1. Point and Flat Shading
2. Shading an Area
3. Irregular Shading
4. Circular Shading
5. Directional Shading
6. Using Line weight in Shading
7. Contour Shading
8. Shading in Perspective
Point and Flat Shading
The first step to successful pencil shading is to control
the movement of your pencil, making sure that every mark you
make on the paper works towards creating the shading or modeling
effect that you want. The following pages offer a few tips
to get you started. To begin with, decide whether you want
to use the point or side of the pencil to shade with.
The example at left is shaded with the point, at right, with
the side. The difference doesn't show up clearly in the scan,
but you can see that the side shading has a grainier, softer
look and covers a large area quickly (a chisel-point pencil
will also give this effect). Using a sharp point to shade
allows you more control, you can do much finer work, and get
a greater range of tone out of the pencil.
Experiment with both to see how they look on your paper.
Try it with hard and soft pencils, too.
Shading an Area
When shading an area, the first thing most people do is to
move the pencil back and forth in a regular pattern, with
the 'turn' at the end of each movement roughly parallel, as
in the first example. The trouble is, when you use this technique
to shade a large area, that even edge gives you a dark line
through your shaded area. Sometimes it is only subtle, but
often it looks very obvious and spoils the illusion that you
are trying to create.
Irregular Shading
To prevent unwanted banding through a shaded area, change
the pencil direction at irregular intervals, making one stroke
long, then next short, overlapping where needed. The example
at left shows an exaggerated example of how this effect is
begun; at right the finished result.
Circular Shading
An alternative to regular 'sideways' shading is to use small,
overlapping circles. Use a light touch and work an area in
an irregular, overlapping pattern to gradually build the tone.
A particularly light touch is required for lighter areas to
avoid a 'steel wool' texture developing.
Directional Shading
Direction. Don't underestimate it! Here's a really rough
change of direction: with two coarsely shaded areas side by
side - there's no missing the difference! Drawn like this,
it is screamingly obvious: one has a big horizontal movement,
the other vertical, and the edge between the two is very clear.
Now, if you are shading an object, even if your shading is
more even and the pencil marks less obvious, this effect is
still there - just more subtly. You can use it, to create
a suggestion of an edge or a change of plane. But it will
also suggest a change of plane even if you don't intend it
to: you don't want to randomly change direction in the middle
of an area. The eye will read it as 'meaning' something. Control
the direction of your shading.
Try shading an object in various ways: using no visible direction
(circular shading), one continuous direction, few big changes,
and many subtle changes.
Using Line weight in Shading
When using directional shading, you can vary the pressure
on the pencil to create light and dark tones. Controlling
it very precisely can allow you to model smooth forms. A more
relaxed approach to lifting and re-weighting the pencil for
a fairly continuous line is useful for creating highlights
across textures like hair or grass.
Contour Shading
Following the contours of a form with shading, especially
when controlling the line weight to create light and shade,
allows you to create strong dimensional effects in your drawing.
You can control these precisely or use a relaxed and expressive
approach. Be sure to take perspective into account, so that
the direction of shading changes gradually down a form drawn
in perspective.
Shading in Perspective
If you are doing a quick sketch or roughly shading an area,
the direction of the pencil marks can be very obvious, and
even quite dense shading can still reveal directional marks.
A common mistake that beginners make is to begin shading along
one edge of of an object in perspective, and to continue that
direction all the way down, so that by the time they reach
the bottom, the direction of shading is working against the
perspective, as in the panel at top left.
Beside it is a panel shaded horizonatally: again the shading
fights against the perspective and flattens the drawing.
In the second example, the direction of shading follows the
perspective correctly, with the angle changing gradually so
that it is always along an orthagonal (vanishing line).
With a practiced eye, you can do this by instinct, or, as
you see in the example, you can draw subtle guidelines back
to the vanishing point first. The right panel of this box
is shaded vertically. This doesn't accentuate the foreshortening
as perspective shading does, but it also doesn't fight against
it. Another good option is to use circular shading and avoid
creating any directional movement at all.
