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Do you enjoy drawing artistic portraits of family, friends, or photographs? Some of the most celebrated art pieces in the world are portraits like the Mona Lisa, Vincent van Gogh’s self portraits, and Leonardo da Vinci’s self portraits. The popularity of portraits increased as cameras were available to make faster and more accurate portraits, but for many art enthusiasts photographs don’t have the same artistic enjoyment as paintings or drawings. Before you start down the path to improving you drawing skills you must realize that a great drawing engages the viewer to continue to look at and be pulled into the portrait. The viewer must feel like they are in the middle of a conversion with the person in the portrait or involved in the scene of the portrait. If you have ever wanted to draw portraits like the great artists, here are my 5 tips to drawing more engaging portraits using graphite or coloring pencils.

1. Don’t be intimated to draw the human form.

For many people drawing the human body, especially the face, is like meeting your favorite actor. You would love to meet that actor and make a good impression, but are afraid that you’ll end up being so nervous you’ll make a fool of yourself, so you avoid the situation altogether. Whether you are a hobbyist or professional don’t be intimated because your portrait skills will never improve that way. So try your best, but be ready to make mistakes and acknowledge them.

2. The portrait should make eye contact with the viewer.

This is also a basic concept of social skills. The best conversions you’ve ever had were with someone that made eye contact. Magazine ads, TV commercials, and public speakers all make eye contact with their viewers to engage them so they feel connected to the subject matter. A portrait subject almost always should be looking straight forward to allow viewers from all angles to be engaged by the eyes of the picture. This is why people say the Mona Lisa’s eyes follow you where ever you are, she is looking straight forward.

3. The portrait should have a mood that is expressed to the viewer.

Having the portrait subject looking forward is no excuse for lack of action or mood in the expressions of the face in the drawing. A person laughing expresses joy and friendliness to the viewer or a person frowning expresses distress, worry or anger. The expression of the subject in the portrait needs to be lively to engage the viewer to continue looking at the drawing and to be interested in the portrait. Also the background should reinforce the same mood as the subject.

4. Create the illusion of depth with shadows, shading, and clean edges.

A common mistake is to outline the subject in the portrait this results in a lack of realism. The portrait doesn’t look life-like but resembles a cartoon or anime character. It is fine if you are drawing a cartoon but is bad if drawing for realism. Also shadows should not neglected; make the darks dark, this will add layers of depth to the drawing to make it seem 3-D. Shading will also create realistic contours for facial features like cheeks and noses. Shading should be subtle and well blended. A good rule of thumb for creating realistic depth is to make sure that adjacent areas of the portrait have different grading of shading. For example, the bridge of the nose should not have the same shading as the tip of the nose since the tip is further out.

5. Practice drawing without hesitation.

It is easy to get discouraged from mistakes and not feel like you’re improving. Most likely you are improving; you just don’t notice the improvements. To overcome this potential stumbling block complete all of your drawings and keep them with their mistakes. Archive the practice drawings and completed pieces for a time and then look back to see your improvements. You will have an easier time seeing how you draw much better eyes, for example, than you did a month ago. It might be useful to put dates and notes on the back of each practice piece to catalog the progress.

Remember most of all drawings are for personal or public enjoyment. Show friends and family art pieces and use them as subjects for portraits. This way you will get feedback as to what the most engaging parts of the portraits are and how to improve overall. Soon you will have portraits that are so engaging that viewers won’t be able to keep their eyes off them!

Then see how far your drawings will take you. There are many people out there who appreciate good artwork. Don’t limit yourself. There are many ways to sell your drawings.
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