I walked out of a Mike Lin workshop at a CELA conference at LSU in the late ’70’s. Why? Because I was already drawing and sketching using this “style.” But I was taught by Buck Abbey and Van Cox – both L.A. prof’s at LSU. They probably leaned the method from Mike himself. I was also snagging a copy of every book on architectural and site graphics I could find at the time. I did “buy into” the style as a whole, though. I find that it did and still does enable quick, broad-stoke results for idea generation. Details can be refined from there. I’ve never been a good “artist,” so the style helped me cheat a little on getting my point across – to teachers and later to clients and fellow professionals. I could do a 10-12 minute sketch to convey an idea, and then pass it off to a younger colleague so they could take the idea and start to develop the detailing needed to pull the project together. I always found that the style really shown when drawing section and elevation views.
I should point out that Ace Torre’s method of tilt-up perspectives have had a similar impact on renderings and presentation graphics, at least in the Southern US. The methods are tools. Tools should be used – but they should be sharpened now and then….. there’s always room for improvement. I appreciate good graphics – mainly because I’m so lousy at them!
