Drawing unknown faces, part 188

A somewhat caricaturist version of a photo I found in a newspaper.

Drawing unknown faces, part 187

Slowly losing inspiration, I decided to pick up where I left on my drawing unknown faces series. However, I did it with a twist. I used a soft pencil with a chisel point (for variation in line width), and tried to draw with broad markings, caricaturing style.

If I’m ever going to draw people I should be able to put them on paper in a few minutes. That is about all people have patience for when they’re not being paid as a model, I guess.

I bought a book about caricature (Face Off, by Harry Hamernik), with good tips on street drawing. Before you go on the street practice single features until you’ve mastered them, use a permanent medium, and draw with clear, firm strokes. You want to have a resemblance in as few lines as possible. To become that efficient, you have to practice, practice and practice.

That is all.

Drawing Unknown Faces, part 186

This is an inked drawing, based on an underdrawing that in turn was based on a photo I found on the Flickr photo stream.

I had to do some editing on the scanned image, because some parts that were outlined looked better when not outlined. This is something I still have to learn. When should you put an outline around a shape, and when not. Of course, the outer edges of the head should be outlined (or should they?). Doing it on the inner edges can look strange, especially when the edge isn’t well defined, as is the case with most women. I’m sure that in men, who have more angular features, putting outlines around shapes inside their faces works very well.

It all comes down to anatomy. Where are the boney parts of the face, and where are the soft, fleshy parts? I really should go back to studying Bridgman, or similar, to extend my grasp of the human face and body.

That is all.

Drawing Unknown Faces, part 185

It has been a while, but here is another unknown face, based on a photo I found on the Flickr photo stream. It is only loosely based, more a caricature of the original.

The above drawing is based on the sketch I made with red, blue and black pencils. As you can see, that sketch has been altered considerably on the computer. The coloring was based on the original photo, but only as a reference, not by picking the color from the original.

It was my first drawing that used a photo as a reference, and didn’t literally copy the photo. Here is the photo.

That is all.

Today’s drawing treasures

Instead of putting each drawing in a separate post, I thought it would be more efficient (though less nice on the stats) to put all my drawings of today in one single big post. I’ve drawn more than what I show here, by the way.

I tried some experiments with lettering and fonts. This is nothing serious, just playing with letters.

While this pencil sketch was nice, the next ink sketch is much nicer, I think.

Then a cat came lying next to me. Natasha is a rather shy cat, but lately she seems to trust me more. Must have something to do with the mild diet I’ve put her on, so she’ll loose weight. Cats are like that, I guess. Anyway, she did let me sketch her.

After all that sketching, I thought it was time for a somewhat more formal drawing, an unknown face, after a photo I found on Flickr, using the free too zFlick.

Although I used a photo as reference, I tried to simplify the drawing, to give it a more cartoony look than what I normally do with a pencil sketch.

That is all.