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| Golden Orb Weaver Nephila edulis |
Read on to see how it was done...
Entomological illustrations can be done in a variety of mediums. The most commonly used mediums are water colour paints for colour illustrations and stippling, scraperboard or carbon dusting when working in black and white. Black and white illustrations are very appealing for scientific papers because they are generally reproduced very cheaply, often on inexpensive photocopiers and cheap paper. Colour illustrations can obviously still be printed in black and white, but because so much of the original information is lost, then will not look as refined as illustrations that have been completed in black and white. Besides, why spend so long on a coloured illustration if it's just going to end up being printed in black and white?
Of all the black and white mediums, stippling and scraperboard are the most reproduceable. With these, instead of scanners and printers having to deal with a broad range of grey tones, every part of the illustration is either black, or white. There is no in-between.
Stippling is the shading of an area using small dots of ink, and the concentration of dots is what creates the tone. Lighter areas will have fewer dots, if any, and darker areas will have more. Scraperboard is different, and requires a special material, known as 'scraperboard'. Scraperboard is a special type of cardboard that allows for any ink on its surface to literally be scraped away. It also comes in two types, being black and white. Black scraperboard comes pre-prepared with a flat layer of black in on its surface. White scraperboard doesn't have this, and ink needs to be applied manually. The inked areas are then scraped away using a sharp implement, such as a scalpel, creating tone by revealing the white underneath.
However, not all mediums are suitable for all specimens. For example, golden orb weaver spiders have white hairs covering their black cephalothorax (uppermost body part containing the head and thorax), which is something that is best expressed using scraperboard. Having chosen a golden orb weaver as my specimen, I opted to use scraperboard for by entomological illustration.
The first step is to draw the specimen, and for spiders, however, this can prove challenging. Despite their appearance, spiders are soft-bodied, and will shrivel up over time if left out in the open. Unlike beetles and most insects, which can simply be pinned out on a mount and left, spiders have to be kept in jars of a metho and water solution. The problem with this is that the spider won't maintain a specific pose, so every time you come back to draw it, it'll look slightly different. This isn't a huge problem, but it does require much more time spent setting up the specimen every time you want to work on your illustration.
Obviously, when drawing such small and detailed specimens, you will need to magnify your specimen. At uni, we were provided with microscopes, but a decent magnifying glass should give the same effect. Another tool we had at uni was a 'camera lucida', a device that acted as a part of the microscope which allowed you to see what you were drawing while also looking at your specimen through the eyepiece of the microscope. Effectively, this meant you could 'trace' your view of the specimen, though in practice, this was much harder than it sounds. Ultimately, I didn't end up using the camera lucida, mostly because of the difficulty I had mounting my specimen. Not only would it be in a different position every time I set it up, which would defeat the purpose of trying to 'trace' it, but because I couldn't pin everything in place, my specimen always slumped to one side, requiring me to prop up whichever part of it I was trying to draw.
The trick to drawing insects, spiders, even some crabs, is to only draw one half the specimen, and then flip what you've done to create the other half of the final drawing. For the most part, these organisms are symmetrical, and they are intended to be drawn that way. While slight differences between the left and right hand side of the specimen may exist, these are not what you're trying to express in your illustration. Compared to simply drawing the whole specimen, scanning and flipping one half of the specimen will provide a lot more consistency in the illustration.
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| 'Half' sketch of Nephila edulis |
At this point, it is very important to ensure that everything you've drawn is actually correct. It really is essential that you research the anatomy of what you're drawing. That way you can guarantee what you draw is actually correct, and not just your own interpretation of what you're seeing. All in all, the extent of mankind's accumulative knowledge is simply staggering. What's the point of ignoring it? You can't assume that your first glance at your specimen is going to give you all the information you need.
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| Labelled anatomy of Nephila edulis |
Honestly, I almost skipped this step. It may sound conceited, but it's too easy to assume that everything you've done so far is correct. Fortunately, I did look into the anatomy of a spider, and, unsurprisingly, I did notice several omissions, the main one being the distinction between the metatarsus and tarsus, but also other details that a dead specimen couldn't tell me, such as the functionality of the chelicerae, which would help inform my drawing. Needless to say, I promptly returned to my initial drawing and added this information. Unfortunately for people reading here, I only scanned everything after completing the assignment, and as such, I can only show you the corrected version. Nevertheless, it is very important to research what you're drawing.
Flipping the drawing can be done in a number of ways. Tracing paper, scanning and photocopying all pretty much do the same thing. The only really important part about flipping the image is making sure the halves match up at the right place. Obviously if the halves don't match up properly, the specimen's body will look too fat or thin, and will be wrong. Once it's flipped, you've got the finished sketch!
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| Completed sketch of Nephila edulis |
Now the sketch is ready to be transferred onto the scraperboard. Where possible, white scraperboard is preferable for scientific illustration, but there are instances where it would be better to use black. To get the most detail and accurate proportions the sketch was done A3, but the final work is to be done A4, which is half the size, so it needs to be reduced before it can be transferred. The reduction can easily be done using any photocopier or by scanning and printing, and the transfer with tracing paper. At first, only transfer the outline, as the inner lines will be inked over. The inner lines can be transferred once the scraperboard's been inked. The inking is best done with acrylic ink and a fine brush. The finest areas, like the tarsus, metatarsus, pedipalps and fangs, were done using a good quality felt-tip pen.
Once the scraperboard is all inked up, you need start scraping away the highlights. This differs strongly from almost every other form of illustration, where value is created by adding to the shadows or dark areas. This can make starting difficult, as it's natural to want to start scraping at the darker areas of the illustration. Because of this, I opted to start with the extreme highlights, and gradually work backwards from there. The final step, after the scraping stage is complete, is to add the hairs on the legs. The alternative to doing this after is by inking a larger area, and trying to scrape the hairs back into it. This, to me, seems a lot trickier, and could look messy if not done correctly.
Again, unfortunately I only scanned everything after the assignment was finished, so I don't have any examples of the scraperboard in progress. Nevertheless, as you've seen already, the final illustration was, and here it is again.
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| Completed scraperboard illustration of Nephila edulis |
I've already had some success with this illustration. Recently, it was exhibited in the uni's Depicting Nature exhibition at the Maitland Regional Art Gallery. It was exhibited alongside a number of fellow students' entomological illustrations, as well as a number of third year and honours students' and staffs' own illustrations, artworks and photographs. If you're particularly observant, you may notice it was listed as Nephila plumipes, as opposed to Nephila edulis, which was what I identified it as. I'm not sure where this change occurred, but I'm certain my specimen, at least, was a Nephila edulis. Whether they thought my illustration more closely resembled the Nephila plumipes, I don't know, and you can be the judge of that, but even if it does, I'd rather it be labelled as what I was intending to draw, not what it ended up looking like.
Later this year, I'll also be submitting it to the Australian and New Zealand Entomological Societies' Illustration and Photographic Competition, where it may be exhibited in Christchurch, New Zealand. The exciting thing about this competition is the one hundred dollars prize money for first place, and fifty dollars for second. Furthermore, it offers a chance for the winning work to used on the cover of the Australian Journal of Entomology! As exciting as that is, I'm definitely not expecting to achieve that, for a number of reasons. First and foremost, it'd be ridiculous to expect to win. Secondly, spiders aren't strictly categorised under 'entomology', and while they are still considered to be allied forms to insects, I'd find it odd to put an allied form on the cover of an entomological journal. The last reason is the design of the illustration itself. Being so sparse and lanky, it just wouldn't fit well into the letterbox-style design space of the journal's cover. Those points aside, it'll be a very exciting competition to be a part of, especially because of those prizes!
And that's it! If you've read this far down, thankyou very much for your interest. I'll keep updating this page with all the latest of what's happened with this illustration, and I'll also let you know when I have, with a post on the Home page. Thanks again!
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