JOANA MIRANDA STUDIO

A few days ago, if you had said the words isometric perspective art to me, I would have gone running in the opposite direction. In fact, even just plain one-point perspective sounded like high-math lingo to me! Fortunately, I’ve been learning from a master. (You can see some of my earlier course projects in this post.)

Before I get into explaining my recent isometric perspective art project…

Let me start by sharing some of the one-point perspective illustrations I worked on earlier this week.

One-Point Perspective Drawing

In the project below, we were asked to draw our living space using a one-point perspective viewpoint. We were also supposed to imagine and add interesting objects that told a bit more about our lives. While I felt good enough about my illustration from a technical stand point, I realized it lacked imagination. Yes, my husband never sweeps the balcony, and yes, I probably won’t be getting my dream cat for a few more years, but there’s little else to suggest fantasy in the drawing below.

My second attempt…

Definitely had more life and humor. However, I switched up the grid lines halfway through drawing which threw me off. So, in the end I created a half room illustration. (Progress does come in baby steps sometimes.)

Isometric Perspective Art

Requires a much more complicated viewpoint and involves more grid guidelines. In this project, we were asked to create an imaginary cityscape. And, we were told to add in people, trees, and other objects that would round out our imaginary city.

The illustration above took me the better part of two days to create. After creating my isometric grid, I lightly sketched in the placement of the buildings. However, I tried to draw most of the rest of the illustration freehand to keep it looking alive and interesting. Surprisingly, once I started drawing, I couldn’t wait to keep going. My imaginary city combines a bit of all of the cities I hold near and dear to my heart:

Lisbon – The Rossio-inspired train station (top left) journeys through the hills to the town of Sintra (not visible)

Copenhagen – Bikers replace cars in my imaginary world and a canal meanders through the city

Minneapolis – Sky walks (so useful against having to go outside in the winter) connect three of my buildings in the upper half of the illustration

New York – Jane’s Carousel, a food cart, water towers, rooftop basketball courts, a band shell, and of course, Lincoln Center are all part of my imaginary city. (You’ll be pleased to see that the performing artists are practicing social distancing.)

Lastly, the balloon seller and red balloon are a nod to a fond childhood memory; and, the laundry hanging out to dry on the rooftop is in honor of my mother.

My one regret…

Was that I didn’t make the scale of my illustration bigger. I love to draw people and practically went blind trying to draw the peeps in this illustration. So that you don’t have to pull out your binoculars, I’ve created the slideshow below of some of the highlights from the illustration:

There are two more units remaining in my drawing course, so I hope you’ll check back here for more updates. In the meantime, if you’re a fan of my illustrations, please visit my shop at Etsy or Society6.