Proportion, canon and compositional organization
This block examines two linked skills: measuring ratios reliably, and arranging those ratios inside a frame so the result reads as deliberate. Questions typically ask you to place given objects or a figure in a stated format, or to explain why a composition works; markers look for comparative measurement and a stated compositional idea rather than a lucky arrangement.
Measuring
- Comparative measurement: choose one unit (head, object height, longest edge) and express everything as multiples or fractions of it. Never measure a part in isolation.
- Pencil checks: verticals, horizontals, diagonals, and the angle of a form against the paper edge. Step back at least once per stage.
- Speak in ratios - 1:1, 2:3, 3:4, 1:1.618 - because ratios survive a change of scale.
Canons
- Egyptian grid of 18 squares; the Greek canon commonly cited at 7 heads (Polykleitos), later classical practice at 7.5, and an elongated 8 heads in heroic or mannerist use. Leonardo's Vitruvian sheet ties figure proportion to geometric figures.
- Working checks: hand length ≈ face length; foot ≈ one sixth to one seventh of standing height; shoulder width ≈ two head-widths.
Composition
- The frame is active. Rabatment, rule of thirds and golden-section placement all work by refusing to centre the dominant mass.
- Visual weight comes from size, contrast, isolation, detail density and colour temperature. Balance may be symmetrical or asymmetrical, but spacing must not be equidistant.
- Forces: alignments, sight lines, directional folds, gaze. Shape the negative space as deliberately as the objects.
Worked example
Three objects in an A3 landscape sheet, horizon two thirds up. Put the largest mass on a thirds intersection, the tallest object slightly off centre, and the smallest to complete a triangle. The gap between the two large objects should be narrower than either width, so they read as a group. Cast shadows run to the light's vanishing direction and tie the group to the plane.
Traps that cost marks
- Measuring by eye only, then discovering the group does not fit the sheet.
- Changing the scale of one part midway, so the whole drawing drifts.
- Centring the subject and the horizon, producing a static, unconsidered page.
- Tangents where an edge just touches another edge or the frame.
- Applying a canon rigidly to a child, a seated or a foreshortened figure.