In nearly every form of art, you can find incredible and intricate designs that are repeated throughout a work of art and contain a symmetrical aspect to them that make them truly unique and stand out. The ability to make a work of art symmetrical can be greatly enhanced as with many other hobbies with simple practice. From tribal influenced artwork to abstract and fantasy inspired designs, symmetrical aspects can be associated with various different forms of art. The following is a small guide to help once understand and develop simple methods in which you can increase your own ability to incorporate the symmetrical aspect in to your own style.
In the first picture that I have included, you can see my attempts at the tribal influenced style. To take a quick glance at the picture, you would think the design is very simple. Though this wasn’t an incredibly imaginative and detailed sketch, there were still a number of small steps that had to be taken to get this picture to this point. Tribal art in itself can easily be found and associated greatly in the world of tattoos. Many of times tribal tattoos can be said to be predominantly black with heavy dark intersecting lines that resemble a desired object or figure. What grabs my attention, is when the tribal style is accented with the symmetrical aspect, which is the inspiration for the first picture that I have included.
The first step, is to come up with a small sketch or doodle as a simple idea to work off of. My first step as depicted in figure 1. is to come up with the concept of a wing that will fit my tribal influenced piece. Because I want most of the attention to come to the details in the wings rather than the wing itself, I make a fairly simple and outline for the wing opposed to a wild shape. In figure 2. I made a rough sketch of the tribal influenced design that I wanted to be the focus of my wing. To achieve the tribal approach to my picture, I had all my twirly line work coming from a white boarder that surrounds the inner part of the wing. With this kind of picture, a pencil is a great choice, for one,because you can keep altering the way your picture looks so that you get the best result, and also because you can erase the lines that run into the boarder of your design if you choose to include one as I have.
If you choose at first to use only one color as I have, you can use the next step as a great way to touch up any uneven lines or objects. The next step that I took as depicted in figure 3, is the point where you fill in the whitespace. When using only one color, you have the advantage of being able to adjust how thick or thin each of your lines are simply by shading out the unwanted portion. In figure 3, I wanted to be able to show an alternative outcome to this style of wing, so I made jagged incisions that went barely inside the boarder of each of my lines in my design.
The next step is where the symmetrical steps come in to play. If you would like a quick preview of what your soon to be perfectly symmetrical picture is going to look like, a simple hand held mirror held at a slant towards the picture will give you a good idea. Using this small and practical preview, can prove to be smart when trying to come out with the perfect opposing and symmetrical objects, especially if you happen to be a perfectionist. Because the wing of this drawing is not the center of my piece, I will have to take different steps than I will for the head of the figure. I first trace the exact picture on to the back of my piece of paper. Then, I have a perfect stencil for each wing when it comes time to put it all together.
The next part, as shown in figure 4, is the point in which the head of the tribal figure is being developed. Because the head is the center of my picture, I am only going to initially draw half of the face. The first step in creating the head is finding the center of my new paper. To do this, I fold the paper in half long ways and continue to trace the half of the head onto one side of my new paper. After drawing the first half of the head, I turned the paper over to the half that was blank and traced the opposite side of the face. It may be necessary to use a window, or an alternate light source to see through thick paper and will help if the figure is outlined on the backside of the paper as well. Once this is complete, you are left with a perfectly symmetrical face. When you line up the wings from your stencil that you created earlier, you then are left with nothing more to do, but trace them evenly which can be made easier with a ruler. The end result is that of the very first picture.
The second picture that I have provided is more of an abstract approach at symmetrical art in which I will use a portion of a random “doodle” that I did some time ago. I chose this random drawing to show how much you can really touch up a small idea such as this to become a fuller more respected piece of art. Because abstract art comes more natural for me, I thought that it would be something that I could use to be able to show how much my own style was improved with the same methods as in the first picture. Because in my eyes abstract art should be a little random and not all perfectly symmetrical, I’m going to leave some ideas in the doodle as they are to bring a more abstract feel to the overall piece. For example, the descending banner in this quick sketch will remain because of the sharp edge that it seems to have to it. Also, although the really unattractive banner and star ruin this picture for me, I am going to use the same concept in the final piece with a major repositioning, to really bring this symmetrical piece together.
The first step in this sketch, is to determine which side of the picture was the best to duplicate a mirrored view of. Because the left side of the picture includes more shapes, and is more detailed due to the amount of space available compared to the other side which about runs off the page, I will choose the left side to work with. I make an imaginary line down the middle of the spherical grid shape, and place a clean sheet of paper over the picture. To insure that I am lining up my new picture in the center, I fold the new piece of paper in half long ways, like in the first picture, and use the crease in the paper to split the sides of the new picture. I make the center of this drawing the line that splits the spherical grid, and line up the crease of the new paper on top of it.
I then traced onto the left side of the new paper all of the parts that I wanted to keep and incorporate into the new picture. After the main parts have been traced, you want to turn the front piece of paper over, and trace the mirrored image onto the backside, just like in the first picture. Once this is done you turn the picture back to the front side and fold it along the middle crease to where you are looking at the blank half. As a result with my drawing, I ended up with what is depicted in figure 1 of the new drawing.
As you can clearly tell, there is a major improvement in the two pieces. All that would be left to do in this drawing is the small detail work and placement of the banner and star. Everything is perfectly in line, and looks much more impressive than that of the original “doodle”. Using these simple tracing techniques as a tool to make symmetrical artwork, can result in breath taking and professional looking results. Entire mirrored images can be easily manipulated over any imaginary line, or lines with the same techniques that I have mentioned. The main idea in making a guide such as this is to help someone find or enjoy art on a new or different level. Though these tracing techniques work well, it is strongly encouraged that these ideas are made to fit ones own style. The most intriguing part of art is the ability to be creative. Incorporating these ideas with ones own ideas and style is in all hope, just another stepping stone for the aspiring artist.
