Quilt Barn Pencil Drawing

Hello, it is hard to believe another week has gone by and we are almost halfway through September already. Fall is fast approaching, and I can’t wait for the cooler temperatures to come. With the change of seasons, I hope to have less lawn work to do and a little more time for drawing. Speaking of drawing, I am continuing the portrait of my Grandma and Grandpa Dillard. This week my focus has been on my Grandpa and getting the values established and correcting some areas that were off with my original outline.

For my Grandpa, I started with an H Pencil and working from the top left began to build up the layers to get the skin tone. For the skin, I used mainly pencil, instead of relying on the blending stumps and makeup sponges to start. Then gently went back over the areas just to soften and blend the edges. When I did the skin for my Grandma, I think I relied too much on the blending stumps and sponges which almost makes it look blurry. I do not believe this will be a problem, because I planned on going back over the entire portrait at lease a couple of times to add layers. In doing so, I will be able to correct the blurry feel.

To clarify the difference in approach I used between drawing my Grandpa from what I did with my Grandma. For my Grandma, I was using the blending stumps and makeup sponges between each layer of the pencils. I think I ended up over blending the image. The change I made was that I would use the range of pencils (H, B, 2B, 3B & 6B) to get the value I wanted and then blend it lightly afterward. In doing so, I feel I achieved a more realistic feel to the skin tone. I am not sure that the pictures in the blog show it that well, but it is noticeable.

Now as I worked on my Grandpa, I found a few things just did not feel right. As a result, I would stand the portrait up and sit across the room from it and compare it to my reference photos. Doing so, gave me a little different perspective of the drawing and I could spot areas that needed adjusted. I found that I had to raise up and resize the ears and also change the shape of the cheeks. They were close but not exact. That is the fun of a portrait, you have to be exact. If you are even a little off, it will be noticeable in the final result. The challenge is that the brain is so used to recognizing faces it starts to interpret the image. This can lead to details being incorrect. One method I have read about to help prevent the brain from over riding what the eye sees is to turn the portrait upside down and compare the reference to the drawing. I have not tried this yet, but as I approach the finishing stages of the portrait, I think I will try it to find tune the drawing and make any corrections.

As I leave off for this week, you can see from the images, that I still have my Grandpa’s beard and hair to finish and a few more corrections to ensure everything is accurate. I mainly have the shapes established and some of the values. Hopefully, this next week I will be able to get that area finished and start working on the clothing. Wish I had more time to draw, but life seems to always get in the way. My current schedule, is that I get up between 4:40am and 5:00am. Which gives me around an hour that I can draw before getting ready for work. I find that I can concentrate on drawing better first thing in the morning. In the evenings I am normally not home from work until 6:30pm and 7:00pm. Which does not leave a lot of time for drawing before bed. Besides, in the evenings I do not have the focus to really concentrate on drawing. Now this maybe different for others, but it is what works for me. I have also found that drawing for an hour or so before work, puts me in a better state of mind to deal with all of the issues/problem I have to face as a manager of an IT Help Desk.

Anyway, I would love to hear from you. Please leave a comment below. Thank you and have a good week.