Why landscape designers can’t draw with hand comfortably anymore?

Mike,

I bought a copy of your book in 2003 or 2004 and followed each exercise and copied the styles in the book on landscape plans I worked on before I went back to school for landscape architecture in 2005. Your book helped me a lot and in some ways led me to becoming a landscape architect. So, thank you.

I agree on the importance of hand drawing, but I also think some of your methods can be applied to digital drawing. In many instances, right brain thought can happen during computer drawing as well, especially when you incorporate a graphics tablet. Sure, there is still some undeniable disconnect between the hand and paper when working on the computer and I see the value in that, but I think it is possible to exercise creativity on the computer.

I feel lucky to have discovered your book so early on in my career. I think in either medium though, digital or hand, we as designers need to be careful not to get too caught up in stylization of our graphics. I think a lot of designers get stuck on drawing in one style or another and forget about the end goal–the quality of the design itself. Personally, I think many designers could benefit from good fundamental black and white drawing techniques over which colors to use, etc., though I think both are important.

I see alot of built work that I think suffers almost solely because it was designed on the computer. I’ve noticed a lot of parks and other spaces that look like computer models in their built form, which I think is unfortunate.

What do you think?

In the real world, in a real office, drawing is becoming less critical for many reasons.  For one, illustrative graphics and perspective sketches are not required for most bread and butter landscape architecture projects.  Most projects don’t have a budget for this type of work and clients don’t want to pay for it.  They simply want enough work to get their project pushed through the approval process and the design firms want to get the project done and get paid as quickly as possible. 

Hand drawings are also unique to each individual.  If an illustrative, hand-drawn perspective needs to be changed, it will typically be changed by the original production person.  In a fast paced, design firm, the original designer may be too busy to make modifications to the original drawing. That is why many offices will have only one maybe two ‘graphics’ guys they use to keep their illustrations consistent. 

The informed clients who do want illustrative graphics want more than just a few hand sketches these days.  They want fly-throughs, aerial perspectives and the ability to change things instantly. They want shadow studies and the ability to compare materials in relation to one another. Some municipalities and government agencies require environmental graphics that are accurate to within a few feet and include alternative designs.

Yes, it would be nice to draw lots of perspectives and illustrate plan views all day long.  Unfortunately, the real world is way beyond that.  It’s good to know the basics of hand-drawn graphic composition but by no means is the profession based on that alone anymore.  After nearly 11 years in the profession, I have learned that drawing is only a tiny portion of what makes a good landscape architect. 

Hi Mike,

I am one of those fellas that yearns for just a thimbal’s worth of artistic ability.  I certainly agree with you that a designer that can draw effectivly and can communicate those designs well to the client can breeze quickly through the conceptual stage.  And I think we would all be better designers if more attention was paid to these skills especially at concept.  I think it really depends on the type of work you are doing. The small projects i.e. residental and the really large projects both have the most potential for hand graphics.  I see a hybrid emerging though.  One in which Construction drawings are done in CAD and 3D perspectives are created in SketchUP from the CAD Drawings and then either Augmented with hand graphics or the fly thru computer renderings are created.  I think this gives the designer the most flexibility.  It depends on the size AND the scope of the project and most importantly who the audience will be for the end product.  That is why I chose LandFX.  I can create all my construction drawings in CAD and then export the drawing into SketchUP where a 3D Model can quickly be built.  LandFX swaps all the 2D CAD/or 3D SketchUp symbols bi-directionally in their SketchUP plug-in.  At the point where the 3D computer model is complete, If a hand rendered drawing is desired,  a perspective can be chosen in the model and output to paper where the hand rendering can begin.  Or if a computer rendering is desired the SketchUp model can be exported into a rendering engine such as VUE for a more realistic walk/fly thru of the model.  The beauty of using LandFX is that it sets on top of AutoCAD and they have a Plug-in now for Revit so your investment in learning their technology is following longterm industry trends on the software development side.  At some point I want to get with you and learn more about the hand graphics but for now I have my hands full just getting my brain crammed full of all the technical junk (including how to survey with a Robotic Total Station)

s.