Portrait of Soteropoulos

Drawing by Daniel B Sibley

This is a drawing in graphite portrait of a man in 3/4 view. This was an attempt to work with a very broad range of values from very dark to high light. The highlights are very lightly hatched white paper background. The hair and pupils were done in 8B pencil.

Thanks,
Dan S.

Hi Dan,

Many thanks for your wonderful drawing.

There are few things you may want to consider:

1. Constructive drawing:
Check the horizontal line of the mouth, you will find that it is not quite parallel to the horizontal line of eyes.

2. Tonal rendering:
It looks like you smudged graphite marks, which makes mud on paper. Try to draw with separate pencil strokes. You can do multiple layers, be soft and smooth if required, but don’t smudge.

3. Cross-hatching:
It is better to avoid 90 degree cross-hatching in portraits, unless you render clothes. Try cross-hatching in sharper angles (30…45 degrees).

Once again, thank you for your portrait. It looks very impressionistic and has the feel of confidence in drawing skills.

Kind regards,
Natalie Richy and Vladimir London
Drawing Academy tutors