Jenny s drawing (above left and right) showing minimal guidelines, mainly ignored, and the completed study and (lower left) my own smaller study.

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Norman Quinn
5 years ago
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WEEK 5 Last week we looked at creating contrast, and we previously studied how to apply shading from the deepest blacks to the lightest of tones.

That demands an explanation and an understanding of seeing and using white as you draw. CREATIVE SHADING The mindset is important.

After I had completed a 3 x 2 drawing of a Golden Mantled Ground Squirrel, my wife Jenny wanted to have a try (her first drawing since the age of twelve).

1 WEEK 5 Last week we looked at creating contrast, and we previously studied how to apply shading from the deepest blacks to the lightest of tones. Now let me introduce you to another way of using shading that brings the two together what I term Taking my pencil for walk. That demands an explanation and an understanding of seeing and using white as you draw. CREATIVE SHADING The mindset is important. I begin with an empty mind so, no problem there with no preconceptions of the outcome. This is truly sculpting with the pencil. After I had completed a 3 x 2 drawing of a Golden Mantled Ground Squirrel, my wife Jenny wanted to have a try (her first drawing since the age of twelve). She drew an excellent Squirrel but the rocks below troubled her, until I told her to take her pencil for a walk and just let intuition take over Jenny s drawing (above left and right) showing minimal guidelines, mainly ignored, and the completed study and (lower left) my own smaller study. We both knew the Ground Squirrel was approaching a rocky crest but that was the only prior decision. Both rocks were drawn organically. 1

2 It s a continuous process beginning with a single initial mark the first step on an unknown journey. That mark suggests the next, those two suggest a third, and gradually organic form and texture begin to emerge. The unfolding drawing starts to suggest things recalled, or a natural feeling of form. A shadow gradually appears that suggests a rounded ridge, the pencil travels up it until it reaches what it perceives to be a crest and suddenly you find yourself shading down the highlighted side to where is a mystery. A sharp edge occurs that leads you to draw a deep fissure in the rock, maybe because something reminds you of seeing such a feature in the past. It s an exciting and rewarding way to work. When I drew the bricks below, I surrounded my paper with photographs of old bricks. This is not the same as copying a photograph far from it! Some suggested features, others reminded me of surface textures, and they all combined to fire my imagination. The modelling of the bricks was carried out with both linear and circular shading, completed by light blending to remove any line, which would have upset the sense of reality. I had one thought only in mind I wanted The to bricks, keep the cliff, surface stones fairly simple and smooth, so the gritty lime mortar and smoother and boulders bricks were would all contrast and play against each other to emphasise both shaded textures. intuitively. Beginning at one end, possibly with a surface feature suggested by the brick photographs, the linear shading was extended into the next small section. Maybe that shading overlapped previous shading, or one end of the section was darker than the other for whatever reason, if I saw the darker area as being a change in plane (curving away from the light) I would emphasise it with additional shading. Often this would be flat-face, circular shading that allowed me to feel the surface beneath my pencil. The hard boundary of that new shaded area might then appear in my mind to be the sharp edge of a deep indentation in the 2

3 surface. Establishing a dark interior, a darker cast shadow beneath its top edge, and a highlight catching the bottom edge gave it a three-dimensional quality. And so the shading continued until the brick was completed. Establish a dark shadow first. Knowing your drawing s darkest value will allow you to easily work out all the intermediate values between that and the white of your paper. EXERCISE 1 Have a go at some or all of these bricks. They can be as complex or as simple as you want to make them and interpret, don t copy. Make them your bricks. You ll find a printable line drawing on page 10 and selection of reference photos on page 11. You have two textures brick and lime mortar so find two different shading methods to contrast each with the other. I used stippling to create the gritty mortar, adjusting highlights with Blu-Tack to leave just a trace of it, and 2H shading provided the three-dimensional form over the stippled detailed. The stippling itself, by adjusting the spacings of the dots, also provided a suggestion of form closer dots reduce the white space between them and combine to appear darker in tone. Linear and circular shading with HB and 2B was used to create the bricks. Before you begin, know and maintain your direction of light. Make it your aim to describe to your viewers the three-dimensional form of every part. They cannot read your mind and will not want to explore a flat and uninteresting drawing. Don t draw brick and mortar at the same time. Switch between the two as necessary but concentrate only on the one beneath your pencil. You must be able to picture each small area in three-dimensions as you work on it, and allow what you are creating to suggest what comes next. It s like writing a letter to someone to explain an event in your life. You know the subject and there is a chronological order you can follow, but there is no planned structure. You begin writing and your initial words recall memories that complete the paragraph. That paragraph suggests the next, and sometimes you go off on a tangent before returning to the original subject. It s intuitive; it just flows onto the paper, or into your letter. You are writing your thoughts. 3

unfold before your eyes. Working guideline drawing for What?

Sometimes twigs, leaves and pebbles appear as I m drawing; at other times I quickly sketch their

Some survive; others are discarded, and here (above left and right) the bottom stone has been split

4 Do the same with your drawing. Allow your creative juices to flow down your arm from your mind to your hand and watch your world unfold before your eyes. Working guideline drawing for What? There is no indication of texture and the ground is bare. Sometimes twigs, leaves and pebbles appear as I m drawing; at other times I quickly sketch their outlines as they suggest themselves, such as the grass behind the paw. Some survive; others are discarded, and here (above left and right) the bottom stone has been split into two. The ground is just scribble that begins to take form and grows organically. Make yourself aware of your lead against the paper. Feel the bite of a hard edge drawing a line, or a flat face glide over the surface. And feel the lead caress the paper when you draw very light strokes. Feedback aids control. 4

5 EXERCISE 2 Try it. Don t expect instant success but have a go at drawing with no prior planning. Of course, it has to be in some sort of context so, to make it easier, I ll suggest a scenario similar to What? and you can take it from there. There are no strong shadows, just light and shade. The sun is shining but wispy clouds are diffusing the light. You re in a yard of some description a farmyard, scrapyard, chicken run, or some other place with a rough earthen floor. You decide. Picture the scene in your mind. Pick up your 2B or HB pencil and make sure it has a chisel point with a smooth flat face. That face will allow you to glide over the surface and feel your imagined ground beneath it. And it won t produce sharp-edged lines. This is a secondary area you are drawing, so keep the detail restrained. Now make a mark any mark. You re drawing surface and shadows. The white areas you leave between marks are either highlights or actual objects. Vary the weight of your lines and squiggles. Let them suggest what they represent, and when you recognise it, describe it a little more clearly and add tone over the white to subdue it. It s your yard, so include whatever is appropriate. In What? it was pebbles, twigs, bits of straw, and leaves. In a scrapyard it might be pieces of wire and metal, or old nuts and bolts. A chicken run might have weeds, feathers and scratched holes. Don t break your concentration and feel you have to complete every object you create. Outline it, leave it white, create a shadow beneath it if it needs one, and then go back to it later and give it basic form and texture. It s a very enjoyable and free way of working, and the results tend to be naturalistic and often surprising! SHADING DARK TO LIGHT And now for something completely different. Wherever possible protect the virgin white of your paper, and the simplest way of doing that is to never apply graphite to an area until you are certain it belongs there. So, how do you shade a lock of black hair that has a central bright highlight? There is one golden rule: you draw from black to white, or dark to light for blonde hair, in stages that gradually 5

approach the highlight. That simple procedure protects the highlight because, by the time you reach it, you know what is required. Stage 1: Begin at both ends shading in towards the centre.

This example measures 1¼ from end to end. Stage 2: Start every line of shading of every layer at the beginning, and don t worry about the blunt ends.

6 approach the highlight. That simple procedure protects the highlight because, by the time you reach it, you know what is required. Stage 1: Begin at both ends shading in towards the centre. Be aware of the white gaps you are leaving because they will later appear to be subtle highlights in the dark hair. I m using the flat face of a 2B and drawing slowly and deliberately. Don t rush! This example measures 1¼ from end to end. Stage 2: Start every line of shading of every layer at the beginning, and don t worry about the blunt ends. You can go back into those dark ends later and extend them in either direction to form the next curving lock. Please note: Each layer of shading is made with less pressure than the previous one, and all lines are feathered as they approach the centre. Stage 3: I m still using a 2B at this stage but it s beginning to look a little grainy in the lighter areas. Notice how the initial white gaps are beginning to look like subdued highlights, and the dark lines like shadows between them. Stage 4: Now I ve switched to using an HB pencil, and I m still shading with a flat face. The feathered ends are beginning to create a recognisable central highlight, which I ve decided to not leave white. Stage 5: I ve reached the centre and allowed my HB to lightly shade over it, removing the white. I ve also created a dark line through it, with the edge of my point, to increase the contrast but the contrast can be increased further, once the surrounding tone is added. 6

7 No digital enhancing or erasing was used at all these images were quickly and spontaneously drawn just as you see them. Stage 6: Naturally each lock of this hair will have a deep and dark gap between it and those alongside. With those black shadows now established, the increased contrast gives the highlight a greater brightness. If I d left the highlight white, it would now appear to shine with even more brilliance. Shading first and then erasing cannot achieve this effect as believably erasing will inevitably leave soft edges and visible signs of dragged graphite. Nor can it achieve the same delicate degree of feathering. But more importantly, it will be a mechanical exercise that won t directly connect your mind to your hand! Shading with this method of layering allows for creative spontaneity and serendipity. As with the Ground Squirrel s rocks, the marks you make are guided by feedback from the marks already drawn. Just keep your mind open to what is appearing beneath your pencil; recognise a gap as a hair, and a dark line as a gap between hairs or a hair s cast shadow. Even if you draw guidelines first, as I did below but not for the demonstration above, employ this method for best results. Look at the lock in your reference photo and soak up its three-dimensional information and then put it away and draw your mental picture of it. Now you will be working solely from your threedimensional mental image and not from a two-dimensional photo. Remember: to create a thin white hair as you shade black, look at the white as you draw either side of it and not at the line you are drawing. Part of a Springer Spaniel s ear showing multiple uses of this technique. 7

The same method using a high-key palette is used for blonde hair. As your curving line leaves the starting point, keep the other end of the lock in your peripheral vision.

8 The same method using a high-key palette is used for blonde hair. As your curving line leaves the starting point, keep the other end of the lock in your peripheral vision. That gives you somewhere to aim for, ensuring that both halves will eventually join with a single correct curvature. EXERCISE 3 OK, by now you were expecting this Have a go! Again, don t expect instant success and it will probably take a few attempts before you get the hang of it. But persevere; it will be time well spent. Keeping the drawing small might help you but draw at whatever scale you feel most comfortable with. I m so used to drawing this upside down in my workshops that I drew it with my hand in the top right-hand corner. I suggest you use the natural sweep of your wrist and draw it as an upward curving arc from the bottom left, as you see it here, for left-handers. Right-handers can flip the image and draw from the bottom right for simplicity. This is on super-smooth plate-finish Mellotex so no surface texture is visible in my drawing. If your paper is coarser, don t worry about any pits in the tooth that remain as white dots. It s practicing the technique that s important and not a flawless final result. 8

9 WHAT TO SEND IN THIS WEEK Exercise 1 Your drawing of some or all of the bricks and contrasting them with the rough, grainy mortar. Don t try to copy the reference, just let the surface suggest itself as you draw. You ll find a line drawing you can print out on page 10 and a selection of references on page 11. Exercise 2 The surface of your imaginary yard, drawn without prior planning, and including anything that occurs to you as you draw. Keep an open and empty mind it helps! Exercise 3 The lock of dark hair and the shadows alongside it. Draw many if you prefer, and extend them too into long tresses. I ll critique anything you want to send in, but a single lock is all that is required. Remember to shade dark to light and soft to hard and don t erase. Next week We ll take the drawing of hair a stage further and experiment with other textures and surfaces too. Happy drawing! Cheers. Copyright: All text, images and exercises included in this course are the sole copyright of Mike Sibley No reproduction for commercial purposes, in whole or part, will be permitted under any circumstances. Applying for written permission from Mike Sibley may permit extracts for display or promotional purposes only. Mike@SibleyFineArt.com Website: Videos: 9

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11 Reference for line drawing above 11

DRAWING FROM LINE TO LIFE Beginners Course

DRAWING FROM LINE TO LIFE Beginners Course WEEK 2 Remember last week when I asked you to draw blocks of tone with each pencil, and on the second line to draw as heavily as you could? The object of that exercise was make you produce the darkest