Here I was drawing free-hand against a traced copy of the reference photo (by Clarke Sanders on Unsplash). I merged the free-hand and the traced to see how far (or how close) I was to actual proportions. I added red pencil to the free-hand version so the lines would show up better in comparison.
While the face is relatively in the same proportions as the original, it’s substantially smaller all around. (Sigh.)
I’m following along in Nathan Fowkes’ charcoal portraits course, but using graphite and my sketchbook instead of charcoal and newsprint.
This is the initial step.
I usually hold my pencil like I would for writing. But now I’m taking (one more!) online course — called Draw Awesome — taught by the same guy who taught on ArtTutor.com (which is closing its virtual doors in another week) and practicing an overhead grip.
This is the first round — no detail, no shading — of a head based on the Reilly method, and as homework for the charcoal portraits online class I’m taking.
Image by Anastasia Gepp from Pixabay
This walnut was sketched with 2B, 4B and 6B Derwent pencils.
Using Derwent pencils, which surprisingly seem “better” — darker — than Staedtler, which I’ve been using until now.
This sketch is of a relative.
I recently purchased Nathan Fowkes‘ How to Draw Portraits in Charcoal, and I also just signed up for his online course at Schoolism. It’s a 9-week course, and the idea in the first week is to get busy practicing drawing heads.
I had never heard of the Frank Reilly Method, but what I understand now is that it can assist you in thinking about the 3-dimensional form of the head, and how light and shadow can define the planes of the head.
An example is below — the light lands on the little girl’s face by her right eye in the photo, and in the Reilly drawing, the horizontal lines by the girl’s right eye indicate the planes of her face that would cause the light to land there, and not above or below.
This was done in charcoal pencil (2B and 6B) on gray-toned paper. The reference photo was from the Life Drawing Techniques class on ArtTutor.com
BetterLateThanNeverArt 