Indholdsfortegnelse for Paint & Draw Beginner's Guide to Drawing i Paint & Draw Beginner's Guide to Drawing

To be able to capture the world around us in the form of a drawing is a talent that only the most passionate and dedicated artists possess. After all, to see the world through the eyes of an artist and then translate it onto paper takes time and practice. Whether it be outlining a human face, depicting an animal in its natural habitat, or sketching a particular building on a busy street, the right approach and good-quality tools are absolutely key, especially for those embarking on their first steps into the world of drawing. If you are reading this, you might well be considering taking those early steps on a journey towards improving your drawing and becoming a better artist. If so, you’ve come to the right place, because within…

Hands are an intimidating body part to draw, sometimes even tripping up the most seasoned artists. When we look at a picture of a person, the hands are often the thing we look at most after the face – they often express a lot in body language. Of all our own body parts, the hands are those that we can always look at easily without the aid of a mirror, so they are something we are extremely familiar with. As such, we will notice even the smallest mistakes! The hands are very complex, and all that complexity is condensed into a relatively small area of the body. There are lots of joints and overlapping forms that require careful observation. Understanding how the major sections of the hand break down will…

Shading and rendering is my favourite part of a 10- or 20-minute pose. Here, I’ll introduce some of the basic principles, tools and techniques that I use to shade or render in a short amount of time. Before I begin, I first analyse and limit the values I use. For life drawing, I use a three-value palette of light, dark and midtone. This helps me control values as I shade and render forms. To define forms, I use a combination of soft or hard edges. Soft edges do the majority of the work and create the most natural look. Hard edges are great for accents or sculpting forms. There are many shading and blending techniques, but they can simplified into either line or tonal drawing. Line is great for details…

Many people shy away from proportional dividers, but they are a really versatile tool once you understand a few basic rules when it comes to using them. Over the next couple of pages, this bitesize explains what they are and how to use them. If you want a more detailed tutorial on using proportional dividers, there are plenty available online. 1 Decide proportions Dividers come in many of sizes and are used to transfer a drawing 1:1 or to enlarge or reduce. There will either be a sliding scale or a series of holes with a screw or clip to join the two pieces together to form a pivot point. Decide on the scale you want and adjust accordingly. The centre hole will usually be 1:1 scale. 2 Print a…

Textures are important for adding a more authentic and believable feel to our drawings, especially when it comes to animals and other organic subjects. Here we are going to look at how to render a selection of different textures found on a wide range of creatures, using a variety of media. Although I will be showing examples in different media, the underlying principles of looking at edges, shadow shapes, highlights and other visual cues apply regardless of material. Light and shadow play an important role in describing texture. We can only clearly see textures in well-lit areas, and especially on light-shadow boundaries. Shadows have less light, so we cannot make out texture as easily. Less light means less information! Although we need to make marks to draw textures, it is…

The humble pencil is a ubiquitous and versatile drawing tool, and I’d like to take this opportunity to show you the potential of graphite as a drawing medium and introduce you to a fun and simple exercise while also revealing some techniques to help you really get the most out of your pencil. 1 The Shakespearean question 2B or not 2B? Picking the right grade of pencil for your drawing will help you make the best sketch possible. Graphite pencils are available in a scale of hardness from 9H (hard, pale) to 9B (soft, dark) with HB and F in the middle of the range. Typically, the H grades are suited to technical drawing, while B grades are ideal sketching pencils. Start of with a 2B or 3B pencil for the…

How to illustrate animal eyes Jill Tisbury explores the observations and techniques that you need to know in order to recreate animal eyes Drawing eyes is something that I get asked about often. There are some critical, yet simple steps to remember that will improve the end result. In this short article, we’ll cover those key elements in relation to feline eyes, but the same principles will apply for most animals. I’ve used pastel pencils on Pastelmat for this leopard piece. Follow these steps… 1 Being aware of the eye’s anatomy will helps you understand where everything how the eye works and how fur sits around it. For example, the lacrimal gland over this eye will cause the fur to curve up and over it ridging slightly, forming the eyebrow and…

Working with Indian ink has vast possibilities for expression. One of my favourite ways to work with ink brings the two opposing sides of the medium, line and smooth tonal gradients, together in one picture. The specificity of a line compared to a soft gradation can feel different, with the line being more of a confinement to the figure. By promoting variation in the thickness of the line and following the rhythm of your hatching lines into the brushstroke application of ink wash, you can create stronger unity. Take a go now and see how creative you can be! 1 Establish a sketch Establish a rough sketch of your subject. For the fox, I am being loose and using gestural lines with some underlying geometric structure. I make sure to create…

Most of us have drawn and paint posed models in the confines of a studio. Or we’ve sketched animals in a taxidermy collection. It may be easier to draw such a subject that holds still in controlled light conditions, but the results can often look lifeless and unnatural, more mannequin than man… The remedy is to head outside and hunt for lifelike poses and authentic lighting – real humans and real animals alive in their natural habitat. However, sketching moving subjects from observation is a formidable challenge that can frustrate even the most capable artist. In this feature, I will share my top-ten strategies to help you succeed with sketching moving subjects. 1 Start with simple tools The simplest set-up for sketching people and animals is a graphite pencil or…

Landscapes are an endlessly varied subject. Each one has a different pictorial composition and elements comprising it that are all individual, as each tree, rock or plant is unique. We are going to cover the process of setting out a more developed landscape scene and look at techniques for drawing these particular elements. A common challenge when starting out with landscapes is to fixate on details or individual subjects rather than the whole idea of the scene; quite literally not seeing the forest for the trees! We’ll tackle this by simplifying a landscape to a small-scale composition and breaking it up into simple shapes. Then we’ll go over how individual elements such as clouds, rocks, trees and plants each present their own challenges with regards to expressing form, handling detail…

Create a colour theory chart to improve your colour mixing GETTING TO GRIPS with colour theory can seem a little bit too much like learning maths or science. You may feel you just want to be creative and express yourself, not work out calculations. But colour theory is one of the fundamental things you need to learn in order to progress and grow as an artist. Read on to create a colour theory chart that will transform your creative life. Follow these steps… 1 Colour on the go The following exercise can be completed with acrylic, oil or watercolour paints, but colouring pencils are best. Not only do you just need the pencils themselves – there’s no need for water, spirits, brushes or a palette – but they’re are also a…

The head is an important part of the body, as we love to look at faces and will usually look at the head first when viewing a drawing. Because of this familiarity, coupled with the complexity of the features, we are ruthless judges of portraits and notice even the smallest of mistakes. The posture of the head is also important when drawing the figure because it adds interest to the pose, as well as indicating intent, especially in more dynamic poses. There are a lot of potential tripping points, with proportion being a common complaint. I recommend lightly roughing out where you want to place the features before delving into the details so you can double check your proportions early on. In particular, eyes have a tendency to come out…

This feisty little Scottish wildcat is a perfect model for practising fur texture with. Here, I am working with pastels on velour, but the main principles hold true for any type of pastel paper. I like to use velour for two reasons. First, it takes plenty of layers before it becomes saturated, and second, the soft ‘tooth’ adds to the final texture that you’re trying to achieve. Knowing the make up of your subject can help too. Scottish wildcats are ‘true fur’ animals, which means they have a thick downy under-layer designed to keep them warm, and a more wiry outer layer to protect them from rain. Knowing this make up helps you understand what you’re aiming for. With the method I’m showing here, the colour and marks are laid down…

In this workshop, I’ll show you simple yet effective ways for how you can create beautiful, organic textures, using only one colour. We will explore the possibilities of the ink medium together! The theme of our drawing is nature – an incredible source of inspiration. I encourage you to use real objects for your artworks as often as you can. For example, I collect various natural objects; they make it possible for me to take a closer look, to touch and feel the surface. If you don’t have a real object, it’s great to use reference photos. My advice is to gather as many visual materials as you feel necessary – they will nourish your artistic imagination and give you useful information about the texture and details. Sometimes I create…

For part 3 of this series, I am using soft pastels and Conté Crayons for drawing, rather than painting. There is always a debate about whether pastels are a drawing or painting medium, but I think it depends entirely on the way you use them. Here I will be using limited colour, to capture the energy and texture of natural forms by changing my mark making and feeling for the flow of line. As I draw each piece, I hold it in my hand to feel its weight and use other senses as well as sight. I want to convey more than just what it looks like. What does it feel like? Is it hard and spiky, and heavy to hold? Or light and fragile, and easily crushed in my…