Seeing the big picture and narrowing down
Changing your angle is fun because it changes what you notice and how you draw.
During my live online Mini-Workshop last Tuesday, we looked around as if looking through a lens. When you zoom in or out, you’ll notice how the story changes.
A wide view gives you the big picture.
It helps you understand the scene, the layout, and the relationships between things. In film, it often sets the mood. For your sketchbook practice: think about landscape or capturing a sense of the place.
A medium view narrows your focus and makes the subject more personal.
You still have context, but not the overwhelm of a full scene.
A close view slows you down.
You notice textures, shadows, shapes you hadn’t seen before.
Switching between wide, medium, and close can help you avoid overwhelm, find your focus, tell better visual stories, and bring variety in your sketchbook pages; you keep things fresh (even when you’re drawing the same stuff over and over again).
With this post, you got a little peek inside the very last live online session of 2025.
