I used to love drawing portraits when I was younger and I was always drawing portraits of my favourite popstars when I was a teenager. Now that I have got back into drawing, I decided that I would have another attempt at a portrait, but as it was my first time after so many years away from drawing, I decided that I would try and draw a portrait of myself. After scrolling through my photos, I decided I would attempt this photo:
I began by printing the photo out on paper and then drawing a grid of 2x2cm boxes over the image. Next, in my sketch book, I decided that I wanted to draw a bigger image than the one that I had, so I drew a grid of 3x3cm boxes on to the page. Using a grid to lay out my composition helps me space out the features better rather than having them disproportionate. I then proceeded to draw. This is what the finished sketch looks like:
Having not drawn a portrait in about thirty years, I’m pleased with how this has turned out, especially as I had a lot of issues with getting the mouth right and the positioning of the nose. The shading of the lenses on the sunglasses could have been improved too. There also needs to be better shading with the hair as well. I definitely found using the paper stumps beneficial when doing the shading around the nose and the mouth as it made the pencil lines a lot more subtle, and it meant that I could get the shading around the nose area more accurate. I found that all I needed to sketch for the nose was the area around the nostrils; everything else was blended.
Overall, I think the whole process has gone well, and as always there is room for improvement, but practice does make perfect and there is always a learning curve when drawing. I have noticed that when I am out and about I’m always looking at objects as if they are going to be my next piece of work. I find that I’m looking at the profile of objects and the colour as well as different shades. I suppose it’s a bit like a photographer wanting to get the composition correct when they want to take a photograph.
Genie Art 