How To Draw Like Scott Campbell

How to Draw Landscapes

Why Sketch and Draw?

Whenever I paint a mural I never simply get straight into it, I ever practice some planning starting time and the planning always begins with my sketchbook. Only why sketch and describe, why not just start painting? Well there is a simple answer, if you go straight into a studio painting it's likely you'll run into trouble with the composition.

I've seen many terrible landscape paintings in fine art galleries (some with loftier toll tags) because of bad compositions due to lack of prior planning. This problem could have been alleviated had these artists carried out some pencil sketches first to design their compositions.

Planning a painting in your sketchbook get-go is an important step in the painting process in my opinion. Yous wouldn't start building a firm with no foundations or prior plans and drawings, it'south the same when planning a painting. Besides which drawing and sketching is fun.

Getting Started With Sketching

The about obvious materials you'll need are some pencils and a sketchbook, but in that location is a picayune more to it than that. I use a range of graphite pencils to achieve light and dark tones within my drawings. I also use a craft pocketknife and sandpaper in social club to sharpen my pencils.

Materials

Hither is a list of bones materials you volition need:

Sketchbook (A3 is platonic)
Pencils (4H, 2H, HB, 2B and 4B are platonic)
Craft knife (for sharpening your pencils)
Sandpaper (for filing the graphite of your pencils)
Eraser
Ruler (optional)

Pencil Mark Fundamentals

When it comes to using pencils there are many dissimilar methods to achieving successful pencil drawings but the method that I like and that works for me is the Ted Kautzky 'broad stroke' method of cartoon. I learned his method from his volume which I'd thoroughly recommend called 'The Ted Kautzky Pencil Volume'.

I personally like this particular cartoon style.

The broad stroke method allows you to create a multifariousness of uniform wide marks that are very effective at communicating realistic forms that you would discover in landscapes. This is achieved past sharpening your pencil and then filing the graphite (lead) at an angle to class a apartment wedge that is held evenly against the paper.

When sketching the pencil itself must be held at an angle and marks made evenly, not besides quickly but not too slowly either. This is depicted in the paradigm below.

Filing your pencils at an angle to achieve broad stroke marks. — Filing your pencils at an angle to accomplish broad stroke marks.

How to Sharpen Your Pencils

The pencil is start sharpened with a arts and crafts knife to leave nigh ane/iv" of graphite exposed. This should then be filed on some sandpaper to for a apartment wedge. The broad strokes are fabricated with the flat side of the wedge.

The lead of the pencil is filed on sandpaper to form a flat wedge

Filing your pencil on the sandpaper allows y'all to reach the wide stroke marks as seen in the image below.

Screen Shot 2018-11-12 at 20.47.39 copy.png

The tip of the pb tin be used for fine marks but go on in listen that filing information technology again on the sandpaper possibly needed if further broad strokes are required within the drawing or sketch.

Achieving Depth in Your Pencil Drawings

Whenever I sketch landscapes for potential paintings I always remember about the tonality of the drawing and the relationships betwixt light and shadow so I tin create depth and a feeling of space inside the sketch. In order to comport this out I use five different graphite pencils which include 4H, 2H, HB, 2B and 4B. These pencils allow me to achieve a range of tones.

I employ hard pencils such as 4H and 2H for afar objects as the pencil mark is tonally lighter. For nighttime tones and shadows I use softer pencils such as 2B and 4B. I am more likely to use these pencils to shade in objects in the foreground where dark shadows occur.

I use hard pencils to achieve the lighter values for the distant mountains. For the dark shadows in the foreground I use a soft 4B pencil. — I apply difficult pencils to achieve the lighter values for the distant mountains. For the dark shadows in the foreground I use a soft 4B pencil.

Planning Your Limerick

Whenever I plan a composition whether it be for a painting or for a beautifully finished pencil cartoon, I always first with pocket-sized thumbnail pencil sketches. These thumbnails should exist quick sketches to notice out how your composition idea will work.

Whenever I practice thumbnail sketches I spend about two to three minutes on each sketch. I besides make the sketches proportional to the size of the final sketch or canvas I am going to work on.

Quick two minute thumbnail sketches to plan some composition ideas. — Quick two minute thumbnail sketches to program some limerick ideas.

In one case I take a expert thought for a composition later doing a serial of thumbnail sketches, I do the final pencil sketch. I can so utilize the pencil sketch to refer to when I start a painting.

Pencil Sketch and thumbnail sketches of the south coast cliffs of Guernsey.

Drawing Sit-in #1 - Rolling Hills of Northland, New Zealand

This cartoon features a grouping of pine trees surrounded by rolling hills that are then feature of the region of Northland in northern New Zealand. It is my intention to do a studio painting of this scene.

This is 1 of the reference photos I have used for the pencil drawing.

In my composition design I have fabricated the group of trees the focal surface area and I have moved the tree closest on the left further forward in the composition as yous will see in the demonstration. I accept fabricated the group mass of copse bigger.

I am going to be doing a colour report of this scene first so I have made my last sketch the verbal same size as the linen panel I will paint on, which measures eight" x 10".

I sketch out the pattern faintly with a 4H pencil. Once I am happy with the proportions I can utilise the broad stroke pencil method to shade in the various zones within the scene.

Now that I am happy with the sketch outline I beginning shading in the darkest values inside the scene. I commencement with the distant trees which are a mid-tone so I use a 2H pencil which produces a light mark.

For the trees in the mid-ground I use a HB pencil every bit the value is darker than the trees in the altitude. The HB pencil produces a darker marker than the 2H pencil.

The shadows in the pines trees in the foreground have the darkest values in the scene and for this I use a 4B pencil. The graphite is soft and it produces a night mark. The darkest shadows volition be plant in the foreground of the mural and so in order to communicate depth in the cartoon this must be taken into account.

Note the broad stroke marks are excellent for depicting pine tree foliage.

I employ an HB pencil for most of this drawing particularly for the copse and grass in the mid-basis.

I apply 2H pencil for the pine tree leaf thats in full sunday as pine trees are by and large tonally night and in this case are the darkest values within the landscape.

As grass is calorie-free in value I exit the grass with the white paper exposed, nevertheless I add a few suggestions of clumps of grass. I employ a 4H pencil to lightly shade in the grass in the afar hills besides as the base of the clouds.

Rolling Hills Northalnd - pencil drawing - Samuel Earp.jpeg

Drawing Demonstration #ii - Shotover River, Queenstown, New Zealand

This drawing features a mount river valley surrounded by broadleaf trees. Ane of the reference photos I am using (seen below) depicts by chance a naturally pleasing composition so didn't need to change it likewise much when I was designing the drawing.

Again I will use this cartoon as reference for a colour study and then a terminal studio painting.

Tucker Beach, Shotover River, Queenstown, New Zealand.

In this composition I have incorporated a blueprint called a 'steelyard' composition where the trees on the left institute a large weight in the scene that is counterbalanced on a theoretical fulcrum by the smaller pine trees in the mid-ground on the right.

For more information on landscape composition designs including the steelyard limerick check out my weblog post on '5 Composition Ideas for Landscape Paintings'

As with the Rolling Hills, Northland drawing, I faintly sketch of the composition with a 4H pencil. This is a difficult pencil and so it produces a light marker.

Before I get-go shading in the drawing I determine where my dark values are. They are to exist found in the cloud shadows, the afar mountain, the shadows in the mid-ground trees and the trees in the foreground.

I use a 4H pencil to depict and shade the clouds and a 2H pencil for the afar mount.

I use a HB pencil for the mid-ground trees and use a 4B pencil for the shadows of the trees in the foreground.

I finish the drawing by shading in the prominent shadow within the poplar tree in the foreground. This is the darkest value in the cartoon and and then I use a 4B pencil.

The grass is light in value so I use a 4H pencil, I also use a 4H for the foliage that is in light within the foreground copse.

With a 4B pencil I add in a few final details such as the proposition of clumps of grass and $.25 of wood.

Shotover River - Queenstown - New Zealand - pencil drawing - Samuel Earp.jpeg

Thank you for reading 😊

If y'all enjoyed this weblog post you may like some of my others. Check out these blog posts:

References

Ted Kautzky, 1979. The Ted Kautzky Pencil Volume. Van Nostrand Reinhold Visitor.

Edgar Payne, 1941. Limerick of Outdoor Painting. DeRu's Fine Arts.

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