I have always loved sketching and exploring different techniques of blending and creating texture with a pencil. I believe sketching skills form the foundation of any art form. Through learning sketching skills you build up knowledge of shadow and light, proportions and creating texture.
As I have never had any formal training I signed up for a drawing class in Hong Kong. The teacher taught a very particular style of sketching. Everything had to be very light and drawn only using lines. The angles and width of each line was particularly important and he believed you must show that you are able to control the pressure of your lines. Though there is a great discipline in this type of sketching technique, I found it particularly difficult to be creative with such a rigid set of rules. I did learn useful techniques about creating accurate proportions and comparing light and shadow.
My own personal style is actually much darker and more textural. I prefer using blending and different crisscross techniques to create shadow. I feel that this gives a sketch more emotion.
Color Pencil
![Picture](/uploads/4/9/1/1/49115679/8459900.png?250)
I have seen some incredible color pencil sketches before and have never really explored using them myself, at least not since the last time I was still coloring in pages in primary school. I was interested to see what it would be like to try and blend colors and use different shading techniques to create depth and volume.
This sketch took several sittings and many hours to complete. It was much harder than I thought it would be as you have to create several layers to get the desired effect. It is also harder to change something if you made a mistake, as erasing color pencil isn't very effective. When you are painting you can simply go over an area with new paint if you are unhappy with it, but this is not the case with color pencils.
Overall I am still very impressed with the sketch, though I know that the proportions seem slightly off. For a first attempt at sketching with color pencils I think I did quite well.