From initial first lines to final print, with a funny twist at the end. A video, a short one, showing you the first two lines required to draw a most simple nested shape tessellation. It’s easy to draw tessellations if you have an iPad, the free KaleidoPaint App from the iTunes store and the magic sentence to get you started, one simple trick for each symmetry method.

It is not overwhelmingly difficult. Have a look at the video below, it starts off with two simple lines. A bit of intuition and some tweaking of those two lines results in a possible perimeter for yet another tile that tessellates.

Here is the recoloured version of the above hiker tessellation, as well as the single extract of each of the two instances. Note that the outline is unchanged even though the content is different. Nice Teddy.

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My first hiker tessellation was done in a different symmetry group. P2, built of four different four-way rotations. See if you can locate all four rotations. That was created in 2013. It has a similar set-up, where the hiker is stacked above the head of the one below. But this one below has instances that are rotated 180 degrees.

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The second and third hiker tessellations were done last year, but never posted on my blog. Hikers of the Forbidden Plateau. A young one and an older one, done the same week. There must have been a time shift in the space time continuum up there in these cold regions of the Island. Probably got stuck up there for a few decades, without realizing it. Could be the super short legs that slowed their progress along the trails. Came back older and wiser. This P31m symmetry is basically three identical mirrors, forming a grid of triangles, with a three-way rotation point in the middle, the top of the head. Both have bilateral symmetry, which is absent in the other two hiker tessellations above.

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If you’re a “Learn by Seeing” “Learn by Doing” kind of person, I’ve started creating videos on “how-to” create tessellations. I’ll be covering each of the 17 symmetry groups, one class at a time. And like all artists, we need to make a living. So. I’ve uploaded these to the Skillshare platform. I’ll get paid by minutes watched.

You can take the classes for free. Skillshare offers anywhere from 2 weeks to a month for free if you sign up, even temporarily.

You can register for just a month and cancel anytime. It’s less than the cost of a Netflix subscription! And you can still stay put on the couch. There are over 40,000 classes on topics for creative persons just like you. Join my mailing list, either here on my blog (in the sidebar), or a at this link for a specific list I use to announce new classes.

I’d love for you to join me on this wonderful learning adventure.

If you prefer, you can follow my progress on social media, I always announce my new class:
Facebook: Franc Champagne, and Vancouver Island Tessellation Artist
Instagram: champagne.francine
Twitter: FChampagne1
Linkedin: Graphic Design, PowerPoint and tessellations
Youtube: Video animations and class intros

My classes have received an independent rating of 9.7/10, placing these Skillshare classes in the TOP 2% of classes reviewed by CourseMarks!

🙂

Here is a list of the classes up so far:

1. Rekindle your Love of M.C. Escher Tessellations, draw your own tessellations using a free iPad App. In this class I introduce the concept of tessellations, show you the work of M.C. Escher as well as other artists. Then we dive into a first symmetry method, P4g, accomplished by drawing only one line to create the perimeter of your tessellation.
2. Just like M. C. Escher’s Tessellations: Draw Using a New Symmetry Method and Your iPad. We tackle the Mirrored Triplets symmetry group, aka P3m1.
3. This UP/DOWN, LEFT/RIGHT Tessellation method was M. C. Escher’s favorite. It is also the symmetry method, P1, most taught in schools. Probably the only way most artists have tried to accomplish a nested shape. We will push it a tad farther, but also easier than scissors and cardboard.
4. M. C. Escher Tessellations: The Three Cozy Buddies Symmetry Group, know as symmetry group P3. Lots of examples, from many different tessellation artists. One of my favorite ways of creating tessellations.
5. Digital Patterns: Super Simple Quickie Patterns. 20 patterns in 30 minutes! I will show you how to draw and assemble your pattern design elements in four different and unusual ways. Come explore the possibilities, from a different point of view using your iPad and the free KaleidoPaint app. There is more to symmetry than rigid repeats, half-drops and tossed layouts.
6. My next class with deal with a symmetry group I have named: “This way — that way”, aka crystallographic notation Pg. That Koloman Moser video above, is part of the series.

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