First attempt

Back in around 2002 I was introduced to a book which revolutionized my view of drawing.

It was "Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain" from Betty Edwards. The whole notion is that 'drawing is seeing' - instead of drawing what you think the flower in front of your looks like, actually draw what it looks like. Our brain has a whole lot of default images for everything which usually revert back to a very childlike or cartoon way of drawing. Our brains need to break away from these defaults and focus on what we actually see.

It was only in 2005 when I seriosly began using Edwards methods and gave it a good shot, but my results weren't exactly what I was after. Nonetheless, my thoughts about drawing had chaged and I had begun to break away from my defaults.

Last year in August I stumbled across a book in a library that opened up a whole new world of possibilities - "Realistic Drawing Secrets" from Carrie Stuart Parks. I devoured the book in two short days and couldn't wait to get my hands on a pencil.

I took a photo of my wife's eye, printed it, got some paper, a paper stump, some pencils and set to work.
Below is the result. I couldn't believe my eyes when I stepped back and viewed the full the picture. Did I really draw that?

Now, over a year later, I look at this first attempt and see so many things I could do differently. Nevertheless, this drawing is a bit of a landmark for me - something that showed me that what I thought wasn't possible actually is.

(In another post I want to show you how I drew this same picture four months later to see how much I had improved.)