Perspective in Observational Sketching


Based on my experience, students tend to create a perspective that is a bit higher than normal human eye view but not entirely as an aerial eye view perspective. When it comes to observational sketching, it is appropriate to create human eye level observation if the observer point is at the regular eye level. I have been creating video tutorials to teach students how to draw perspective in the hopes that these videos will help students to practice making a perspective at eye level.

To create a perspective drawing at eye level, knowing where and how to establish a horizontal line is the gateway to a good perspective. Please refer to the graphite sketch of my watercolor painting. In this sketch,

Sketch after Joseph Zbukvic’s watercolor painting

1. I first established the horizontal line.

2. Next, I defined the vanishing point on the horizontal line. This is one point perspective.

3. Finally, I drew a few human figures as a scale reference object before I began to establish the building scale based on the human scale figures. It is important to know that all the human figure heads will need to be located on the horizontal line. Please also visit the video tutorial on how to establish building scale based on human scale figures.

If you follow these guidelines as an initial start of your perspective drawing practice, you should at least have a good structure to further develop your sketch into more detail.