[Hypercite]

Hi all!
Ive been doing some drawing here at home and i want to give my girlfriend a portrait of here face for christmas...

So i need help with shading her face....
I know there are great ways for doing this with photoshop but i want this one don in the traditional way

So do any of you know of a good board/forum with people who can help me...? maybe even you guys?

Thanx
Hyper

[Welles]

Hi Hyper. I'm not clear here. Do you mean you are going to do the shading by hand? What medium?

[Hypercite]

Hey Welles!!
sorry for my fussiness

Well I'm drawing the whole thing by pencil... using mostly B, and 4B. Hardness
And I'm gonna use a stomper (or what ever you call it) (those weird pencil kind off thing made by paper that you can use to smudge the lines) for the shading...i thought...

I have done most off the line art and now i want the drawing to get a great shading...
And yes i wanna do it "by hand"...

Thanx
Hyper

[Welles]

Here are a couple of tutorials which might be worth looking at...

Portrait drawing tutorials
http://www.portrait-artist.org/face/index.html (especially http://www.portrait-artist.org/basic...explained.html )

Pencil Drawing Techniques
http://elfwood.lysator.liu.se/farp/t...esspencil.html

Introduction to Drawing - Value
http://drawsketch.about.com/cs/drawi...introvalue.htm

The biggest single decision you have to make is what basic technique you are using - line shading vs. value shading. One of my best friends was a fabulous pencil drawer who created a technique of stippling. The shading values were created with tiny meticulous dots only. Lines were seldom or never used, even for hair and other areas where it would seem to be obvious to use them. Nor did he use smudge shading. His work was amazing and much sought after for commercial purposes as it printed beautifully.

Good luck with your project!

[Hypercite]

Sorry for beeing away so long...had stuff to do... ;\

Thanx alot for the links Welles!!
That really helped

But im not quite getting the result i want...

Here are some pics of her....
The original, my line art and my test with shading......

[img width=115 height=167]http://img498.imageshack.us/img498/2397/896719eb62064df3a3e6b43e4ca118.th.jpg[/img]

[img width=111 height=167]http://img498.imageshack.us/img498/327/ny21br.th.jpg[/img]

[img width=111 height=167]http://img498.imageshack.us/img498/7268/ny3ny.th.jpg[/img]

What am I doing wrong.....the shading sucks as usual } \:/

Thanx again
Hyper

[Welles]

Hi again, Hypercite.

I'm afraid I can't help with real suggestions as I started in the arts with sculpture and furniture first and then varieties of painting, prior to the computer. I never did pencil drawing.

My guess is that you need practice...lots of practice until you develop a technique which is personally satisfactory. Maybe if ronmatt chances upon this thread, he can help as he is a for real illustrator of many skills.

[leenapink]

it just a matter of practice..break down the face into workable parts...
get the shape of the face first all around not just the outline.. then place the general shape of the eyes nose and mouth..she's smiling showing her pearly whites..thats a big part of her look.
the eyes and the mouth make or break a drawing like this...
I'll see if I can draw something up tomorrow...
Until then I did this with PS, it actually show the intersting parts that make up drawing.
You could also blow up the picture and trace it in pencil (light tables are great if you are drawing a lot)...some will say its cheating, but beleive me there is no reason to reinvent the wheel.

Lasa

[leenapink]

This is a start... I wanted to post something drawn...It might help breakdown the parts.
Eyes are not flat they have inner curves/edges within the eye the white doesn't go to the end it is surrounded by the eyelid..same with the nose..

You've got a great start..keep at it.

Cute girl,
Lasa

[AngelWhip]

my first post. :surprised: and it has nothing to do with photoshop. i know nothing about photoshop. teaching myself. i love to draw, taught myself. i agree with Lasa. and i think it helps to draw from a black & white photo. it seems you can see the lines better. and practice, practice, practice. have fun!

[Welles]

Hi AngelWhip

Welcome to the forums! [righton]