How To Draw Portraits

Most artists would love to know how to draw portraits. For me, it's something I work on continuously - I'm getting better even though it's a slow process due to my personal time constraints.

For assistance, I bought an online art book which isn't available anymore, I am sorry.

Just below you can see the drawing that I created just by following simple steps. I haven't re-touched anything and, as you can see, I did an awful job with her hair. I now know what I did wrong but I'm not silly enough to try and fix this one, I'll just do another.

Halle Berry

The finished drawing took me a few hours to complete but I was blissfully unaware of time. I used mainly 2B and 5B pencils.

I wouldn't say the book was perfect but it did give me great guidelines to follow. It's natural for us to do things differently so I noted changes I'd make on various pages.

I noticed that once I did this drawing, I had the confidence to do another portrait drawing.

Everyone, I'd like you to meet my beautiful little granddaughter, Caitlin.

Caitlin

I've been wanting to do this for ages but I just didn't think I'd be able to do her justice. This is my first attempt, I know I don't have her mouth right but I'm happy to do it again. Just by repeating the process I'm sure to improve.

It's amazing how one little nudge in the right direction can dramatically improve your drawings! Whenever you find an art book with a step by step process, follow along with pencil in hand and you'll discover many benefits.