Everyone can learn how to draw. As you draw and practise different approaches, you will discover which combinations you enjoy most, and which work best for you.

Drawing for me is a way to think through ideas as well as focus on and discover more about the world around me. As you’re drawing, you will discover more about the subject you are working from. Starting to draw from a place of curiosity about your subject will help you develop.

Here are some key tips for beginners when drawing from observation:

• Make sure you are in a comfortable place. If you change your position, it will change your viewpoint.
• Think about composition before you begin: What do you want to fit in your drawing? How big do you want your drawing to be? Should the paper be portrait or landscape?
• Draw lightly to begin with: it will be easier to adjust and change your drawing as you discover more about your subject.
• Hold off on detail and start with a simple sketch until you are happy with the composition and proportions in your drawing. This will make it easier and faster to make changes early on.
• Focus on looking as much as what is going down on the page.

City Lit drawing and painting tutor, Steve Wright takes you through his tips on how to start a sketch.

Pencils

Pencils come in different grades of hardness and softness. Think of a HB pencil as the middle grade. The Higher the H grade the harder the pencil. The higher the B grade the softer the pencil will be.

Harder pencils like a 2H or 4H would be good for fine detailed line work and are harder to smudge. An engineer or designer might use these to draw plans or maps.

Softer pencils like a 4B or 6B are great for creating a dramatic range of tones and soft transitions from light to dark. Some artists choose to combine different pencils within one drawing. You may want to do this if you are looking to create contrasting qualities of marks.

Other artists will use just one pencil throughout, adjusting the pressure on the pencil to create varying tones. This may give the drawing a more cohesive feel. 

Charcoal

For a beginner, I would recommend using willow charcoal. Willow charcoal can be pushed around, smudged and adjusted easily with a rubber or your fingertips.

Rubber

A rubber can be used as a drawing tool as well as a way to erase, especially when paired with charcoal. 

Putty Rubber

These are soft and malleable so that you can change their shape to suit the task at hand. They are great for making subtle adjustments by softly lifting the graphite or charcoal from the paper.

Paper

Paper comes in different thicknesses, textures and surfaces. Cartridge paper is a good place to start for dry drawing mediums such as pencil or charcoal. It will come in a variety of textures (called a grain or tooth) and weights.

Try picking a paper with a slight grain to it as a starting point. For drawing with dry mediums, the paper doesn’t have to be too heavy. Between 80 - 120gsm is a good starting point. Most sketchbooks will contain suitable drawing paper around this range.

Practise holding the pencil in different ways to create different marks. Here I have flattened the pencil close to the paper to find the side of the lead.

You can build up smooth areas of tone using this technique by picking up the grain of the paper. If you need to smooth down the patch of tone further, try shading in from a different direction to even out the marks.

Light to Dark Pencil Exercises

Still using the side of the pencil, practise building up bands of dark to light by increasing or reducing the amount of pressure you are using. If you notice a sudden jump in tone, see if you can go back and even this out.

Side and tip of the charcoal

Try drawing with the side of the charcoal as well as the tip. This will pick up the grain of the paper and is a quick way to create areas of dark tone. 

Smudge

Use your fingertips or some tissue to smudge. You can soften and lift the charcoal to lighten the area you are working on.

Use a Rubber Into Charcoal

Work back into the charcoal with a rubber to lighten. This can create a lovely ghostly feeling. You can switch backwards and forwards between rubber and charcoal continually adjusting your drawing by adding and taking away. The historical marks that build up through this technique can also create an interesting effect. 

Lines

Instead of drawing lines with the tip, try flattening the charcoal to the paper and lining it up to the line you want to draw before dragging it along to extend the line. The stick of charcoal will act as a guide for a straight line.

There are many different techniques you can learn to help with proportion. Learning a few different ones can help you decide which approach you like.Imagining or drawing in horizontal and vertical lines is one approach. This could help with checking the symmetry of an object or the positioning of an object in relation to another. If you hold up a pencil horizontally to line up underneath one object where does that line intersect with another object?

When drawing from observation, it’s important to focus on looking at the object as much as what is going down on the page. There are exercises that can help with this too.

Blind Drawing Exercise 

Try making a continuous line drawing without looking at your paper or lifting up your pencil. This can help to build trust between your eye and hand. The aim of this exercise is not to make a perfect drawing but to get used to focusing on your subject more than your drawing. 

Choose a view point where there is quite a lot of stuff to work from. As your eye is looking and traveling around the scene your hand should be moving steadily at the same pace. 

Learn to Draw at City Lit

Supported by our team of experienced and expert tutors, we offer students both a practical guide and an informative insight, providing an opportunity for all levels to explore traditional and contemporary styles of drawing.