Pencil Shading Technique – How to Shade a Drawing Using Pointillism

About Miranda

My work fits into two very different and unrelated categories: realism and abstract. Each style allows me to challenge different parts of my personality. Drawing realistically indulges the side of me that loves detail and is a perfectionist. It challenges me technically and I am always pushing to create more accurate drawings. The abstract works reflect my interest in colour and form. I am able to work loosely and fluidly, reacting to the painting as I go. It is sometimes a relief to shift from the tight discipline of realistic drawing to this type of work, but it can be equally relieving to go from these open-ended paintings to getting lost in the details of a drawing.

A very important part of drawing realistically is shading: the variation in value from shadows to highlights that describe the shape of something. By improving your shading, you can greatly improve the quality of your drawings. Shading isn’t difficult to learn, but it does take some practice. You can learn how to make your drawings more realistic by understanding light, controlling your pencil, and blending.

To learn more about Miranda, please take a moment to visit her websites below:

Art Lessons & Tips: http://www.learntoart.com/

Portrait Work: http://www.customportraitsonline.com/

Online Gallery: http://www.mirandaaschenbrenner.com

How to Shade a Drawing Using Pointillism

Pointillism is a technique using a series of dots to create an image. It takes time, and loads of patience, but the results can be incredibly impressive!

For pointillism, you’re going to need some special pens. The best are fine tip pens with free-flowing ink. Ball point pens don’t work well because they need to be moving for the ink to flow. My favourites are Staedtler Pigment Liners. You’ll also want a range of sizes as well, from very fine to a wider tip. Something like a 01, a 03, and a 05 would work well.

Throughout the drawing, you’ll use each size of pen. Make sure you blend the dots together when you switch pen size. You don’t want to see the border where you switched pens. Also, don’t rush your mark-making. If you get careless, some of your points might get little tails. You want nice clean dots to create an even pattern across the whole of your drawing.

As with any drawing, you want to start out with a good line drawing. Outline the contours of your subjects, as well as the shapes of the major shadows and highlights. You want to have good guidelines for when it comes to filling in the values.

When using pointillism to shade, you need to think about values just like you do when shading with a pencil. It’s important to have a range of values to give your drawing enough contrast.

Let’s use the sphere as an example for how to shade with pointillism. Once you learn how to shade basic shapes, you can shade just about anything!

Start with your finest pen and make some dots around the highlight. Avoid putting any dots inside the highlight area, but make sure that the points gradually become more and farther apart closer to the highlight. You don’t want your marks to suddenly stop dead. As you move away from the highlight, place your dots closer together.

As the highlight fades to the mid-tones, switch to the middle-sized pen and mark your points closer together. Now you can fill in almost the entire sphere, making your points closer together as you approach the shadow.

For the shadow, use your widest pen and make your marks close together. In the darkest areas, your dots should be so close together that white shows through. You might be tempted to cheat and use the pen to color in the entire shadow.

Try to resist!

It would be faster, but it would be obvious. With pointillism, it’s important to use only dots. The marks create a pattern or a texture that is visible even in the solid black areas. If you have a really large area of black that would take you days to dot, you could try colouring it in solid, then adding a few dots on top to mimic the pattern. I don’t recommend it, but you could try.

When drawing with pointillism, make sure you don’t draw any lines. Even when you’re drawing wrinkles or eyelashes use a series of points to create the line. It will look more natural than a solid line, which would stand out amongst all those dots

When your drawing is done, let the ink dry for ten minutes or so before erasing the pencil lines. You’d hate to smudge all your hard work!

Pointillism in Colour

You can also do pointillism in paints or pastels. This technique involves layering different colored dots on top of each other. When seen from far away, it’s like an optical illusion: dots blend together and create a new color. A simple example of this would be dots of red and yellow, which would appear as orange from far away. This type of illusion was used extensively by the French painter, Seurat.

His example from Wikipedia is A Sunday on La Grande Jatte, by Seurat.

Pen and Ink Drawing Demonstration by Mike Budden

Drawing Demo – How to Draw the Chetnole Church by Mike Budden

How to draw: Using a photograph.

Click here to visit Mike’s Site

MATERIALS USED IN THIS PROJECT: - HB Pencil - Putty Rubber - Layout paper - Acid free cartridge paper - Viewfinder grid - Ruler - Magnifying glass - Rotring Isograph pens; .1mm, .25mm and .35mm - Black India ink - A piece of lint free cloth – to wipe your pens on - Tissues, for resting your hand upon – fingers leave greasy marks on the paper and the ink won’t take kindly to it. Gillott Mapping pens can also be used (dip pens) for fine detail work.

Where accuracy is required, I use this grid system. This can be used on location as well. Simply hold the see through grid at arms length and locate the key points. Photo’s can often hide details in shadows and bright highlights.

Draw your own grid onto layout paper (thin paper) to enlarge the image – the larger the squares, the bigger the picture.

Now transfer your best lines from the layout paper to your cartridge paper. You do this by using transfer paper, (this is similar to carbon paper except that it transfers a pencil mark instead of ink) and a sharp hard pencil. Make sure the transfer paper is face down onto the cartridge paper. Place your layout drawing on top and then simply trace over your best lines. When this is completed, add the extra details lightly to your drawing on the cartridge paper, using an HB pencil.

Start with the clock first because if this goes wrong it’s easy to start again. The actual size of this clock face is just 21mm high.

1.Layout paper. 2.Transfer lines/marks. 3.Ink over, then erase the transfer lines. 4.Draw the numerals 5.Ink in using tiny dots.

Be sure to get your drawing right before applying ink – it’s easy to erase pencil marks, but not ink. For this particular clock, making white hands and numerals to ink around is best – they are easier to see than a grey pencil mark. The numerals must be at the same angle of perspective as the brickwork the clock is on. The tighter the ink marks are packed together, the darker the tone. The more spaced out they are, the lighter the tone. Remember the clock is higher than your eye level and at an angle.

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WORKING INDOORS (with imagination) FROM A PHOTOFeel the warmth of the sun and a gentle breeze, Hear the songbirds singing in the trees. Smell the fragrance of some nearby flowers, A peacefull place, we can sit for hours. Working this way is from the soul, And helps us reach our final goal.

The obvious can elude me sometimes, so a fresh look next morning can be a real eye opener. I often find things that have been overlooked.

Click Image Below for Larger View

Be sure to draw each tile in the direction it is laying. When I became bored with bricks, tiles etc, I turned my attentions to the Woodpecker.I have used artistic licence to enhance this picture and add depth. Things like T.V aerials, telephone wires etc, I generally leave out.

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Click Image Below For Larger View

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Example of how to make things look round.This is just lots of tiny dots.

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Click Image Below For Larger View

“ST. PETER’S CHURCH” Chetnole, Dorset.

If there was anything that’s not clear to you, please e-mail Mike. Equally, if you have any tips to help make Mike’s website or the tutorials better, He would be delighted to hear from you.

Pen and Ink Tips – Getting Started

You really don’t need much to get started with pen and ink. You can start with a normal ball point pen and a piece of paper that you have lying around the house. Of course, normal household pens and plain old paper will not be as rewarding as a professional pen & ink set, but at least you can get started right away.

Here are some suggestions for popular pens to check out once you are ready to buy:

Rotring Rapidograph Pen


Rotring Sketching Art Pen

Here are some suggestions for your pen and ink paper:

Strathmore 400 Series Drawing Paper


Bienfang Raritan Heavyweight Drawing Paper 18 in. x 24 in. pad of 30

Click here for more pen and ink drawing tips from CreativeSpotlite.com