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AnndreaLeeann — Charcoal portrait tutorial
Published: 2009-10-17 21:47:03 +0000 UTC; Views: 43533; Favourites: 761; Downloads: 1820
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Description
I hope this tutorial helps you with charcoal in some way :]...:/....o.OThe brushes I use are Loew-Cornell 1812 in size 9 and 3 but any brush that's soft should work fine. I use a rounded brush as apposed to square because it's easier to blend and square leaves little lines. The charcoal pencils *the woodless ones Ive found work better* are Art Alternatives brand but General's brand are studdly as well :]
For paper I recommend Strathmore Drawing. It's not too pricey and seems to work really well.
The subject used in this tutorial is Bert McCracken from The Used and
The drawing used to make this tutorial:
Works done with these techniques:
(If you drew a charcoal portrait and used this tutorial, please send me a link and I will add it here! Or if you don't want it to be added, I'd love to see and fave.)
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Comments: 324
What interesting techniques! As soon as I get to an art store and buy the materials, I'll be sure to try this out. Thanks!!
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Ohh cool!! Hope it helps, thanks :]
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Nice - I found the instructions for gridding and using a brush instead of pencil pretty cool
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Heyy, I had a question. I wanted to know how long it took you to get from the first sketch to the stage just before the hair?
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About an hour to two hours, if I remember correctly. I usually get hung up on the hair if I do it next to last *clothes usually coming last* because I already did the face which is the fun part lol
The hair usually takes me the least time if I do it first but that's no fun :]
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Awesome. Thanks.
Your art is brilliant.
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Thanks so much!! I'm glad people like it, I just wanted to help out :]
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miss leeann! can i ask another question? is there a trick to get rid of all the charcoal dust without having it smear the rest of the paper which is supposed to stay white?
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Yes! I should add that to the tutorial, I didn't think of that.
The best thing to do is try not to touch it at all, but dust will most likely tint it, what I do is when it's all done, I take my kneaded eraser and drag from the outline of the drawing up to the top of the paper in straight lines. After one pass, I knead the eraser *if you make more than one pass, sometimes a small speck of charcoal gets lodged in the eraser and you end up marking a long ass black line, i've done that a million times, that you are pretty much stuck with >.<* so knead and make another pass. If you don't touch or mark the white, then the eraser should pick most if not all of the dust it up in one pass.
And sometimes too, if your paper is creame and you want white *and say you want the 'white' skin of your subject darker than the background but still white*, or if your white paper is just not white enough, take white chalk and chalk the background white. I do this too when I smudge something, but it doesn't cover up totally black mistakes. Just something to keep in mind :]
Some of my drawings when I screw up a white background I go and make hatch marks to blend in my screwup lol. I hate them, but that's an option too XD
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XD okay, thanks a lot, i'll try that out!
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Man, you are generous for sharing your secrets.
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O.o I've never looked at it like that. *grabs your shirt* should I have looked at it like that?! o.O Now my eyes twitchen look at it! XD
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I'd answer you, but you'd have to let go of me first.
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wow, very good! I am bookmarking this for when I ever try to do charcoal again
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:] Thank you so very much!! I'm glad you found it useful!
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This is a really good tutorial. Thank you! You provide loads of helpful hints and it's enjoyable to read. I like especially the brush-modifying for the stubbles and the charcoaling with a brush. I didn't know that charcoal works with a brush. You don't use any water with it, do you? The only thing that I doubt is putting a grid over the reference. If it helps you, that's okay. But I think that it's better to estimate lengths by eye.
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No, I don't use any water with the dust, I use it dry :]
I dip my brush into the pot, tap off the extra, test the amount on a spare, and then gently dry paint on any shading. (and I also use the sandpaper like a pallet like I said in the tutorial which I put dust onto) I grid because I can't seem to get down proportions right when I eye it. It's something I am working on and gridding is helping me out a lot. I find myself starting to shade 'just a bit' with my pencil when I sketch out my lines without a grid for some reason which drives me nuts, it's like a compulsion I don't realize I am caving into until it's too late XD
Thank you so much for giving it a chance :]
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that's actually a really nice tutorial O.O
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Lol thankyou, that's actually a very nice compliment :] haha
I was impressed with the other tutorials I've seen, but they didn't help me so I made my own XD
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ah that's great i'll let you know if i try this
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That is really helpful! I have a question - do you simply buy the charcoal dust? Never heard of such thing... O:
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Oh no, when I sharpen my woodless charcoal pencils which is just charcoal with a hard film over it and I sharpen it with with my exactoknife and I put the dust into the container. :] If I could buy it that would be new to me!!
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Oh I get it. Interesting XD
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That's a really good tutorial, I especially like the idea to use brushes when working with charcoal. I have not done that before but I see now how to get really soft shading. Thanks for putting this together (espcially in such an entertaining manner 
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:] I'm glad you liked it and that it helped!! thank you for giving it a chance
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Good tutorial, full of helpful information. Nice!
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Very cool. I'm going to have to try some of this myself!
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Interesting and very useful tutorial.
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