David's nose - Final

Yesterday I finished the nose project at the Sofia Art Academy. Worked on making the sides darker and making the strokes on the bridge of the nose softer. Igor did some of the final touch-ups where he added some darker shadows and created more contrast. Here is the end result:

Drawing Tip #1 - Use a HB #2 pencil

In the beginning of your drawing career it is vital to learn to control your pencil so that you get the result that you are expecting. That means, you need to be able to vary how much pressure you apply in order to get the right tone that you are looking for. It is of course much easier to have a very hard pencil (H series) to get very light tone and a soft pencil (B series) for darker tones but using a HB #2 and learning how much pressure is needed for a certain tone is great practice. They are really easy to come by as well and you can probably get around 10 of them for less than $1.50.

Leaf Study

This is a picture that I did last year in the fall when there was plenty of leaves on the ground. I was pretty happy with it because it was my first real drawing after having a few art classes and I did this one on my own at home.

One thing that I got critiqued on by my art teacher was that I probably shouldn’t have used strokes for the drop shadow. That really draws your attention to it and it would be better if I used a softer shadow (going back and forth with the pencil).

Apples

One of the first things I had to do in my drawing class was to draw a plate of apples. This project took around 5 session I think and it was interesting to see how many layers it took to complete a drawing.

David's nose - Part I

Another art class and some more progress on my current project which is the nose. I am currently trying to draw a cast of David’s nose (as sculptured by Michelangelo). Probably have one more session to go with it.

Current state:

List of thing that are left to do:

• Make left side slightly darker
• Make nostrils much darker
• Soften the strokes (add more light layers) on the nose bridge.
• Make the shadows where the major and minor alar cartilage meets more round and soft.