How to Learn to Sketch or Draw in Pencil
Drawing with pencil and charcoal requires the right tools and a delicate technique and touch. Unlike oil paintings, pastels and watercolors, the sense of depth, perspective and contrast in pencil sketches and drawing is achieved entirely by creating texture and tone with the pencil. A gifted artist knows how to manipulate and use the pencil in a variety of ways to produce a number of different effects that give the drawing its details.
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Instructions
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Drawing Tools
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Experiment with different types of pencils. The two options are wooden pencils and mechanical draughtsman-style pencil. The advantages of the latter is that they maintain a constant length and balance and they don't need to be sharpened as much.
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Purchase different erasers for correcting mistakes. The two erasers relied on by artists are the putty rubber eraser and blue tack eraser. The putty rubber eraser absorbs and picks up up the graphite without leaving eraser residue behind on the paper. Blue tack erasers have a very tacky quality. This makes it possible to remove the graphite without moving the eraser and risking damage to the paper.
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Purchase cold press drawing paper. An artist can obviously draw on any type of paper but cold press paper is specifically designed for drawing. Its rough textured surface is responsive to graphite and charcoal. The surface of the paper allows for a greater degree of shading effects.
Drawing Techniques
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Draw a light outline for the drawing on the paper with a soft pencil. Use a minimal amount of pressure as you draw the outline.
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Work on one area of the drawing at a time. Fill in the general details. Use a variety of strokes to produce tone and texture to the drawing. Controlling the amount of pressure with the pencil creates different effects.
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Create a sense of contrast with lighter and darker shading techniques Shading techniques are essential to a quality drawing or sketch. The contrast between light and darker shades produces a sense of depth and perspective. Experiment with soft, medium and harder pencils. Add the finishing touches and final details with a hard pencil.
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References
Resources
- Photo Credit Ciaran Griffin/Lifesize/Getty Images
