Art Blog: Portraits

Looking at the picture of Justin Bieber on his newest album ‘Believe,’ I thought that he would be so simple to draw—he is so symmetrical, and his features are all very smooth and even. But it was not easy!

There are many different ways to begin a portrait. Some people like to map out where all the features of the face will go; some people like to use pencil or charcoal to shade in the entire page a medium gray, and then pull out light tones with an eraser and build up dark tones...and so on.

I myself stared out with a very light line drawing of J.B. But when I began shading in the tones to give his face volume, I noticed that his nose was situated at an angle that I had not originally seen. And I had to erase it and start over.

Erasing is pretty much like blasphemy to many artists, and so is referring to a photo to draw from, but oh well, that’s okay. (‘Never Say Never!’)

A really good way to make sure that a drawing turns out looking like the person you’re trying to render, is to begin with a tiny detail—I like to start off with the left eye—rather than drawing an oval face and trying to fit everything inside it. (Working on details opposed to the ‘whole’ is another violation of artist code… Oops.)

To get your drawing looking ‘smooth,’ it helps to rub it with a little piece of rolled up paper or a finger. This blends the graphite down into the crevices of the paper and removes the grainy appearance of the drawing. (Don’t worry; this is a widely accepted technique.)

The number one, ultimate, greatest trick to drawing any picture though, is (‘I’ma tell you one time’)… to ‘Believe’!