For this drawing I chose the view from my living room into my kitchen.
I placed a piece of black tape on the doorframe as a guide to my eye level and then decided that the central point was at the edge of the wall cupboard.
Starting with the door frame seemed logical as it has a strong vertical and from this I estimated the door and its panels before moving into the kitchen.
In the kitchen I worked first on the horizontal line of the nearest kitchen end panel, then estimated the angle of the worktop with a pencil. The wall cupboard was flat on so did not need perspective to VP.
Finally, I worked on the floor which is oak planks. I counted the number of planks in the doorway and then drew them in. Looking at the floor it's fairly east to see that they don't meet at the VP. I don't have a rug but put one in as just a rectangular shape going to the VP.
Than I put the ruler on it. Wow! My immediate reaction was just how sharp the line at the bottom of the door had to be and I was made well aware of how I had underestimated the acuteness of it. Same applied for the ceiling slope and the bottom door panels.
I can see that using a ruler really helps in getting the right angles for the perspective but can see, too, that a ruled line takes us into the realm of more 'clinical' types of work such as necessary in architects' offices. I read that some artists put pins in their work to show where the VP is and I can see that I need some practice in getting this right. And some others, or so I read, might put string across the room. I mentioned this to an acquaintance who is an artist and he replied, 'Well yes, I've got a vanishing point somewhere and I think it's in the room next door'. I could see the funny side of this and his advice was to think of angles as a transparent clock face and see what time it is compared to 3 or 9 o'clock. I've found this useful and was quite pleased when in my first life drawing class this week the teacher told me my angles were very accurate.
However, and going back to the exercise, and in mitigation, I will say that I found it really difficult to hold the drawing board in front of me whilst trying to draw the lines. Hopefully, an easel where the paper is held securely for me will help in achieving better results.
As I continued with the unit I found that I had queries regarding issues of perspective in other ways. Whilst on holiday I was looking at a row of arches and wondered how to construct these so that the distance between them was accurate. I found a very good website, as I didn't have any books with me, and found that rules of perspective cover so many different areas. I'm more of a language person than a maths person but found these drawings fascinating. I'm sure that experienced artists can do without working things out like this but also feel certain that learned theory helps sight sizing.
So, ruled lines can very much help in getting the perspective right as I found out when doing the above study. The other aspect I found perplexing at first was the squashed look of some drawings and then realised that if the VPs are too close together the drawing will be distorted. Lots to learn here but I believe progress made and have become very interested in perspective. While at the National Portrait Gallery earlier this year some paintings that really appealed to me were done from strange view points and the foreshortened effect was quite startling.
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