Archive for the ‘Portraits’ Category

Street Painting in Florence ~ Chalk Drawings after Botticelli and Vermeer

Sunday, August 10th, 2008

Street Painting (Chalk Drawing) is hard, intensive drawing work.

You are constantly observed by a wide range of passers-by and under pressure to deliver and finish a work that the majority will admire.

If you don’t do something at least ‘pretty good’ you could be in for a barrage of criticism from all sorts of people – So I would say it is a little bit stressful too!

Girl with a Pearl Earing - Street Painting by Peter McClory

Girl with a Pearl Earing, and Passers By – Street Painting by Peter McClory

Well, despite all that, it’s worth it to see a smile on so many people’s faces as they walk past, or stop and watch.

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Basic and Essential Drawing Tools and Materials

Sunday, August 10th, 2008

If you want to start drawing, and haven’t done it before, you’ll probably need to get a handful of inexpensive drawing tools before you begin!

First of all, you’ll need a pencil. If you can, I suggest you buy a mechanical graphite pencil with interchangeable leads. You’ll need HB and 2B Graphite leads.

If you can’t get hold of a mechanical pencil with interchangeable leads, you’ll need a small craft knife or Xacto knife for the first stage in sharpening your wooden pencils.

The fundamental drawing tools you'll need to learn to draw academically

The fundamental drawing tools you’ll need to learn to draw academically, minus the drawing board.

You’ll also want a small, usually wooden sandpaper pad for sharpening your pencil, and a grey kneadable eraser (putty rubber).

Also, get a Drawing board (about 50cm/18-20 inches on the longest side). This is small enough for you to rest it on your knees and lean it against your desk, but also large enough to use for medium-sized life drawing on an easel.

Posted in Artist Tips, Figure and Life Drawing, Portraits | No Comments »

Realistic Drawing Techniques – Head Portraits

Thursday, August 7th, 2008

Many artists and potential artists spend years striving to be able to draw realistic faces.

Some people achieve this goal but many do not, only getting increasingly frustrated with what can be boiled down to a process of both creative and methodical techniques.

This process is demonstrated step-by-step in the following tutorial, taking you explicitly through the stages of creating the portrait drawing below.

Anyone should be able to follow this tutorial successfully.

Closeup of the face on the finished realistic head portrait, drawn in pencil by Peter McClory

Closeup of the face on the finished realistic head portrait, drawn in pencil by Peter McClory

This tutorial will take you through the stages of copying a photo of a persons face (without tracing). This will also help you to learn how to draw someone’s portrait in real life.

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Posted in Portraits | 3 Comments »