RESEARCH FINDINGS

Our observations as we progress with this study center around the value of stroke replay as it relates to different drawing types, and the effects of working with experts and students.
 

Stroke Replay and Drawing Types

Initial trials show that pen-stroke replay varies in usefulness for teaching different kinds of drawings. Drawing replay is useful for teaching descriptive drawing because the task is simple and direct. Different techniques for drawing the same subject can be easily compared. While descriptive drawing techniques are well documented in books, interactively viewing every stroke in the development of a drawing is more engaging than looking at a few printed frozen steps. Immediate review of a student's drawing procedure allows identification of crucial decisions and mistakes.

The pen is less useful in diagramming and creative design than descriptive drawing because of the usefulness of recording and replaying stroke sequences depends on the quantity of marks made. The pen's trail doesn't reveal much about analytic diagramming because it involves less mark-making and more internal thinking. In contrast to the scarcity of diagram marks, the complexity of design drawings makes the sequence of sketches more important than the sequence of strokes. Since graphic approaches to design solutions vary widely, digital versions allow individual steps to be identified more easily than complete procedures. Steps can be identified by actions or intentions (review of constraints, use of metaphor, creation of alternatives, evaluation of alternatives, correction, etc) as well graphic methods (i.e. orthographic view, detailed enlargement, etc.).

Working with Experts

While the subjects can describe their drawing process in a general way from the paper drawings, replaying the exact sequence on the computer monitor allows them to go into much more detail. In many cases, the way people conceived that they draw is much simpler than the actual activity. While cognitively they follow rational steps, in practice, they react to the changing visual field (as described by Daniel Herbert in Architects' Study Drawings). In some cases, subjects describe the construction of their drawing in manner inconsistent with the instant replay feature.

Drawing techniques reflect both training, experience and personal style. Not surprisingly, while many advanced students produce strong drawings, experienced professionals and professors were much quicker at sketching, and more articulate about their process. Drawing teachers tended to be more deliberate about their approach, with architects often using construction lines in a formalized way. They were insightful in looking at other peoples' drawings, able to identify common patterns.

Working with Students

Ideas for how to teach with the digital pen are included in the Teaching section.

Examples explaining techniques from the experts' drawings are published on this web site.