Doug Patt: Hi, I am Doug Patt and this is the how to draw like an architect series, part 5. The Perspective. Now that we have a floor plan and elevation and now what our details look like, we can draw a perspective. This two point perspective would be derived directly from the floor plan using the elevation as our guide.

First, a line is drawn on the side of the building; we want to see in perspective. This line is called the picture plane. Then, a point is drawn away from that plan. This is the station point and it’s essentially the point from which the building is being viewed.

Next, I draw lines from every part of the building on that side to the station point. These are mainly building at roof corners as well as windows and doors. Next, a vertical line is drawn from the pointing, which our line crosses the picture plan. These vertical lines are extended down to a second horizontal line. This line is called the horizon line. One point is chosen at either side. These are called vanishing points.

Next, I create a single vertical line that corresponds with one corner of the building. This line represents the point at of which dimensions are true. Drawing lines from the vanishing points to the proper heights on our vertical lines create the perspective. Now, I’ve drawn this perspective by hand, but there are lots of CAD programs that will generate perspectives for you from the floor plan.

I have also simplified things here a great deal. What’s I have done with the drawing, I didn’t like how narrow the building looked in my perspective. So, I took it in the illustrator and then stretched it to give it a more realistic appearance. After that, I brought it into photoshop and added all the details, the windows, some color, shade and shadow, background, foliage and scaled figures. Speaking of scale, the next video will be an overview of how to use and understand scale. See you, next time.