Fashion Sketching with iPad apps (videos)
Last night I shared fashion sketching examples from my ipad created with Procreate app during my weekly live zoom group. Fashion Sketch Group is about drawing from OBSERVATION: drawing from something we are looking at.
TODAY’S EXAMPLES ARE SOMETHING DIFFERENT–
FASHION SKETCHING FROM OUR IMAGINATION
Today’s fashion illustrations don’t come from looking at anything, pictures, photos or models. (I recommend drawing lots and lots of clothes and looks that you are looking at and observing, in order to build your vocabulary and confidence).
Today’s fashion sketches all came from my imagination this week, using Procreate app on my iPad pro.
Take a peek at the short video below to see the sped-up version of my process from blank page, to lightly laying out figures, and then dressing them with silhouettes, design details, colors, textures, seams and the line and shadow that makes it all “pop.”
I always create my shadow tone by taking my base color and adding some black into it.
Designing with flares
Fashion Designing with color blocking, gathers and drapes
One of the reasons I like to use Procreate app for sketching with my iPad is to get these timelapse videos to share with you.
I also enjoy that it allows me to “paint” while i’m sitting on the train or airplane, or curled up in the corner of my sofa, leaving my paint palette, water cup, and brushes aside for the evening.
Here you can see that it’s the same designer (me:0) but a different side/ mood/ approach.
See the video below to catch the timelapse replay of the designing process from taking a simple standing fashion figure, then cutting and pasting it across the page and “dressing her”.
COLOR BLOCKING
Color blocking is an approach to fashion design that I often turn to because it always fascinates me how the clothes I’ve already sketched TAKE ON A NEW LIFE when the panels or construction elements are broken up into different pieces and colorations.
You can also see that I started with an asymmetrical look, but that the rest of the looks took on symmetrical detailing with gathered panels of blue.
Thoughts that go through my head while design sketching
I always want to give you useful tips to consider in your fashion sketches.
I always fully recommend sketching with fabric swatches in your hand so that you know exactly what you are working with.
Because I took all of the blue and black dress design sketches/ croquis (ABOVE) from my imagination, I am STILL trying so hard to decide whether these fabrics are knit or woven ,or a mix of the two.
This is not recommended. I watch my students suffer so much when they sketch without holding a piece of fabric that EXISTS IN THEIR HAND! It makes a huge difference in how they draw and design.
I’m also considering that the blue fabrics could be slightly sheer (chiffon- woven, or stretch tulle-knit– for example), while draped and tacked onto a base fabric that is thick and stretchy like a double-knit. BETTER TO DESIGN BASED ON FABRICS THAT YOU HAVE ALREADY DEFINED.
MULTI -USE COLORS
I also want you to notice how I took the blue brush from my color palette for this fashion collection, and used it for accessories, eye makeup, and some graphic details to add to the background and compose my “presentation”.
the Final Four Fashion Sketches
My ipad Pro had died and I just got my hands on a new/used one, so I’ve been sketching a LOT in Procreate app this week as we were reunited.
HONESTLY Procreate has never been my favorite app for iPad fashion illustration, but since so many of my students are already using it, I am exploring it fully so I can at least understand what they are dealing with.
This last collection of fashion sketches (BELOW) also features four looks, using crisp pleats and panels as the main design details along with color blocking effects.
It’s late November as I’m sketching these, so I’m pretending it’s summer. These warm-weather sketches are keeping me warm.
Where to go from here?
A digital sketchbook is both a blessing and a curse. lol.
Procreate app, for example, offers so much freedom to explore fashion illustration and design ideation. So many brushes and tools, unlimited colors and textural effects, and the ability to do and undo your ideas while in the process of exploring ideas. This is wonderful, but can be completely ovewhelming to have so many choices.
ONE OF THE MOST POWERFUL THINGS I TEACH IS HOW TO FILTER OUT THE NOISE OF TOO MANY OPTIONS and how liberating that is.
LAYERS
Layers give us another kind of freedom too, where we can color and recolor our color sketches into various fabric and color stories on layers that lie behind or under our pencil sketches. Layers in digital apps mean we can throw all kinds of paint onto a drawing without permanently altering the original drawing. A
BUT, GLASS IS FLAT.
And these groups of sketches are just 4 looks.
REFABRICATING
What I would recommend after working up some sketches like this is to add your fabric patterns and colors to the illustration using a separate layer.
Then, you can even try different fabric stories into the same set of designs, if that interests you! You can “hide” the layers you had painted, paint with the new colors, and then switch out whichever ones you want to print or share. Choose your favorites!
TAKE A THEME YOU LOVE AND KEEP GOING!
Now that you’ve got the seeds of your collection, keep growing it!
Take the pieces you love and develop some black and white flat sketches where we can see the whole garment front and back, planning all of the fashion design garment construction details such as closures, seams and finishes.
You can add written and verbal notes, too, on your pages!.
FABRICATIONS
DEFINITELY add your fabric swatches to the pages, as well as any reference or inspiration photos and images or processes that support and “feed” your concept.
THE LAW OF NUMBERS: my FORMULA for designing
ALWAYS ALWAYS allow yourself, EXPECT yourself, to sketch more looks than you need, so that you can really LIVE IN the fashion design collection and catch the ideas that build momentum and flow more and more as you contemplate it.
Sketching more looks than are required for a project frees you up to EDIT OUT all of the sketches that don’t fit in or that you don’t love.
TELL A FASHION STORY TO BRING IT ALL TO LIFE
Light, dark, shadow, sparkle and form
Don’t forget that whatever colors you are working in, varying the light, dark, highlight, shine creates three dimensional form and texture on any image…. see the digital Procreate app model drawing above, from Fashion Sketch Group , that I created on my Ipad.
You can always use grey or black to create tonal levels for shading within your fashion illustration, no mater if what media you are using.
HAPPY CREATING!
Come join a course and invest in your growth and advancement in this incredible art form.
WHAT YOU WILL DISCOVER!!!!!
WIthin you?
Love
Laura
