Hey, welcome back!
Remember the 3 Pillars of Portrait Drawing that I mentioned yesterday? (If you haven’t seen the first video in this series, you should go watch it here & and then come back to this page. Things will make more sense. )
Well, in today’s video, I’m going to cover Pillar #1: Realistic Shading. Shading is one of the most important thing in portrait drawing but most people get it wrong.
See, there are many styles of shading out there, but if you want to draw truly realistic portrait, you need a very specific way of shading. It’s called Gradual Blending.
This video will teach you what it is and how to apply it:
The shading technique I just showed you is very powerful and it is one of the big reason why The Blended Pencil Method is so effective.
If you are currently struggling with making your portrait look realistic, you’ll see a big difference once you apply the Gradual Blending technique. It is the foundation for the method, so be sure to learn it well.
Now just practice drawing a gradual blending bar so you’ll be ready for tomorrow’s lesson. I’ll tell you about the most important shape in portrait drawing.
And I’ll show you how to take the concepts that we’ve learned to day and use it to draw a realistic 3D object.
It’ll be fun!
If you wanna learn more about portrait drawing, check out my “Portrait Fundamentals Made Simple” course.
It’s a very beginner-friendly course that walks you through all the basics of portraiture, from constructing a basic head, facial proportions, drawing the features, and finally drawing a realistic portrait step-by-step.
Thank you very much Ethan, your video is very helpful
Thank you very much Ethan, your video is very helpful.
You are professional and I recognized that you have a professional you tube ,too. So I like the staff you send by mail it is organized, I would like you to send me the staff you created on you tube in a news feed email gradual lessons, so I could learn the free material first, because you are the only one who know how can I benefit from your you tube, thank you.
Your lessons provide invaluable tips. Thank you Ethan.
wow nice one bros….I was hoping u teach us how to draw complete portrait,.
I haven’t watched the first video could u send it plz
No problem. Here is the link to the first lesson: http://mydrawingtutorials.com/drawing-realistic-portrait-1-of-8/
guy u r gud
tnx for ur time .ethan u r guy in arts
Hey thanx Ethin love and respect from Afghanistan .
Im an architecture student and my instructor doesnt really give instructions and briefing lessons he just post the activity and leave the room iam really bad in rendering and shading but your tutorials helped me alot 🙂
Hi Ethans
I’m a growing artist who is talented in drawing,how can you help.I mean drawing material so that can perform it in a digital way?
Ok thanks for replying. I just have a suggestion you don’t have to do if u don’t want to but if you can please post the video from your DVD about materials I am a beginner who really needs to know the basics. Thanks, -Viv
Hi Ethan,
I have a question. I see that in a lot of your videos you are
able to go very dark with a 2B pencil, and I never see graphite
shine when you do it. Is there any trick to get rid of graphite shine,
or is it just not showing in the video?
Thanks, Viv
Hi Viv,
Great observation! The graphite do shine, I just try to change the lighting so that it doesn’t show up on camera. 🙂
Youre videos made my drawings more realistic than my past drawings. Thanks a lot Sir 🙂
thanks so much…interesting
Thanks.
You really are a help.
Blessed be
What type of pen do you use for drawing ?
I have pencils #2b 3b 4b 6b and hb. I will appresiape any advise.
Thank you. Eli
Good instruction. Almost done with Angus young portrait got art set today don’t know how to use looking for my art to be more realistic Thanks a lot.
Hi Ethan, love it! Such fun, the eye required three tries, but the 3rd one looks like the sample.
Hooray, the shading is so important…..thanks looking forward to #3.
Thank you very helpful
This drawing class really helps Thanks Ethan!! 😀
thank you. fascinating.
Complimenti per questi tutorial, sei bravissimo!
Grazie mille.
Antonella.
Thanks so much Ethan for the lessons on Perspective. I have been trying to get my head around it for years, maybe with your help I will finally get there, you make it sound so logical and easy. It all makes sense when I follow your instructions but then I get confused when I try it for myself.
I will keep practicing. 🙂
heey
u hv a nice tutorial
but could u put some of ur best works
ur lessons are good.. 🙂
finally understood the art of shading
great job!!!!
This website is great
looking forward the rest and practicing as I do
thank you
I really like all of those tutorials, it makes my drawings much, much better. Thank you for doing this! x
Nice information. Thank´s
Hi Ethan,
Today I realised that my drawings didn’t look realistic because my blending work is not good enough.
Thank you,
Shammoon,
There is a tremendous difference in my drawings so far. Great Job on these easy to understand tutorials!
So far so good, Some great tip’s, And I seem to understand more what your saying.
I loose interest in other tutorial’s. Looking forward to the next one.
Thank’s. x
He makes it easy to follow and gives great hints
Thank you so much Ethan for this Blending technique lesson. I just purchased a pack of new tortillons. This is first time I try to use tortillon. May I ask how many times I can use it? I am Looking forward to the next lesson. Thanks again! 🙂
Hi Ethen I am in my mid seventies and I have struggled with tonal values for quite some time ,but your video has enlightened me thank you soooooo much and cheers Edwin from the UK
Hi, have 1-8 and 3-8 lessons I have been trying to view
Them and have not although its nice to know I can follow
These tutorials it gives me a better view on how to apply
Correctly as I was comparing my sketches I saw the cast
Shades were not applied and that I had more darker tones in the
Eyes.
Which H or B pencils you use on each video would be handy.
Hi,
I use a 2B lead pencil for all these lessons.
tankyou you are a good ticher, but you are more famous if you translate to spanish too, am recomend you to all the spanish people you are great!!!
Thank you for the recommendation! I have been getting quite a few request for Spanish translation. I guess I need to look into that 🙂
that’s so good, thank you very much. it’s very generous of your part.
Hello Ethan im fallowing your every move i work a lot so my feedback is slow but i look forward to your videos and lessons. I saw a comment from Abel Perez where he asks for videos in spanish. Well your videos are step by step and very self explanatory but if u need help in tranlasting im cetified as a translator for spanish so I offer my help. I transalate in a county hospital im just offering friendly help . Thank you your videos are excellent!!!!!
Oh wow. Thank you so much for your generous offer, Maria. That is a great idea.
Unfortunately, I’m still pretty swamped with working on part aspects of the site. But when I’m ready for that, I just might take you up on your offer.
Thank you so much again. You are very kind!
Many thank for your lessons always wanted to draw but never seemed to have the time now i am 70 and retired i have desided to make time and learn your lessons are easy to follow and not rushed it gives me somethink to look forward to once again many thank
You’re very welcome, Gwendoline. I’m very honored that you find my lessons helpful.
thanks for the lessons, as of now i’m in the second lesson.. and it greatly affect how i draw now.. thank you 🙂
thanks you so much for the lesson great help in inproving my drawing skills
thank you so much for the lessons thay are great and looking forward to my lessons from you thank your
Thank you Sir
Hello!!! I have a question… is it ok if I use drawing pencils? or do I have to use a mechanical one like you? thank you!!!
Hi Claudia,
Good question. No, you are welcome to use any pencil you like best. The mechanical pencil was just a suggestion.
Thanks for everything, with a suggestion if you have videos subtitled into Spanish because I do not understand the English .. thanks
Thanks for the suggestion, Abel. I will try to see what I can do. But to be honest, I can’t speak Spanish 🙁 so it might be a long time before I can implement that feature.
Maybe one day 🙂
Thanks for the help! Been wanting to learn how to draw for ages!
Loved this video. Blended shading does a lot to improve a portrait. Thanks for your easy style of presentation.
well, i’ll be waiting…:)
i love the lessons. do you mail lessons overseas and how much is it exactly.fineely somebodywhocan xplain t that anybody can understand this
Hi Bianca,
Thank you, I’m glad you like them. When you say, “mail lessons oversea”… do you mean my Realistic Portrait course? In that case, the course is digitally accessed so you can get it from anywhere in the world. But I do plan on created a DVD set for those who wish to have a physical copy. And yes, when that is available, I will ship it oversea. Thanks for the question.
hi ethan why do you show only your hand in the videos? i would like to see u. please show your lovely face in the next video
🙂
lol. I’m camera shy 🙂 Maybe one day…
Hi Ethan, I asked you could I sent you my drawing of the eye that was our second lesson so that you could evaluate my effort? I really was looking forward to your input because it would help me to know how I am progressing in your lessons. You responded ASAP from my first message to you, so I was wondering about the the delay this time that you have not responded to my email yet. Can you please let me know whether you will send me that feed back or not because I feel it is critical that the instructor can see and review our work if not I would have to determine how good or improved my work is based off how I see it whether I did it correctly or not, that is why I decided to follow a person who is all knowing in this matter because you will see the lack of technique among other things that will make a more realistic picture pop as you would say. Thanks again for your time
Hi Akiraah,
Sorry about that. I’m been so busy with uploading the new lessons that it must’ve slipped my mind.
I was going through all the past emails (sorry, I receive many so it’s hard to keep track) but I can’t seem to find the one with your name. The closet one I can find is with the name “Bernie”?
If not, would you mind sending it again and I will try to review it as soon as I can.
Sorry again,
Ethan
Hi Akiraah,
I just saw your email in my inbox now. Sorry, you must have sent it to me yesterday and I haven’t had a chance to check my messages yet. I’ve re-written a reply just now. Hope it helps. Thanks.
hello Ethan, i want to ask you how to clean the Loew-Cornell ?? Or do i have to buy another one, because where i live it’s not very easy to get it… 🙂
Hi Puja. By Lowe-Cornell, do you mean the tortillon (blending stumps)? In that case, I don’t really clean them. I try to have 3 separate tortillon. Each one is assigned a different darkness level. So when I blended a really dark area, I will use a dark tortillon and a light one for light area. This keeps them lasting a lot longer.
And if art supply store is hard to find in your area, you can always use a q-tip or a cotton or a piece of paper instead. With a little bit of skill they can work just as well 🙂
Good start, keep it going!
Great site,one of the best tutorials,good explanations .Your site making drawing very interesting.
Thanks Ethan
I am finding these videos of yours helpful. I’m just about to finish 5yrs of “part-time” art school and the one thing not really taught (glossed over) is realistic anything. I’ve been told that no art school in NZ teaches realistic drawing/ painting etc. So now at the end of my studies I now have to source my own learning for realism. Thank God for the internet and books on the subject! Oh and also for the tutor I have found and will go to as $s allow.
So thanks for these lessons, they will be of great help.
Hi Zalina,
I agree. Information on how to draw truly realistic drawing (especially gearded towards beginners) are very hard to find. It was a big problem for me when I started learning and it one of the main reason I started this website. Thank you for the comment and I’m glad I can help you on your artistic journey.
Very helpful. Easy to follow.
Very helpful. I’ve been drawing portraits of my family and have never heard these “rules” before. This will help me tremendously. Thank you.
Thank you so much very easy to follow
Very interesting, good explanations and easy listening. Thanks
so pleased at the way you explain things. Almost as if you were beside me
real good it’s helping me to find my mistakes.
Comprehensive tutorial…very straight forward …you don’t beat around the bush…GREAT !!! Thank you, I am looking forward to learn more.
I enjoyed this video very much thank you
Ethan, excellant blending technique. You make it look simple. I will let you know lol.
Thank you, Jean.
great site gives me a lot to learn im not good in shading
Ethan you explain how to do blending in terms that we can understand. I had tried previously to do it but it was not smooth and flowing like his. Thank you..
Hey! Would you mind if I share your blog with my twitter group? There’s a lot of people that I think would really enjoy your content. Please let me know. Thanks
Yes, of course! Please feel free to share anything on this site with all your friends. Thank you.
Perfect. Thank you.
As we say in England – spiffing! Great work!
Wow! Great teaching skills..i recently got interested in drawing and i am sure i will learn alot from you..Thanks!! I will start practicing tomorrow!
Thank you Xochiti,
Nice to have you join us.
Will be practicing tomorrow! I have read Lee Hammonds book and she has you make the dark cast shadow and then take the tortillion and gradually blend to the light area. I like yours better in that you place the lines from dark to light and then blend them.
Thanks
Gostei muito!!!
Realy interesting, I like it.
I just want to tell you that I’m beginner to weblog and truly enjoyed your blog site. Probably I’m going to bookmark your blog post . You definitely have awesome articles and reviews. Thanks a lot for revealing your blog site.
I have recently started a site, the info you provide on this web site has helped me tremendously. Thanks for all of your time & work.
Thank you may bien me gusta
Helps me. I was looking for that. i get an error but i think its a firefox error but ill throw it out there just in case.
Hi, can you tell me more about what kind of problem you are having? Thank you.
Thanks!
I’m looking forward to tomorrow!
You are welcome! Thanks for watching.
Very helpful
Love it!
good so far
enjoing it so far .great videos
Wow this actually helped alot.
This is the most helpful drawing lesson I have come across in years – it is simple, doable and the results are tenfold more satisfying than most book and video advice on shading. Thank you so much, Ethan Smith, for sharing this knowledge.
Wow, you have know idea how much I appreciate that. Thanks you Micheline!
Great info, Thank you
very good tutorial
I liked the theory of light and shadow, gradual blending, and its translation from the sphere to the shading of the nose.
Jazlin
I think you’re really going to like tomorrow’s lesson then, Jazlin. Thanks for watching.
liking it thanks
Thanks for the LIKE, Sue!
You are a very bright person!