Portrait Drawing: White Bearded Man

Another good Saturday morning portrait drawing session at the Al Hyter portrait group.  This model is great, he can really hold his pose well. This time around the hair on his head was a little wild, it was great for drawing: added more depth, shape, and emotion!

This drawing session was fun, I was giving tips to fellow artists on their drawings.  It's always good for me to hear myself share my views, knowledge, and techniques with others. There is so much thought I put into a portrait drawing that I'm not aware of until I start talking to others.

Here's something I do with almost all my portraits:  I like positioning my drawing pad in landscape to draw a portrait. I like a lot of white space (negative space) on both sides of the portrait drawing, it's what gives depth to the piece.

Portrait Sketch, Elderly Man & White Beard

This past Saturday, I attended the Al Hyter Portrait art session in Toledo, Ohio. They have a new model for the next four Saturdays. This model has a white beard, which is great for portrait drawing. The beard adds more shapes and depth to the face. I have to be careful not to get caught up in drawing the hair from the beard, instead focus on the shape of the beard, as if the model had smashed potatoes on the chin.

When I draw portraits I'm constantly looking and drawing the shapes on the face: The shapes of the eyes, the nose, lips, head, ears, collar, forehead, hair. Believe it or not, I just draw shapes and when I'm done the viewer sees a portrait.

I had fun drawing this model, looking forward to sketching him again on next Saturday's portrait session.