Charcoal References

              Charcoal is also a versatile medium. While you can create extremely realistic, sensitive drawings with it, there is something about picking up that dusty stump of charcoal that frees us to go big, expressive and gestural.

Charcoal of All Kinds: Charcoal comes in several different forms.

• The compressed stick, which can can be hard, produces a grayer shade, or soft and very deep black.
• A softer charcoal is easier to smudge: it’s the one that will get all over your hands, your paper, and probably your clothing and face too!
• Pressed charcoal also comes as a pencil. This is useful for detailed drawings because it can be sharpened to a fine point. It is also much less messy!
• Willow or vine charcoal comes actually as a willow stick: it is long, cylindrical and wiggly. Willow charcoal is also very soft and produces a velvety, dove grey. It has a great texture to draw with, but is also very smudgy.

Charcoal Drawing Techniques:

• Charcoal can be used in the same way you use a pencil to draw and shade anything, but it’s best suited to to more expressive types of shading like hatching.
• Charcoal can also be used to do the preliminary drawings of a painting on canvas.
  • Once you’ve blocked in your shapes and values, spray with a workable fixative and start painting. Turning your charcoal stick on its side and filling in major areas of a subject is a great way to train your brain to see shapes rather than contours.
• One of my favorite thing to do with charcoal, however, is gesture drawings. It’s the perfect tool for executing the large, sweeping strokes needed to capture a gesture.
  •  Use a nice chunk and a big pad of cartridge paper to get the most out of your drawings.

This picture interesting because the lady is upside down.  I love the shadow below her chin and her curly hair. it looks so real.

I love the technique of this picture. it makes that girl look mysterious. For me, if i look at the mysterious picture, i will look that picture for long time and make me want to know who is she, why, what, etc... and not every result can be 'eye catching'

I for four techniques of charcoal drawing, first is just a line by charcoal but can present pattern ; Second one is like strokes from left to right from black to white. It present that charcoal can make highlight and shadow but depends on our hand ; Next is like ++++ or ####,  it interesting because not many people use this technique.The last technique looks interesting too, it makes pattern and i think its good for background. i want to try it soon!

I love the shadow and highlight in this picture, even just a fabric, but it looks so real and soft.

The last is so interesting, it looks 3D, the man like in the hole and looking outside the paper. I will make it soon!


Have a nice day,
JAJ