1. I am creating a drawing course for beginners and, as part of this, I pulled out my old drawings from my art school days. 

This portrait, which I drew from life models, has sound basic structures but lacked one important element—value. 

Value refers to how light or dark a color or tone is. 

I enhanced the drawing by adding darker elements to the models’ hair and shadows. As I didn’t have reference photos, I relied solely on my experience.

So the number one tip to improve your drawing is–check your value.

Here are Five Ways for Adding Value to Your Drawing (Enhancing Your Shading):

1. Use a retractable blade to sharpen your pencil into a long, thin tip for better impression on the paper.
2. Opt for a higher-number pencil, such as a 4B instead of a 2B; charcoal pencils are also a good choice.
3. Regularly sharpen your pencil using sandpaper.
4. A paper drawing stomp can be very useful for smudging and depositing more graphite onto the paper.  You can find a good one use this link: https://amzn.to/41SumZT
5. If you find it difficult to add more graphite to your paper, spray your drawing with setting spray. Then you can carefully add more to the drawing. I use this one: https://amzn.to/3O0GUc5 (links in this post contains Amazon affiliate link. If you choose to buy from them there will be absolute no extra cost to you, and you will be able to support this blog.)

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I will always cheering for you!

Ying