time requires some skill and experience; unless fish can be kept at reasonably low temperatures, they will have to be acclimated to cold conditions again before being returned to the wild.
- Commercial aquaria or zoos.
Sketching topics should include:
- Elements of the fish that set it apart from others, e.g., fin size and location, mouth shape, size and structure, general body shape (including head-on views) and colour patterns.
- Important habitat components.
- Ways to simulate movement or natural fish positions.
- Interesting points of view from which to create their image.
Indicate that their sketchbooks will provide the "notes" that they will use to create their final artwork.
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¹ ©2003, The Inquiry Net, www.inquiry.net: In addition to any Copyright still held by the original authors, the Scans, Optical Character Recognition, extensive Editing, and HTML Coding on this Website are the property of the Webmaster, Rick Seymour. My work may be used freely by individuals for non-commercial, non-web-based activities, such as Scouting, research, teaching, and personal use so long as this copyright statement is included in the text.
² See References in Activity 3 for this type of art.
