How do you draw flat objects that look flat?

A question to the more skilled artists, how would I go about drawing a table, plank of wood, a slab of wood or any flat surface from any angle and not make the side farthest away look like it is higher than the side facing us?

Hmm...I would say use foreshortening. But lets see what the others have to say.

See, if you draw the entire length of the table its going to look like its floating if you don't give it perspective. Make sure to keep it three-dimensional though.

Hey rajee!

Yup...foreshortening. In order to create the illusion of depth you want your object to be lined up perspective-wise with any other parallel objects in the picture. Kind of depends on how extensive your knowledge of perspective is...although most cartoonists can get away with fudging it to some degree. Walls...the floor...anything else parallel has to come to the same one or two vanishing points depending on the angle. That would include whatever grain or pattern is on the surface. It also helps to establish a strong and consistent light source and then have that light fade away depending on where it is coming from. That helps contribute to the illusion of flat depth without making the object look like it is standing up.

This table top at this angle would just have one vanishing point.



Hope this helps some. Kinda hard to explain perspective in just one post. But there are lots of good books on the subject out there.

I would recommend "Perspective for comic book artists" by David Chelsea and also "Understanding Comics" by Scott McCloud.

Both were recommended books from Marvel artists or Bolland or someone of that caliber.


These go into the subject at great length and if you don't need that how about


search about drawing perspective

Smade

PS: speaking of Bolland just did a quick search and one of the links turned up this
how about that?

Good tip and link Smade.