Hi everybody it's Tom McPherson with a new Circle Line Art School video this week I'll show you one
way to draw clouds from a simple landscape using a pencil I use a 4b pencil for this drawing but
any dark pencil would be great start by drawing a horizontal line using just a soft line down
towards the base of your page next draw an outline for a large cloud filling up most of the sky
it would be good to use a sharp pencil point for this outline and don't press down too hard
we're drawing an outline of the cloud but this outline will become a line between
two tonal values the light of the cloud and the dark of the sky behind the cloud
next we can draw some inner lines of clouds in front of the main cloud
again using soft sharp guidelines try to make the lines look precise
towards the horizon line the cloud shapes will get smaller and thinner the best way
to draw clouds really is to be able to notice clouds as you see them when you walk around
in landscapes clouds are magnificent things and they have shapes which change and alter over time
often quite quickly next we can draw a landscape start by drawing just a few
marks above the horizon line just indications really of distant bits of landscape far away
then we can draw more lines of the landscape getting nearer us and lower down from the horizon
using dark tonal values as well if you'd like to learn more about drawing from scratch please visit
my website www.circlelineartschool.com to find out about my online drawing courses for beginners
so for this drawing we're just using a sketching technique
of giving an indication of things rather than trying to pin them down too much
so these quick marks that we're making are just an indication of landscape rather than any details
so in a way we can give we can give an indication of how far away things are
by making them softer tonally in the distance but making them stronger tones
and larger shapes in the foreground the things right at the front of us all spiky shapes of grass
and using the side of the pencil to get some smoother flatter tonal values
we need to use these tonal values particularly in the clouds
make sure you don't use the point of the pencil if you want the tonal values to be soft
and for this drawing i'm not shading in the area nearest the edge of the clouds
we're sort of shading in the inner part of the clouds
but in a soft blended way using the side of the pencil so that we can create delicate tonal values
you could smudge these areas with your finger or a side of an eraser to make them look even
flatter if you wish by making the sky darker we are automatically making the clouds look brighter
because tonal values are always relative in a drawing an area of the drawing will look lighter
if it's next to another area which is darker
so in this sketch I think it's a good idea to move the pencil point around when drawing
and not just draw one thing at a time except perhaps for the sky in the background
for that we just need to use the side of the pencil and build up flat layers of tonal values
each one getting flatter as we layer them one on top of another you could use
your fingers to smudge this area or maybe the side of an eraser
the main thing is to take your time and make the sky a soft flat tone which is
darker than the clouds and because the sky will be darker than the clouds and flat it will recede
and that will make the clouds look like they're coming forwards
and because the clouds still have areas which are just blank paper these areas are very bright
in comparison to the darker background and that's really why we're putting a darker background in
because it makes the cloud look brighter so again it says contrast between light and dark
and using that in our drawing to create the effect that we want you could add a few more
details or marks in the landscape and maybe some indications of shapes that could be reflected in
patches of water don't put too much detail again it's just indicating details
and maybe we could define some of the edges of the clouds not too much just a little bit
because clouds are these crazy shapes that keep changing in front of our eyes so we want to give
the impression that they could move around I hope you find this sketch useful for your own drawings
if you'd like to join my online drawing course for beginners please just visit
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thank you for your support and see you next time