Ronald Wimberly analysis

Today I discovered a new artist whose style I immediately fell in love with, Ronald Wimberly.

I decided to take each drawing and trace out the anatomy in perspective so that I could better understand how he is making such dynamic poses with his characters.

The first thing to notice is is the exaggeration of the form that is closest to us is very elongated while at the sametime remaining in proportion to the rest of the figure. Below I broke down the first two drawings and tried a few attempts of my own. The immeddiate difference between the two comes down to the perspective on the front most leg of the ninja turtle is more proportional than my sketch with a similar leg position. The upper leg feels like it is going into the hip which he is leaning on pressing forward towards this leg as if his weight is going to the front leg. 

The whole gesture of the body is pushing forward with his leg, there is a emphasis on rhythm within the figure itself that makes it interesting to look at. Notice for example that in the first example there is a rhythm of how your eye moves down the sword and up the arm to the face in the first example. There is even a loop at the end of the sword holster and a loop for his back pant legs that keep your eye circulating on the drawing and not straying away from it. Notice also that the numchucks in the second image dont come "out" as much as they go upwards, both have a similar triangular shape. In both sketches we see the front form is elongated. What makes it interesting is that the rhythm in the image is not just exclusive to the shapes of the limbs but also the negative space in both images feel very designed. I love how for instance his hand does not overlap with the sword creating this cool boxy shape for the hand and the negative space between the two. 

In the next examples above we can see a similar trend here. The perspective shapes of the figures come out to us but the foreshortening is not as extreme when we look at the shapes beneath than I would have originally thought. Notice again here we see a strong rhythm of shapes in the curves of the feet in the boxer and the shapes of his knuckles which turn from blocky shapes at the joints of the digits and then we get a two sided curve on the knuckle itself where the tendon passes over the knuckle. 

In force I noticed there is another rhythm when we are looking at a foreshortened arm which is the curve of the forearm connecting to a triangular or box like shape at the elbow and then going into a opposite curve or a mirrored curve. We see this in the arm as well, again notice that everything has the rhythm of going forward with the punch not away from it. So we see the same curve in the knee, fist, the face, the padding on the fist, the feet and the belt around his waist. 

These same observations apply to the ninja turtle drawing but its also a great example of how ronald stages his poses so excellently. In this pose we can see each limb is shown here drawn in a dramatic perspective that gives the illusion of a form moving in space. You can find more of Ronald's work here