Drawing Lesson 27, Part 2 – Drawing a Horse

Drawing a Horse in Carbon Pencil on Toned Paper

Video Lesson Description

In this video lesson you will discover the process of Drawing a Horse Head in Carbon Pencil on Toned Paper.

Drawing a Horse – Preparing a Toned Paper

In this video lesson, I was Drawing a Horse on a toned paper. You may buy off-white, or grey colored paper for that purpose. Otherwise, you can tone it yourself, making it the exact colour of your choice.

For this Drawing a Horse exercise, the white gesso was used as a base paint, with addition of a little bit of black pigment to make it light grey.

You can also use a white gouache in combination with black, brown, green, blue, or other colored gouache.

It is also possible to add a watercolor into a white gouache, or a dry powdered color pigment of your choice.

The Heavy Weight 220 ‘grams per square meter’ paper is used; however, you can choose an even heavier grade of paper if you want. Use a wide flat brush to cover the paper with a prepared mix of paint. Make sure the paint is completely dry after each layer, before doing subsequent coats. Two or three coats are usually enough, but depending on your paint, it might require some more. Thick coats of paint can be rubbed with very fine sandpaper, to smooth-out the surface; of course, it shall be done only after the paint is completely dry.

Drawing a Horse – Rendering Shades in Carbon Pencil

When Drawing a Horse Head, keep in mind that the darker areas of the drawing are built up via short, hatching strokes, of the carbon pencil. Several layers of hatching are applied in order to achieve darker tones.

The approach to the drawing is to build up gradually the tonal values of the shadows and the mid-tones. This will be done in several stages. The main benefit of doing it in this way is a greater control over the Drawing a Horse Head progress.

You can always make tones darker, gradually; and work on shadow areas until you run out of the pencil strength.

Work on various areas of the drawing, one after another, without trying to finish one first.

A good sign of a professional drawing, is that it will look completed enough, at any stage during the Drawing a Horse Head process.