Just recently my brother turned me onto a TV series called
Brain Games (you can catch episodes on
Netflix).
This is now
my favorite show and I am savoring every episode. You are probably wondering why I am telling you this, the answer is because this show has a lot to do with the brain and one's vision. As a visual artist
we create visuals for our viewers and a lot of this show has to do with how the brain and one's vision works.
There was an episode of Brain Games where a crime was happening and you were asked to recall what you saw. Most of the people they asked that were part
of that episode didn't get the visuals correct when asked about the crime. For instance, one question they were asked, what was the color of the lady's coat or in a line up of criminals, who was the guy who committed the crime. When I took that test as I was watching the episode I got most every question right, it seemed very easy for me, and I believe this is because I have developed my mind's eye along with a photographic memory. I developed this ability because of my storyboard
illustration career. As a storyboard illustrator, I was asked by art directors to draw storyboard scenes of things they verbally described to me and I would have to come up with a visual to those descriptions. At first I would have to look up visuals for every drawing that I did, then with practice, I developed the images in my mind's eye and would later learn to draw from those images in my head which in turn helped me develop a kind of photographic
memory.
You may be asking yourself why is developing one's mind's eye/photographic memory important to an artist. I believe it helps you in your creative process. Most of my students rely heavily on a photograph when creating their works of art and this I believe can stifle the creative process. Most students are basically copying what they see in the photograph and never look to create something more then just what the photo reveals.
If the photograph
is a beautiful scene, their paintings usually turn out well, but if they have a photo reference that isn't the best or is not compositionally correct, then the painting usually doesn't turn out so well. This is because they never made a change to correct what was in the photo, but instead copied exactly what the photo reveals. This is when having developed your mind's eye comes in handy, you would be able to change those bad photos into well-composed paintings because you can see
it composed in the right way in your head(mind's eye) and you would use that skill instead of just copying exactly what's in the photo.
To develop your mind's eye takes practice but it isn't as hard as it may seem. Here is a list to the process I took to develop my mind's eye.
1. Get yourself a sketchbook and keep it with you where ever you go.
2. When you are ready to sketch, (Don't Sketch) first look at what you want to sketch and memorize
it.
There is no specific time it should take you to memorize it, just take as much time as you think you need to get a good mental image of what it is you are going to sketch.
3. Look away from what it is that you had memorized and sketch it. Don't look back at the subject when sketching it.
4. If you need to look back because you don't remember a part of the sketch, stop
sketching and look back at the subject and memorize what you missed, then start a new sketch. Don't finish the old sketch, always work to try and finish the sketch in one take. this helps you in seeing the big picture and teaches you to see what is important to memorize. If you are constantly looking back to finish the sketch, that would be the same as looking at your subject when drawing it.
5. Repeat,
repeat, and repeat as often as possible. Do this exercise whenever you can, the more you practice the better you get. It took me a good couple of months, sketching quite often to hone in on developing my minds eye, but it was my storyboard career that really helped in totally developing my mind's eye.
