Sighting the Object of Artistic Representation
From bib. source
[…], lining up and sighting[sic] are the keys to reproducing […] relative placement and proportion with accuracy.
The process of sighting applies to a reference object which one wishes to artistically represent or derive inspiration from, and involves a step called “lining up¨ which itself involves finding (Garcia 2003, 48):
From bib. source
This line is known as a sight line and is invisible, as it is an imaginary line that describes the relative position of two points, objects, etc., to each other (Ibid).
A common aid to use for sighting is a pencil, but other extended or elongated objects may serve as rough reference frames for the straightness of lines within our field of view (Garcia 2003, 48-49):
From bib. source
Squint while you hold a pencil vertically and scan the room around you. Make sure your head follows the vertical as it moves. Bring the contour edge of the top part of your pencil up to the contour edge of another object. Look down the pencil vertical to see if an edge or feature of another shape touches this vertical.
What is being measured
Holding “up to the contour edge¨ here means from the given distance, as what is important is how the object is seen from one’s particular point of view, i.e. how the object is projected upon the plane that is the optical field of view (see 20241102174153-Drawing_qua_Sensory_Recording for background).
So, in sum, the process of sighting involves the following (Ibid):
- Lining up, i.e. taking two points hypothesized to be aligned straight with each other
- Moving or turning your head along with the movement of the frame of reference object for rotational degree of lines in the outside world
- Holding the edge of the frame of reference object, that itself is perpendicular to the ground, against the contour edge or feature of another shape, such that it acts as an external plumbline or level for what is in our field of view (for background, see 20250115214726-Analyzing_Symmetry_in_Visual_Art)
It is important to note that sighting can also help with intuiting the relative size (and by extension, scale and proportion) of objects in our field of view (Garcia 2003, 49). The following process of getting the size of a partner’s head and then using this rough measurement as itself a unit for measuring the rest of their body exemplifies the use of sighting for (relative) sizing (Ibid):
From bib. source
[…] shimmy your thumb and forefinger down the pencil to a point aligned with your partner’s chin […]. The space between your pencil point and your thumb and forefinger will mark the length of your partner’s head, seen from a distance. You now have a unit measuring “one head¨ (albeit a shrunken one) on your pencil.
More generally, the use of sighting for sizing can be summed up as simply adding an extra step to our aforementioned steps for sighting (Ibid): 4. Shimmying the thumb or forefinger along the x- or y- axis of the frame of reference object in order to delimit the length of the object along such an axis.
visual_art observational_drawing sight_line seighting lining_up field_of_view frame_of_reference art edges degree degrees rotation relative_size proportion scale
bibliography
- “Additional Accuracy Tools.” In Drawing for the Absolute and Utter Beginner, 48-49.