Susak - How to draw cartoon characters with colored pencils: in realistic style

How to draw cartoon characters with colored pencils in realistic style

Introduction:

In this book with 3 drawing tutorials you can find a lot of tricks and tips that you can apply to your drawings. The most important is to keep practicing. Some artists draw area by area, some start from the darkest parts, some from the lightest ones. You have to find out what is the most appropriate for you. I'll try to keep it simple and helpful.

Few advices that I want to give you that might be helpful:

- Don't compare yourself with those who draw worse than you. This way you can be satisfied although you still have a lot to improve.

- The more detailed, the better drawing.

- Patience. If you just throw your pencil saying "It's not for me!" of course you won't develop and improve. If you want success you have to work on drawing with patience.

- Don't be jealous. This is the waste of time. Just try to make it better and be aware that artist you are jealous of has much more practice than you - that's all. But also it is important to be able to see your mistakes. Be critical with yourself.

We are going to draw a big smokey eyes:

To create a 3D effect with heavy shading:

To draw an eyes that are in shadow:

To blend a colors into one another and make a gradient effect:

So, let's get started:

Using the grid method:

As a first you should always draw a sketch and make it as proportional as possible. Take time and patience for drawing a main lines, because it is a base of your drawing. If it's difficult for you to get a proportional sketch, you can use a grid method, which many artists use. In the next image you can see how it works, I've made one sample from my drawing. Draw a grid, with mechanical pencil using a ruler, over a reference photo and draw a grid on a blank paper. Draw a main lines from the squares of reference photo to the squares of your paper. Once you're finished with sketch, erase the grid lines.

Tools:
I would recommend a two types of colored pencils: for the thinner parts and hair use the harder colored pencils such is Faber-Castell and for creating a smooth textures (skin, larger areas) use a soft colored pencil such is Prismacolors. It's easier if you use the smoothest paper. You can also use a colorless blender, but for blending the drawn areas you can use even a white colored pencil. You don't have to get all the existing nuances of colored pencils; learn to mix them up and create a colors that you don't even have. Of course it's easier if you can afford a bigger set of pencils.

First drawing tutorial

As a first draw a main lines. If you cannot get the proportional sketch, use a grid-method as mentioned in the description. You should practice sketching first, to learn to see the proportionality when you look at your sketch. When the main lines look good, the rest of the drawing is much more easier and has a bigger chance to be successful.

With peach colored pencil draw the skin everywhere leaving eyes and mouth for the next steps. I'm using to draw such an areas with Prismacolors Light Peach colored pencil.

If you don't have a Prismacolors colored pencils, you can use a soft pastel powder as i was doing before a got those pencils. Just make the powder with a knife or something and spread it with tissue all over the areas that are meant to be a skin. You can see in the image below those pastels, you can even mix them up and get appropriate color.

With darkest brown colored pencil draw the shadow under her chin and with light brown pencil draw the areas of the skin that are not much affected by the light. Go gently over these areas and hardly press your pencil. These areas are under her hair/bangs, under her eyes, under the eyebrows, the whole neck except an edge and the top along her nose because the light comes from right and left on her face.

With violet red draw in the middle of the eyelids. With rose draw her cheeks pressing gently.

Now with black colored pencil draw her pupils leaving white the areas for shining. Also draw her eyeliner and eyelashes. As a first go over this areas pressing light (you can even do this with H graphite pencils, because the black colored pencil is impossible to erase) and just when you make sure that everything is on the right place, go over with black pencil pressing really hard. Make more layers to make it absolute black.

With dark blue colored pencil draw the parts of the irises that are in the shadow and draw the tinny circles around the irises.

With lighter blue pencil draw the rest of the iris of the eye which get less light because of the nose. On the other eye draw a little bit under the previously drawn areas. You can even use the same dark blue pencil, but press it lightly.

Now with light blue pencil draw draw rest of the iris. Don't forget not to draw over the white spots which we have to leave white to make a shining eyes this way.

With dark red pencil draw the whole upper lip. This lip get less shadow and it's always darker than the downer lip. The downer area of the downer lip also draw with dark red pencil. The rest of the downer lip draw with simple red pencil and go over with white colored pencil on the little area that's shining the most. You can rather leave that area untouched, because you have to press hardly with white colored pencil to get the white color over the red.