Step 1: Choose An Appropriate Reference Picture

In the first step, you will learn on how to choose a reference picture thats right for you to draw. Some pictures are harder to draw than others, and many beginners jump into the wrong picture, only to give up and never try again. In this step, you will learn how to select a fitting reference picture. The best part is, you will draw more quickly and with less frustration once you know what type of pictures to draw. I will also provide you a reference picture of Halle Berry so that you can just print it out immediately.

Step 2: Organize The Position, Outline And Proportions Of The Features

The position of the features is the most basic element of a good drawing and should be done correctly. Imagine your frustration when, halfway through the shading, you realize that the position of the features was wrong.

Tips for correctly positioning the features

8 illustrations showing the organization of the features Tips on shading (cross hatching)which you will use in every realistic pencil portrait that you draw

Step 3: Eye Drawing Shading and Shadows

The eye is the most expressive feature of the face and is key to capturing the likeness of your drawing. Many people start looking your drawing from the eyes then only to other parts. Indeed, the eyes are often the first part of a portrait that people notice. For this reason, most of the artists pay special emphasis to eyes.

Instructions on how to draw the details of the eyes and eyebrows

34 step-by-step illustrations demonstrating shading of the eyes

Tips on drawing the eyelids, iris, pupils, eyelashes, and the surrounding shadows

Ways to deal with the tiny details of light and shading in the eyes

Step 4: Nose Drawing Shading and Shadows

The nose is one of the EASIEST features to draw because it doesnt do much in terms of giving emotional response for your drawing. Finding noses hard to draw? Thats often because people only focus on drawing the other facial features.

Learn the important aspects of drawing the nose 9 step-by-step illustrations for shading the nose Drawing the nose bridge and nostrils

Step 5: Mouth drawing Shading and Shadows

The mouth is the second most expressive feature of the face. In some cases it communicates emotion more strongly than do the eyes. Drawing the mouth correctly often makes or breaks a portrait, the portrait comes alive with a well-drawn and well-shaded mouth. When you draw and shade on the mouth correctly, it suddenly has an energy all its own.

Learn how to draw the details of the mouth Tips for perfectly formed lips 20 step-by-step illustrations for shading the mouth Learn to draw the lip line Learn to draw glossy lips

Step 6: Ear Drawing Shading and Shadows

What I found when I read art books is that most of them skip the part on teaching ears drawing by covering the ears with long hair. And even if they did mention the ears, its very quick and doesnt go into details. Ears come in many shapes and sizes and are unique to each individual. For drawing ears, you will need to get the spacing between the parts right.

Learn how to draw the details of the ear 14 step-by-step illustrations for shading the ear Getting the correct shading tone

Step 7: Hair Drawing Shading and Shadows

Drawing hair is important. Everything else might be perfect but if the hair looks like a birds nest or is flat then it will affect your entire drawing. Yes, drawing hair is complicated and frustrating, and often the results are terrible if only you go about it the right way, and do steps in the correct order. You cant draw every single strand that would be on a persons head. But you do need to add enough distinct strands to give your drawing a clear texture and form of hair. Drawing hair correctly can change the look of your drawing dramatically.

Learn how to draw the details of hair Don't waste your time making mistakes in drawing hair like most of the beginners 26 step-by-step illustrations for shading hair How highlight portions of hair Simple tips to making hair look more realistic

Step 8: Face Drawing Shading and Shadows

This is the final step of this drawing portraits tutorial. This final step provides the finishing touches to shading the forehead, cheek, and jaw. If you have completed this, Im confident to say that youll be able to draw portraits of your friends, family members, or celebrities.

Learn how to draw the details of the face 42 step-by-step illustrations for shading the face Understand how to shade the face Learn how to add shading on the neck

There are total of 60pages in this e-book. Personally, I hate 200-page books that can be summed up in 70 pages or less. I get right to the point. I make it more on practical, step-by-step methods that can be learnt easily the minute u read it.

Work In Progress
Title: "Inner Beauty" Size: 18" x 14" Medium: Charcoal, Graphite, Carbon on White Paper
Step One: I am using charcoal for the background and graphite for the subject. I'm using Arches 140 lbs hot press watercolor paper for this drawing. This is one of my favorite papers. It has enough tooth to create dark values yet is smooth enough for very delicate textures. In this first step, I have cut out the shape of my subject(s) in frisket film and applied it to the paper. Then, I applied 3b soft charcoal to the background to begin creating a wood texture.

Step Two: Next, I blended the charcoal with a piece of felt and added the beginnings of wood grain. I

repeated this several times to build up a solid tone. After pulling out some highlights with a clic eraser, I used a sharp hard charcoal pencil to create shadows to help create slivers and chips in the wood. I also applied masking tape at this point. I will be drawing masking tape in these areas later. Some of the wood texture will show through from the previous step and give my drawn masking tape a little more transparency.

Step Three: Then, I sprayed the drawing with fixative, Peeled off the frisket and began rendering the subjects. I used a 6h graphite pencil to add tone to the paper and blended with a chamois. In some areas, I applied the graphite with the chamois. For those of you that havent tried blending with a chamois, it can produce incredibly subtle tones almost like an air brush. I use a kneaded eraser to pull out the crinkles in the paper. I am using the same technique to render the rose, applying graphite from dark to light and blending.

The tape on the right shows what it looking like after I removed the real masking tape. I have begun rendering the tape on the right with a General's carbon sketch pencil and blending with a tortillon. Using carbon here for the tape will help separate it from the wood and the paper.

Step Four: I have started adding the holes and lines of the notebook paper. In case you are wondering, I didnt darken the background in this step, I had to turn up the contrast on this a bit to show the lines on the paper. I used charcoal for the holes to match the background. Adding charcoal at this stage always makes me nervous since it isnt fixed and can easily smear. I also continued to add shading to the rose and added the line drawing of the stem. The lines on the paper were produced with a .3 mechanical pencil to keep them as sharp and clean as possible. I used a French Curve instead of a ruler because the lines had to follow the bends and crinkles in the paper to keep the perspective correct. The best way to describe a French curve is its a bendable rubber straight edge

Close-up

Step Five: Heres the final. I had a real tough time taking photos of this one. I couldnt get a picture of the softness of the paper shading without compromising the darker background detail. The original has more punch.

Ive included some close-ups to give you a little better Idea of the detail. In the original drawing the tape is approximately 3/4" wide. It may appear larger than I drew it on your screen.

Looking at their drawings, I felt that I was not as skillful, couldn't draw as well as they could. Until today, I still keep my first pencil portrait drawing on my drawing table

After years of trials and errors, Im now able to draw a pencil portrait like this...

This is not from overnight success. Ive been practicing and learning for almost every single day to attain a higher level of pencil portrait drawing. The truth is... there was this one year period that I did not improve my pencil drawing techniques at all. After achieving the results that I wanted, I concentrated on teaching others, at the expense of myself. Because of teaching others, I lack of practice time and stopped learning in drawing for almost a year! My pencil drawing techniques became stuck at the same level without improvement. Deep down in my heart, I know that Ive been satisfied for where I am in my pencil portrait drawing techniques and skills. Ive been satisfied that I stopped improving my pencil portrait drawing skill.