Creating Cities with Perspective (Rashi School Online Lesson)

Project: Cities with Perspective
Materials: Pencil, ruler, paper, colored pencils or markers, pencil preferred
Time to complete: Approximately four or five 30-45 minute sessions.
Procedure: Watch intro video, read directions, draw and color!

Hi fourth graders! In this lesson, you'll learn how to draw a city using the technique of perspective. Perspective is when artists make something two-dimensional (flat) look like it's not flat. Perspective techniques make it look like a flat surface has depth- in other words, it looks like you could walk right into this painting here: 

This painting is by an artist named Allan Rohan Crite. He was born in 1910 and he painted this in 1935. There is a LOT of depth in this painting! He really knew how to use perspective drawing tools. Soon, you will too. 

For this project, you can design any kind of city you want. It can be an outer-space city, a candy city, a sports city, a cat city... the sky is the limit. Actually, the horizon is the limit- but we'll talk about that soon...

Are you excited yet? I hope so.

First, watch this five-minute video in the blue link below. I created it to show you how this artist created perspective. You don't need to write any of what I say down, because I will type it in here for you before the end of this post. 

Here we go!

How did Allan Rohan Crite create perspective in his painting?

2. Now, follow along as I show you how to begin creating your city. 

You will need:

-a piece of paper

-a pencil

-a ruler or something with a straight edge

That's it!

For this demonstration I'm using images I created with a digital drawing app, because it's easier for me to get them onto this blog that way. So, if they look different, that's why. 

3. Get your paper ready. With your ruler, draw a line across the long way. This is what's called the horizon line. (Sound familiar? It's part of the word horizontal, which means an line that goes across)

The horizon is where you can't see the land anymore, and where it looks like the sky begins. Now, this can be confusing because we know the sky is above us- but trust me. 

*Your horizon line does not need to be perfectly in the middle. It can be lower or higher- that's up to you!

4. Now, start putting in buildings. Buildings can be below the horizon line, across the horizon line, or on the horizon line. Why can't they be above it? Because then they'd be in the sky. I made a couple of each. Notice I erased the horizon line when it went through the buildings. Why? Because you can't see the horizon line any more. That's an example of overlapping!

5. Now, let's talk about roads. Then, I'll let you know the expectations for the project, and I'll review my information from the video about how to create perspective. When you create a road, it is getting further away. If you remember what I talked about in the video, things that get further away get smaller. So, your road should get skinnier as it goes toward the horizon line.

Uh oh- did someone notice a problem? My road ran into my building! Ow. I'm going to erase part of the road because I know that the building is closer- it's overlapping!  

That's better. I added some lines on the road, too. Now, my city is NOT complete, but those are the main things I wanted to show you. Now, you can use these techniques, and your own creativity, to make your own city!

So. Here's what you need to do. 

Using techniques of perspective and depth, create your own city with any theme. 

You must include at least four buildings and two roads.

You must use each of the four techniques of creating perspective, at least once.
(You can review these below or in the video above.)

Include plenty of detail and use color on the whole page.
You can use colored pencil or markers, whatever you've got!

Click to See Fourth Grade City Examples on the Art Room Blog!

How to Create Perspective

Objects that are further away:
-Further up on the page
-Get overlapped by closer objects
-Smaller
-Less detailed

Objects that are closer:
-Further down on the page
-Overlap other objects
-Larger
-More detail