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Really, the most important thing is just to start! There is no reason why you can’t start shading today. My point, is that any old pencil will do. Once it’s burnt, I can use it just like a regular pencil. Because you can draw and shade realistically with pretty much anything that can make light to dark marks! Here, let me show you! I’m gonna draw using this random stick I found in my kitchen. Some tools can make shading easier for you, but you absolutely DO NOT need any special pencils to get started. If you’re interested in the tools I use and want to learn more about the different pencil types. This will take some practice and concentration to develop the muscle memory for. It’s important to maintain a consistent pressure between each back and forth stroke or each individual stroke. Fill the squares from right to left, start with the darkest value you can possibly make and work your way towards the lightest.
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To have good pressure control, practice shading from one end of your sketchbook to the other while pressing harder and harder until the values get darker gradually.Īnother way to practice is to draw a long rectangle and divide it into several squares. While portraits with a wider value range will pop: Portraits displaying a limited value range, can end up looking very flat. The harder I press down on my pencil, the darker the strokes will be. Realistic shading is done by creating a series of values/shades ranging from light to dark. This blog post is a written version of my video tutorial below: There are more, but let’s keep things simple! I’m going to walk you through all 3 topics and then we’ll shade something together, step by step! In order to shade better, here are 3 things you’ll need to learn… You can make a flat line drawing jump right off the page or push things far away into the distance! When you add light and shadow to your line-drawings, you can make your subject come to life by creating the illusion of form and depth.
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