Drawing Tutorials | Drawing Tutorials Online Blog

Thinking Technique – Drawing In Your Own Style

by Matthew | Sep 26, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials, The Blog | 2 comments

There is a time and a place to draw certain techniques physically on the paper. While other times you just will want to draw in your style. The key is to think about certain techniques as you are drawing in your style.

In terms of practice, I believe its a must to draw techniques in their purest form. I have my students do this in class. During the classes morning session, I have the students draw pure technique.

However, during the afternoon session, I have them develop their style of drawing. The point of this post is to get you thinking about the difference between style and technique.
If you just draw a portrait or the figure in traditional techniques, your drawing will not have their voice.

Make sure you practice both every week. Cultivate your style while practicing new techniques. This practice will serve you in the long run.

Thanks so much for taking the time to watch. Let me know your thoughts.

How To Draw Soft Hair

by Matthew | Sep 12, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials, The Blog | 11 comments

I just recently finished up a new portrait drawing course. I wanted to share with you a technique for drawing soft hair.

You want to work in layers. Your first layer in terms of drawing hair is to block in tone. Don’t try to put in your darkest dark all at one time. You’ll want to gradually lay in tone.

With the technique shown in the video, I put down tone, then pushed the tone into the paper with a stiff bristle brush. What this does in push the pencil into the texture of the illustration board.

You will want to do this process a few times. Blocking in tone, using the brush to push it into the board. In the final layers that is where you will refine the details with both an eraser and your pencil.

When working on the final layers you should use a more pliable brush. One that is more forgiving. You can then proceed to pull out the light with a thin eraser. With this drawing, I used a mono-zero cylindrical eraser.

When you use the bristle brush, not a blending stump, you can easily pull out lights with your eraser. Try it it’s a ton of fun.

Let me know what you thought about this technique. Leave a comment below.

How To Draw The Structure Of The Eye

by Matthew | Aug 20, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials, The Blog | 2 comments

I recently completed a portrait drawing course that focuses on how to draw the features of the face. In this particular drawing lesson, I share with you two different ways to think about drawing the eye.

The first way to think about the eye is basically drawing a ball in a socket. Do your best to visualize light hitting a sphere. That sphere is sitting in a socket, the eye socket of the skull. I love drawing with outlines, however, too many artists focus on the linear aspect of the eye’s lashes.

Instead, try drawing shapes of light and dark. Those shapes of light and dark with be dictated by which direction the light is hitting the ball in the socket.

Another way to think about the eye is with surface planes. The master of surface planes is certainly George Bridgeman. I never like my surface plane type drawings. However, they are a necessary evil when learning how to draw the eye. Try your hand at completing a surface plane drawing of the eye.

Lastly, in this short lesson, I also share with you what not to do when drawing the eye. You do not want to draw the eye in the form of an almond shape. You do not want to draw super sharp eyelashes, instead, think of grouping the lashes together in a soft shape.

Lastly do not draw the iris as a full-round circle. The round iris is usually covered up by both eyelids making it look more like a rounded rectangle.

This drawing lesson basically provides you with two exercises to complete. These exercises will help you to think about how to draw the structure of the eye.

Thank you so much for watching.

Learn more on how a membership to Drawing Tutorials Online can help you with your portrait drawings.

How To Draw The Ear

by Matthew | Jul 18, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials, The Blog

I recently just finished uploading the last lesson in a course titled ‘How To Draw The Features Of The Face. This last lesson focuses on the ear.

Drawing the ear can certainly be tricky. There a few techniques that you really want to keep in mind.

First, think of the entire ear as an oval. All of the detail of the ear is housed in that simple oval.

Second, the details located inside of that oval, those details are basically cylinders. To be more specific they are cylinders that are curved. What makes these curvey cylinders hard to draw is the type of light that is hitting them.

I always place my light source above and to the side of my subjects, in essence creating form light.

Third, shade in the shadow shapes of the ear. Keep the shadow shapes more of a middle tone, do not go too dark. I learned my lesson the hard way a long time ago while working on a book cover painting. Let’s just say the ears were a bit too dark.

Ears are very translucent, shade the shadows with a middle tone. This will allow for a glow in the shadow.

Fourth and last, implement the modeling factors to really promote the three-dimensional quality of the Helix and the Anti-Helix.

If you have any questions or comments leave them below. I’d love the hear from you.

Don’t forget to check out myInstagram. I’m always adding new drawings.

How To Draw The Eye

by Matthew | Jul 10, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials, The Blog

I recently completed a course titled How To Draw The Features Of The Face. In this new course, I break down the features of the face in a step by step process. I cover how to draw the eyes, nose, and lips.

I wanted to share this particular lesson with you because it is short and to the point. You really want to draw the eye in a loose, curvy organic sort of way. You do not want to incorporate any straight lines when drawing the eye, everything about the eye should look rough and organic.

As you can see in this rough sketch of the eye I did not really focus too much of my time on the lashes. Do your very best to draw along with me, avoiding the lashes for now. Think more about the structure of the eye, not the lashes.

When drawing the lashes do not draw them with straight lines, instead, try to group all of the lashes into a shape.

I’m really happy with the way this course turned out. It’s really helping people improve their portrait drawings.

Download the Photo reference.

Thank you so much for watching the drawing lesson above. If you are interested in seeing the rest of the course consider a membership to Drawing Tutorials Online. Not only will you gain access to this course and many more, but, you will also be able to get feedback on your portrait drawings in our member critique gallery.

How To Draw The Nose

by Matthew | Jun 20, 2019 | Drawing Tutorials | 2 comments

I just recently uploaded a brand new portrait drawing course in the member’s area of Drawing Tutorials Online.

This new course focuses on short sketchy type drawings that teach you how to draw the features of the face. Most of the video range about ten to fifteen minutes each. They are super easy to get through.

This lessons seven showcases how to draw the nose from the three-quarter view. This video tutorial will show what to do and what not to do when it comes to drawing the nose. No, this video is not about drawing a finished polished drawing, instead, it’s about teaching how to see structure.

This video will teach you how to utilize form lines to promote a three-dimensional look and feel to the nose. You will learn how to see and use tone on the diverse surface planes.

As mentioned above this video towards the end, will show you what not to do. The one thing you do not want to do is make the nostril super dark. Especially in a pencil drawing. Using your darkest dark for the nostril will create a keyhole effect in your drawing.

That said enjoy the lesson. Definitely try your own version of the drawings.

If you would like to sign up to gain access to the entire course today, check out our membership options. This course primarily covers how to draw the features of the face.

I’m teaching small group drawing classes at the Metropolitan Museum Of Art this Summer. You can read more about them at my personal site, Matthew Archambault.