[attachmentid=3583][attachmentid=3584]this is a picture i just drew of my daughter kailee skating for the first time...how does it look????? i think its one of my better drawings...

info please!!!!!!!

Hi Laurie,

it looks good.
I'm a very beginner in drawing but what I know is that if you want to reproduce a reference picture you need to look carefully at the values in it.
In your drawing I see that you could go deeper with the values and reach a darker shading in some zones.
Some says that a good pencil drawing must have the real white and the real black as well.

If I were you I'd add some other layer to the whole drawing leaving untouched the little spot where the real white is. If it makes sense.

Anyway I suggest you to wait for more expert comment.

Paolo is heading you in the right direction on this one Laurie. Your drawing has the right form and you have values in it, but the image looks 'flat'. It needs some contrasts to make the viewer 'see' a dimensional picture.

First, you're working again from a not so great photo in that the values and shapes aren't really clear so its more difficult to render them. Having said that, as its mostly clothing that you're drawing, you can wing it fairly well by simply looking at similar clothing and poses to see how the fabric folds and hangs. Then you need to start modelling it by adding darker values and creating highlights.

Careful observation and practice. You'll hear me say it again and again but it's true. Try sketching every day for practice, draw from life wherever possible as photographs don't give the detail required. In time you'll improve in leaps and bounds. I promise.

thanks you guys...and that where my problems are is the shading the values the making it look 3d and all that...i dont know why but i just cant see what all of you are seeing,,, or i can and dont know how to apply it to my pictures...i have done a couple of shading lessons but even they dont turn out worth beans.....maybe i dont have a thing for drawing...i dont know...i need serious help....i also find that if it is the form of a lesson i cant do it right...if someone tells me what to do i will do it just fine. does that make any sense at all to you guys cause im thinking it doesnt make sense to me...thanks again so much...it means a lot

thanks you guys...and that where my problems are is the shading the values the making it look 3d and all that...i dont know why but i just cant see what all of you are seeing,,, or i can and dont know how to apply it to my pictures...i have done a couple of shading lessons but even they dont turn out worth beans.....maybe i dont have a thing for drawing...i dont know...i need serious help....i also find that if it is the form of a lesson i cant do it right...if someone tells me what to do i will do it just fine. does that make any sense at all to you guys cause im thinking it doesnt make sense to me...thanks again so much...it means a lot.. i also dont know what pencils to switch too..ok like for her skipants...would i use like a 6b or 7b...and her jacket would be what it would havet o be light to like a 2h or something....thats what confuses me is the pencils to use...im not good at following a lesson...i can but it never turns out...i have a problem that way...but i do follow direction....so please see if htere is another way i can be helped other than the lessons.

It sounds like you want individual instruction Laurie, or perhaps just some gentle guidance through a lesson, step by step. Why don't you tackle one of Brenda's lessons and work through it, posting the steps here one by one as you progess and we'll see if we can help.

It does take time to see values and subtle shading and lots of practice. None of us had perfect drawings from the word go.

Give it time. See if there is an art class in your area for beginners and join up if you can.

there is no art classes in my area...i looked into that before i found this website...im sure i will putter through it and eventually get what i want to do but the only problem is is that i want to draw a specific picture of my grandpa for my grandma's birthday in june...he died 8 years ago and i would like to do something nice to have her remember him by...thats why i am practicing on different pictures...i just thought that ya'll could give me a hand
i will for sure keep it posted on the thing one or more of the lessons that brenda has...i ll give it a go...wish me luck....i tried the one with the dog leg and fur must have been like a million times...and all i got was crap...i couldnt do it...i dont understand hatching....are they individual lines or all in one stroke back and forth back and forth...i dont get that....crosshatching i dont really get either...other than it lookes like squares..same goes for the others too,
thats where i need help...and how to know what pencil to use.
maybe i am using the wrong paper...just ordinary paper. i have sketching paper here too.but only small paper...

thanks so much islanderNl

Laurie,

Islander gave you the best advice!

I think no one of us here can explain hatching better than Brenda herself in the lessons.
We only can say the same what is written there.

Look and see - so many of us learned by these lessons and we learned to draw within a very short time. Until June you have time and it is better to read the lessons and DO them step by step as Islander said.

Laurie, you're trying to run before you can walk. Start with something VERY simple and work your way up. You have to master the basics before you can go to the more advanced techniques, no matter how much you want to draw them.

Hatching and crosshatching is an easy technique once you understand how it works. It is a series of straight or curved lines, all individual which can be spaced far apart or close together to give the illusion of light or dark.

Go back to one of Brenda's lessons and concentrate on doing one of the very simple ones well before moving on to the next. I know you want instant results and want to do that drawing of your grandfather. You will do it in time. But it does take time.

Let me repeat something Islander said up above: to draw a good picture from a photo, you need a good photo to start from. If you want the drawing to look 3D, then the photo needs to look 3D, and this one really doesn't. Flash photographs are actually pretty bad source material because the flash washes out all the shadows, making things look flat.

Have you tried drawing any of the pictures from this week's "drawing challenge"? None of them are easy pictures to draw, but they are good photos with a lot of nice shadows to copy.