By Artists & Illustrators | Thu 30th Apr 2020
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If you want to learn how to draw with confidence, have a go at these four exercises from wildlife artist Tim Pond
The key to sketching with conviction is to practice your mark-making skills. Not only will this boost your confidence, but it will also improve your hand-eye coordination and drawing – particularly your quick sketching skills.
Before you begin, make sure you’re at ease with your materials. Our guide to the best pencils for sketching can help out here.
Sometimes trepidation can be attached to sketching with graphite. If this is the case, try using a good quality colouring pencil, such as a Faber-Castell Polychromos pencil.
The following exercises will improve your drawing strokes and help you draw more fluidly, as well as get you thinking about how to visually dissect a form.
EXERCISES FOR DRAWING WITH CONFIDENCE
Exercise 1: Dynamic lines
This practice is ideal for learning how to draw better lines. Create seven straight lines, moving from a light mark to a darker one. Maintain a straight, consistent and accurate line by drawing from the elbow. Draw with a steady pace and then try to speed up. Draw both short and long lines. Repeat the exercise several times.
Top tip: Try locking your arm at the elbow to help draw straight lines consistently.
Exercise 2: Arcs
Using your natural radial geometry to help draw smooth arcs, by locking your wrist and elbow. Create small arcs with a wrist motion and large arcs from the elbow. Practise repeatedly, so that you are able to create these marks accurately without looking at the page.
Top tip: Keeping your joints locked while you move your arm is important.
Exercise 3: Ellipses
Freehand ellipses will always be challenging. They are a fundamental element of drawing biological forms. Go through the motion and ‘air draw’ before your pencil touches the paper, so that you are confident about the smoothness and symmetry of the mark before you make it. You can sketch the first line lightly and then refine the ellipse. Make sure that the shapes have round corners and are not spiky.
Top tip: You can start from the narrowest angle and then open the circle wider, or work the opposite way around.
Exercise 4: Tying it together
For this exercise, imagine a cylinder, such as a cup, turning away from you, so that the circle of the opening gets narrower.
Top tip: The width of an ellipse is called the degree. This is the angle of the circle relative to the viewer. At 90° the circle is perpendicular to the viewer, so the whole circle can be seen. At 0° the circle is parallel to the viewer, so the ellipse turns into a line.
These exercises were taken from Tim Pond’s book The Field Guide to Drawing and Stretching Animals.
Read more:
- How to sketch and draw feet
- How to draw texture, light and form in pencil
- How to draw a self-portrait in graphite
- 6 top daily drawing tips
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