How to determine a vanishing point in perspective?
Question from Diane, Drawing Academy student
I am working on a drawing of a building, positioned at the corner so I can draw both left and right sides. When drawing in 2 point perspective, how is it determined where the vanishing points should be? If the vanishing points are off the paper, how to determine that imagined point and how not to lose it?
Thank you.
Hi Diane,
Many thanks for your question.
When a vanishing point is beyond the drawing edge, you simply don’t draw it. Instead, measure angles of lines that go to this point. As long as all lines in question are tilted correctly, they will meet in one point on the horizon line, see the illustration below:
Watercolor by Vladimir London
When drawing a building, you can measure angles using a pencil as described here:
//drawingacademy.com/how-to-measure-with-a-pencil
I hope this helps.
Best regards,
Vladimir London
To improve the quality of your drawing,
- Receive 15 new videos monthly (45 in total)
- Incredible discount – $4,164
- Bonuses - Fine Art eBooks and Videos
- Drawing Academy Diploma of Excellence after course completion in 3 months
- Personal coaching by Drawing Academy Tutors
- Lifetime membership. Free after the 3rd month
- Immediate access to all 45 video lessons
- Incredible discount – $4,198
- Bonuses - Fine Art eBooks and Videos
- Drawing Academy Diploma of Excellence after course completion in 3 months
- Personal coaching by Drawing Academy Tutors
- Lifetime membership. No more payments
You as an artist choose where the vanishing point goes depending on how you wish to portray what you are drawing. If that sounds too abstract, spend more time drawing things in different perspectives and different vanishing points until you get a feeling for how the perspective and choice of vanishing points change how the drawing looks.
When it comes to picking a vanishing point beyond the paper, remember that lines above the horizon line will go down and lines below will go up. The further up or down the line is, the steeper the angle towards the vanishing point will be. Thus you can use other lines going towards the same vanishing point as a comparative reference. In other words, if the new line you want to draw is higher above the horizon line compared to another line going into the same vanishing point, it’ll need to be drawn slightly steeper.