Colored Pencils

Your welcome to the 18th video and the secrets to drawing video course brought to you by the virtue instructor dot com. And this video we’re going to take a look at our first colored medium colored pencils colored pencils are a drawing medium that are waxy shafts of pigment encased inside wood brands of colored pencils vary greatly in quality and in price higher quality color pencils are going to produce better results colored pencils are probably the most misused medium because they are so readily available to anyone. But there are certain things that you can do when using colored pencils to ensure quality. There are basically five things we want to keep in mind when using color pencils The first thing is we want our finished image to look like it’s been heavily applied. So basically we’re going to build up colors. Which brings us to the second thing layer colors. Put one color on top of another color and you should always make sure colors don’t just grab a green make shell and blue to make a green. Take your time colored pencils are a drawing medium that take time to do right and then add your details . Last Friday on top of what you’ve already drawn so we’re going to keep these things in mind as I go through this demonstration. I’m going to be drawing a sea turtle in this demonstration. You’ll notice that I’m drawing with Teller pencil right from the start. I haven’t picked up a graphite pencil at all. In fact I don’t want my drawing to begin as a graphite drawing because when I start to layer colored pencils on top of the graphite some of the graphite may mix with the colored pencil medium it will turn areas gray which is something that I don’t want to have. I want to keep my drawing as clean as possible. So my entire drawing will be done with colored pencils as I become more confident. What I’ve drawn I can begin to get a little darker with my marks and I can start to add some of the details that I see. Now I’m ready to start in the darkest area that I see. And in this case it’s the eye of the turtle. So I’m going to start with a dark brown and I’m going to fill in that area completely. Then you go on top of it with a dark blue. Now this will mix to make a more natural looking black. In fact in this drawing demonstration I’m not going to use any black colored pencil at all. Black tends to make things look really flat. And for this drawing I want anything to look flat. So I want to create natural blanks in order to create these natural blacks. I use a dark brown in a dark blue. Now the first spot I’m drawing here I start with a little bit of brown and then I’m going over the top of it a little bit or red and then maybe a little bit more brown. I’m trying to build up the color so I’m layering one color on top of another. If a hair have an area that’s really dark I use a little bit of blue with that brown to make it dark and then I’m going to take this cream color and go over the top of everything that I’ve drawn. Doing this will burnish those colors together. Bernard Sheen is basically using the waxy part of the pencil to blend and mix the colors right on the surface. Successful colored pencil drawings are almost dependent on burnishing. You’ll need to have some areas that do have a level of burnishing which will happen naturally when you layer your colors. The softer wax your pencils will be easier to burnish some colored pencil manufacturers even make colorless blunders which are basically pencils with just colorless wax in them specifically made for burnishing and mixing and blending colors. I tend to like to use a lighter value of colors like cream or even white to burnish. I’ll be doing a lot of burnishing in this drawing now that I’ve got a large majority of my turtle’s head completed. I’m going to start to work my way to the left. Ordinarily I would start from the left and work to the right since I’m right handed. This may better suit you for your drawing. But in this case the turtle’s head is pretty important. That’s why I was drawn to start there at the beginning of this drawing. You’ll notice I’m using the cream color as the base color for the skin of my turtle that I’m going to have the top of it with yellow a little bit of orange and brown and even some white to lighten up some areas. I can go right on top of these areas with the dark brown and add details with my pencil nice and sharp . So here you can really see the importance of layering your colors also mixing your colors and then adding your details last to the area. You can achieve this with high quality colored pencils. I’ll point out here that I’m working on grade drawing paper instead of a white surface. The reason why I’m choosing to work on gray paper is because it allows me to start with the tonality right from the beginning instead of just working with white and trying to work from lighter values to darker values starting in the middle of a value scale helps me really push my values in either direction . It also allows for the colors to really pop and stand out against a neutral background. The turtles fin on the far side has a little bit of shadow underneath it. I’m going to address this by first color in a crane. They go over the top of it with blue and a little bit of brown and then burnishing them in with the cream color. Then again I’ll add more brown and then a bit more blue then I’ll burnish that area and that’s going to create a realistic shadow area. Notice how many layers it takes to achieve that and continue to add details on different areas of the turtle over areas that have already built up many layers. How address all the spots. Generally the same starting with a dark brown and a bit of red on top of it a little bit of blue in areas that need to be a little bit darker and then burnishing those areas with Craig . I’ll continue to work backwards. You’ll notice on the underside of the turtle that we have a little bit more shadow. I’m going to address that shadow much in the same way that I dress the shadow on the Farfan earlier . I start with a little bit of blue a little bit of cream burnished in and then more brown then I’ll continue to build that and repeat that process until my shadow looks realistic . Now I’m ready to address the shell of the turtle. Each one of the segments of the shell the turtle is much like the spot. So I’m going to approach them the same way we I’m gonna start with dark brown and a bit of red and then I’m going to add the cream on top . Once the areas burnished I can go back and add details right on top of the layers I’ve created . I’ll continue to work my way backwards repeating the process for each segment of the show . At this point in time and about 45 minutes to an hour into the drawing you can see that coloured pencil drawing is a very time consuming process. In order to do it right you’ve got to put the time into some of the shells on the back end of the Turtle have a little bit darker areas so I’m going to make sure to add a little bit more blue in those areas to make those areas appear naturally black . I’ll continue the process of layering colours and burnishing colours to get them so that they look realistic and believable . I approach the back fan the same way that I approach the front fin by putting down dark brown first and then going over the top of it with dark blue . Now add a bit of green because there is a little bit of reflection of the green water that the sea turtles coming in. And I found a reference in order to make it look realistic. I need to include this as well . Now our race any stretch marks that may be left I could choose to put my sea turtle in a sea of water but for this demonstration the grey paper provides a nice contrast . So what do we learn in this video. Well hopefully you learn some colored pencil drawing techniques like for one thing we need to make sure that our drawings look like the color has been heavily applied. We do that by layering colors on top of other colors and building up the colors. They appear heavy. We also need to mix our colors sell them when you need to use a color that isn’t mixed with some other colors well mixed colors appear more natural. Hopefully you also picked up that card. Pencil drawing is a time consuming process when done correctly. So take your time. We also learn that if we want to be successful once we’ve build up those layers we can add those details last. Don’t get too obsessed with the details at the beginning because you’re going to be putting many layers of color on in the next video in the series. To take a look at our next color drawing oil pastels