How to Draw Hair in Pencil, Draw Hair with Pencil

Artist: catlucker / April 18, 2011

5 votes

Step 1.

Okay, beginners and those that HATE drawing hair, here are some examples of first hand attempt to draw hair that don't portray the 3-dimensional look. The next step(s) show well known boo-boo's or errors. Yeah, I made them too! ZERO VOLUME: Lines

Step 2.

HARD OUTLINES: Ouch! You've made the outside outline of the hair, just straight or circular, like a bowl put over your drawn person's head with no fly away hair or hair strands. Also you've made the hairline at forehead, partings and temples very str

Step 3.

TONS OF TEXTURE: You've sweated with your hair and added volumes. Too many lines are in the halftones, shadows and highlights...everywhere! This becomes distracting. It's a balancing act, but as you can see, the drawing becomes Mad Hatter's nightmare

Step 4.

TONE - SHADING - TEXTURE: All those tiny strands, hundreds of thousands of them, are broken into sections. Then those sections making up a head of hair. Those sections form patterns, shapes, shadows and fly away strands. Take a breath of relief becau

Step 5.

LINE - SHAPE - FORM: This is what causes that illusion. Click on the picture in this step and see how these shapes can form hair!

Step 6.

PENCIL POSITIONS: How in the world do you create hair without the helmet, mop, haystack, toupe wig fake looking effect? The secret is in how you hold the pencil and the type of pencil's edge. Holding a sharpened pencil in normal writing form with fin

Step 7.

PENCIL STROKES: Click on this picture to see the different pencil and graphite strokes. Also these products can be purchased at my favorite art store: Dick Blick! I heart you!

Step 8.

GO WITH THE FLOW: Basically, you're following the direction of object's shape, that is the hair. The hair will curl around, flow from, and slick to the head. The head is like a curved ball, so the hair extends from that ball by the arrowed directions

Step 9.

STRAIGHT LONG & SHORT HAIR: The following steps will start with my realistic drawing of the hair type then guidelines for your sketch. Sketching is a study, practice, or quick choppy/messy/unfinished work. A drawing is an artist's finalized piece--cl

Step 10.

Draw these ovals lightly. We need them to determine the head mass for the hair. You can draw one, both, or all of these drawings... whatever your heart desires!

Step 11.

Bisect the heads with the red line and add that crescent curve on the first head for volume. Don't forget the neck lines.

Step 12.

Add the long and short hair. Stick with the basic shape. I've used portions of these guidelines. They're very helpful. Don't forget the shoulder of the second head.

Step 13.

Remember to stroke in the direction of the bangs and hair.

Step 14.

SHORT & WAVY HAIR: Here's my realistic drawing changed to black & white so you can see the tone & values in the hair. This is originally a color pastel called Ebonacious done on 12 by 18 inches (A3 paper size)! Notice the dark shading in the hair tha

Step 15.

Start out with the famous oval. Stay close to the shape as possible.

Step 16.

Draw lightly the middle line and red crescent shape. This helps with balancing where the hair goes in relation to the face. The crescent helps with the mass of the head and hair.

Step 17.

Here's the basic shape of the hair. You can see the bangs and wisps of hair take shape.

Step 18.

This is a little sketch of her hair. You can start out softly, then give more pressure at the shadowed parts of the waves.

Step 19.

This is my realistic drawing of a friend's sister at DeviantArt. Her sister has very long hair and either she was jumping up and down or a fan was put behind her so her hair would fly up. I flipped out when I saw the photo and knew this would be perf

Step 20.

No oval this time. It's a lopsided mushroom! Or a fan gone expresso! Just kidding. Sketch lightly. You can have extra lines on your drawing... that's what sketching is all about.

Step 21.

Draw a line in the middle to give balance, the rest of the stump and another line for her arm.

Step 22.

The extra red lines give direction and space division. It's easier, for me at least, to see where the hair is going BECAUSE IT'S CHAOTIC!

Step 23.

Here's the sketch without the guidelines, representing the drawing.

Step 24.

Here's the grand finale of the hairstyles. Click on the picture and you'll see the arrows giving the direction of the pencil stroke. Try, see how your strokes look going in the opposite direction. Sometimes you can get that curl's edge darkened bette

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Details

Artist: catlucker
Date Added: April 18, 2011
Steps: 24
Favorited: 1 (view)
Views: 0 in last hour, 0 in last day, 12 in last week, 62367 total
Comments: 0
Tags: draw realistic animals, how to draw realistic, draw realistic, how to draw real, how to sketch, sketching in pencil
Description: Hey,everybody! It's good to be back. You got to FAV THIS TUTORIAL. Though I'll show you how to sketch some hair, I've worked hard to get you some great info, tips, and helps. If you need something on hair, you'll have it at your fingertips if you fav this in your profile account area. So let's get started with the intro! Can you believe there are over 100,000 strands of hair on our head, give or take? Imagine trying to draw each strand. Don't even go there. To create a 3-dimensional look, it's good to start the hair with the general shape, add tone and shadow, then add highlights to represent strands and some fly away hair. In this tutorial HOW TO SKETCH HAIR, I will have some finished drawings to show hair done in its completed form. Next I will translate them for you with guidelines to them draw in sketch form. To quench your thirst for knowledge, this lesson not only includes drawing, but is a general study on hair and how to draw it. I hope you'll enjoy this lesson.