Recommended Reading
If I was to write an article I would write about the pleasure to be had from manual drawing and the creative advantages it has over computer drawing.
Sharpening the pencil fills me with anticipation, is it the right grade, I like an HB short and stubby.
I am at my happiest when drawing in pencil on an A3 sheet, colleagues have remarked that I hum and whistle as I draw, my mind relaxes and ideas flow freely to the extent that often I run out of space on the sheet.
Clients like the slightly wobbly line of the hand drawing and many an architect has taken their mechanical looking computer drawing and traced over it to produce the final drawing to show to the client. It's not an accident that Sketchup has tried so hard to emulate that look.
Manual drawing is fast and doesn't get bogged down in the detail, it encourages multiple iterations, which is the best way, don't think you are going to get from A to B in a straight line when you are developing a design. Don't spend days working away on an electronic 3D model to eventually realise that it's not the right thing, develop the design quickly in pencil instead.
Of course manual drawings don't lend themselves to revision and reproduction, but that's not really a problem if you are an architectural student. Why not stand out from your peers, whose computer drawings all look the same and sharpen your pencil.
