On Dec 1, 2016, I asked myself the question: With simply one month of practice, can I larn how to depict realistic portraits with only pencil and paper?

On December 24, 2016, after 26 hours of practice, I found out that the answer was yeah.

During the calendar month of Dec, I documented my unabridged learning process in a series of 31 daily blog posts, which are compiled here into a single narrative. In this commodity, you can relive my month of insights, frustrations, learning hacks, and triumphs, as I strive towards monthly mastery.

New calendar month, new claiming.

For the month of December, my goal is to draw a realistic self-portrait with simply pencil and paper. Forth the manner, in social club to learn the fundamentals of drawing and portraiture, I will also draw many other faces, which will hopefully keep this month's posts more varied and interesting.

This new challenge starts today, December ane, 2016, and, by December 31, I hope to be a master of portrait cartoon.

My starting point

I've had potent creative tendencies since I was a kid, but I've never invested much in my fine art skills. Instead, I've channeled my artistic impulses mainly through music, motion picture, and computer-aided design.

Thus, to set a baseline for this month'southward challenge, I've drawn a before self-portrait with my electric current drawing skills. Although it'south not the accented worst thing ever drawn, it sadly doesn't look very much like me.

Measuring success

Measuring success for this challenge is certainly more subjective than terminal month (where I successfully memorized a deck of cards in less than 2 minutes).

In this instance, the best I tin do is evidence a photo that demonstrates the level of drawing I'g aiming to achieve…

This portrait is the example drawn in the Vitruvian Studio Portrait Drawing Class, which is the class I'll be following this month.

Clearly, there are major differences in realism between my starting drawing and this example portrait. So, if I can match the level of this case (which will be, of course, a subjective, but hopefully honest judgement), I will consider this challenge a success.

With my goal set, information technology's fourth dimension to start cartoon…

In my life, I've created a fair scrap of (what I'll call) art. Nonetheless, I've done so, non by relying on well-developed fine art skills, just instead, past cheating my fashion through the artistic procedure.

Basically, I've used everything at my disposal (except for fine arts skills) to create artistically.

Y'all can decide if this is cheating or not, but either fashion, this month is going to exist different. This month, I am really going to invest in my fine art skills. This month, I'm going to accept a pencil and newspaper, and nix else, and make it happen.

Nevertheless, earlier I get in happen, I thought it would be fun to share some of my previous works.

i. Lego Portraits (with the help of Photoshop)

During high school, whenever I was tasked with making someone a gift, I usually opted to construct a custom Warhol-inspired portrait out of Legos.

Here are 2 portraits that I made for my cousins Adam and Marissa.

And another one I fabricated for my grandparents.

While these pieces may expect like they required some corporeality of artistic genius to pull off (do they?), that'southward really not the example. Instead, these pieces merely required some clever computational analysis, planning in Photoshop, and executional patience (while glueing and placing each Lego piece).

The reckoner was the existent creative champion hither.

2. Counterfeit paintings (using optical tricks)

I've likewise experimented using optical tools (like mirrors and lens) to mechanically create. Although, I haven't invested enough fourth dimension to produce anything worth sharing.

Tim Jenison, on the other hand, does have something worth sharing. Without any artistic training, he painted a nearly-exact replica of a Vermeer painting solely using optical techniques.

Tim'south journey is documented in the Penn and Teller-produced pic "Tim's Vermeer", which I highly recommend y'all check out.

Here'south Tim's last painting.

This calendar month I'm but using pencil and newspaper

While technology-aided art still should probably count as art (in some capacity), this month, I'k committed to creating using only the tools shown beneath: 9 black pencils, 1 white pencil, a few different erasers, and a grey piece of paper (which I'll explicate another fourth dimension).

It's going to be hard, but that'south the signal.

This calendar month, to learn how to draw portraits, I'll be following the Portrait Drawing video class from Vitruvian Studio.

Today, I spent 2.5 hours starting the class and get-go my get-go portrait.

Selecting who to depict

For my starting time piece, rather than cartoon the model from the course, I've called to draw Derren Brown, who originally inspired me to pursuit portrait cartoon.

Derren is a British illusionist, who I've been post-obit for a while now, and who, I recently learned, casually paints portraits on the side.

Here are a few things he'south casually painted.

After seeing these, I decided I too would similar to exist the kind of person that casually paints impressively expert portraits on the side.

For now, before I get to the painting, I'll start off past mastering the drawing role of program.

This is the picture of Derren I'm drawing.

And hither's my setup.

Starting the drawing

The first module of the grade focuses on mapping out the portrait, which includes determining the shape of the head and locating the features.

Finding the top and lesser of the caput

I started by arbitrarily drawing two lines on the page to indicate the level of the top of the head and the level of the bottom of the head.

Then, I arbitrarily marked, on the top level, the highest indicate of the head, and then used the angle between this point and the bottom of the chin, to locate the bottom of the chin on the page.

I as well drew in the level of the notch of the neck. The first time, I drew it also depression, so I moved it upwardly. I gauged this distances as a proffer of the caput length.

Find the leftmost and rightmost parts of the head

With the topmost and bottommost points identified, I and then needed to identify the leftmost and rightmost points.

To do this, I used a new technique I learned called triangulation. To triangulate a new point, I first sight (attempt to visualize) the angles to this new signal from 2 existing points. So, I draw lines from the existing points in the direction of the new point based on the sighted angles. Finally, I marker the new point where the lines intersect.

After checking the angles again, I updated these two new points.

To bank check, I then sighted the bending between the ii new points, ensuring this angle matches what I see on Derren's head.

Drawing the shape of the caput

With these 4 outer points fatigued, the next step is to draw in the shape of the head. To do this, I connected to triangulate more points, and draw in the necessary curves to connect them.

I continued in this way, until I outlined the unabridged shape of the head.

It didn't look quite right, then I checked a agglomeration of angles.

Once information technology seemed closer, I added in the cervix and shoulders.

With the cervix and shoulders in place, information technology over again didn't wait right. And then, I checked more angles and made adjustments as necessary (mostly to broaden the jaw)

The head was now looking pretty skilful, just the cervix and shoulders needed a few adjustments. I retriangulated, and adjusted the neckband upwards.

That'south it for today

Getting to this point took me two.5 hours, which was split between watching the video form and cartoon my Derren portrait.

And so far, the portrait doesn't look like much, but I still learned a bunch today. I especially like the triangulation technique, which makes drawing much more procedural and mathematical (a.chiliad.a. easier for me).

Tomorrow, I'll go on following the course, and get-go drawing in the facial features.

Yesterday, I started following along with the Vitruvian Studio portrait course, and began drawing a portrait of Derren Brown.

Here'south what I achieved yesterday.

And here'south my end goal (more or less).

Today, I spent some other ii.5 hours watching the form and working on the portrait.

Today's progress

Drawing in guides

The first matter I did today was add construction lines to my drawing. These construction lines are designed to act equally landmarks and help me eventually place the facial features.

First, I drew in the vertical middle line, which will help me laterally place the features.

Then, I marked heart level, to starting time gauging the features' vertical placement.

I followed up with the levels of the brows, nose, and lips.

I fabricated a bit of a mistake here. I drew the horizontal structure lines perpendicular to the middle line (which seemed reasonable), but did not mimic the angle of the features in the actual drawing.

So, I sighted the correct angles, and adjusted the construction lines accordingly.

Blocking in the features

With the construction lines as references, I was and then set up to commencement blocking in the facial features.

I started by adjusting the center line slightly for the nose, and marking the nose's outer boundary.

So, I drew in shapes for the brows.

Next, I included the centre sockets and some more particular around the nose.

Finally, I added in shapes for the eyelids and eyes, and finished upwards for the twenty-four hours.

Reaching this betoken took another ii.5 hours.

Progress still seems fairly dull on the drawing, but I'm making a conscious try to work carefully through the blocking in phase (so I can practise what I'1000 learning, and and then I can ensure the portrait is built on a strong foundation).

I'll starting time detailing the features tomorrow.

Today, for the third day in a row, I spent ii.v hours on my Derren Dark-brown drawing. However, dissimilar the other days, today, I experience like I made a lot of progress.

Finish blocking in the features

Picking up where I left off, I continued to block in shapes for the features.

I added in the center line of the lips and the shadow on the nose.

I then finished the lips and added a line for the mentum.

Lastly, I blocked in the main structures of the ear and added an outline for the beard.

Cartoon in shadow/highlight shapes

With the features in place, I next blocked in shapes for the shadows and highlights.

With these tonal contours in place, I darkened the shadow areas slightly, giving the portrait some roundness and iii-dimensionality.

Detailing features

With the features and shadows blocked in, I detailed the features, starting with the eyes.

Left middle washed.

Right eye washed.

Nose washed.

Lips washed.

Finally, I finished upwardly for the twenty-four hour period with the ear.

After seven.5 hours of work (2.5 hours over the past three days), I'thou finally hopefully that this portrait volition resemble Derren Chocolate-brown.

Tomorrow, I'll starting adding tonal values (i.e. shading) to the cartoon.

Observation near today's session: Based on the output from today, it may seem similar today's drawing was the most technically challenging. But, in fact, I found just the opposite.

Considering I spent the past two days meticulously locating and blocking in the features, it was very easy to add together the incremental detail. (Trying to draw big shapes is much harder than trying to describe little shapes. Little shapes are a lot easier to visually understand and replicate)

In fact, I suspect that today was least consequential to the outcome of the portrait. If I mess upward the shape of the head and the location of the features, I accept very trivial chance of capturing a likeness. If the features are not quite accurately detailed, but in the right place, I still might have something…

Yesterday, subsequently 7.5 hours of work, I finally finished sketching / laying out my first portrait. Today, I started calculation tonal values (a.k.a. "shading the drawing").

Before I show today's progress, I want to share ii techniques I learned that make it significantly easier to accurately add tonal values to portraits.

1. Start with the most farthermost values so meet in the middle

The human eye is really bad at assessing tonal values in isolation — which is why your brain thinks squares A and B below are very different colors, when, in fact, they are the same.

Thus, instead of relying on visual inferences, tonal values can be amend approximated through a simple, not-and so-interpretative process.

Here's how it works:

Outset by identifying the absolute darkest and absolute lightest areas of the drawing. For the darkest areas, shade them as dark as you tin/want. For the lightest areas, highlight them as calorie-free as you can/want.

This establishes the entire tonal range of the drawing, which is chosen the primal of the cartoon.

Establishing the key is straightforward, and doesn't require much visual interpretation (i.e. it's easy to notice the lightest lights and the darkest darks).

Once the key is established, and the lightest and darkest values are in identify, the intermediate values need to exist introduced. Again, this can be done procedurally, by identifying and shading/highlighting the areas which are slightly lighter than the darkest darks and slightly darker than the lightest lights. Continuing recursively in this way, the tonal values eventually meet in the eye, and the drawing (or the relevant part of the drawing) is complete.

2. Squint to meliorate encounter tonal shapes

When keying the drawing (and developing tonal values in general) it's important that the shapes of the tonal areas are captured accurately.

In other words, if the highlight on the forehead is angular, drawing it with rounded edges wouldn't properly capture the class.

This sounds obvious, merely again, your brain and visual arrangement tin can pull a fast one on on yous. Your encephalon is attempting to see a confront (via your psychologically skewed, emotions-based mental model of a confront), and not just tonal blobs.

In fact, this psychological problem of misinterpreting faces is so common, there are entire drawing systems (like drawing upside downwardly, drawing the negative space around the confront, etc.) designed to combat these problems.

Side annotation: Hither's a video of Derren Brownish, the subject of my portrait, when he used to have hair, experimenting with some of these alternative methods of painting. It's a pretty cool trick.(If you're going to watch, stick it out until the end).

In order to accurately see tonal shapes, and avert psychological errors, I've found one method to be surprisingly successful: squinting.

Basically, y'all look at the expanse you want to describe, squint your optics (so the image becomes blurred and your brain no longer sees a face up), and identify the tonal shapes you come across through your eyelashes. This works super well. (I didn't invent this method, I've just validated that information technology works for me).

Today's progress

With these techniques newly-learned, I began to add together tonal values to my Derren Brown portrait.

First, I started with the centre.

In the form, the teacher mentioned that it'due south good to commencement with a small expanse that exhibits the full range of tones.

However, the centre was too pocket-sized to help effectively establish the key. Then, I keyed the drawing more aggressively, starting with the shadow on the nose and the highlights on the forehead and cheek.

I continued shading the darkest areas forth the right side of the face.

Additionally, while doing this, to check the accurateness of my key, I started developing the center.

I finished up my key, by adding shadows to the lower face up and the back of the head, and was ready to begin modeling the form (finding the intermediate values betwixt the darks and lights).

I started with the forehead.

Added a bit more particular.

So smoothed everything out.

This is where I stopped for the day, after another two.5 hours of working.

Derren looks a bit too shiny right now — a bit like a mannequin or the Tin Human — but I'm optimistic that this event will vanish in one case I model the rest of the form.

I'm guessing I have another 5 hours of work left on this.

Today, like yesterday, I continued adding tonal values to the portrait. I spent a piddling less than two hours, and am getting really excited about the results.

Hither's where I stopped yesterday.

I proceeded today by outset addressing the olfactory organ.

And then, I addressed the correct half of the face — farther developing the shadow.

Next, I moved on to Derren's hair and beard.

Since the demo portrait in course is based on a long-haired female model, I had to do a flake more freestyling at this indicate. I remember information technology works.

I continued with the upper part of the beard, and finished up for the day.

Tomorrow, I need to finish the oral fissure, the ear, the neck, the lower part of the beard, and maybe the clothing.

Getting close…

Today, afterward another 2.v hours of work, I finally completed my Derren Dark-brown portrait.

In the coming days, I will write a few detailed posts near what I've learned, how I plan to move frontwards, etc., but for now, I'll only share the final photos of my progress.

Today's progress

I started off by detailing the lips.

And so, I added the mustache.

With this facial hair momentum, I finished off the beard.

And so, the ear.

Finally, I completed the neck, decided not to address the clothes, signed information technology, and I was done.

For my first portrait of the month, I'1000 quite happy with how it turned out.

Nine days ago, I began my thirty-mean solar day quest to larn how to draw photorealistic portraits. Since then, I've watched the entire x hours of the Vitruvian Studio cartoon grade, as well as spent fourteen.5 hours working on my beginning portrait.

Here'southward the effect…

And hither'south a video documenting the progression.

Considering where I started only 9 days ago (see the before portrait), it's hard for me to believe that I actually drew this. It's not perfect, merely I'thou definitely excited about the upshot.

Role of me lacks the motivation to continue drawing, as I experience like I've already accomplished my goal. The other (more overpowering) function of me realizes that I accept another 21 days to improve fifty-fifty further, so that's what I plan to exercise.

In item, I'm going try to reduce the amount of fourth dimension necessary to complete a portrait like this. With some practice, I think I can reduce my time down from 14.five hours to four–five hours.

Tomorrow, I'chiliad going to go through my previous posts (1, 2, iii, 4, 5, six) and write up a "Portrait Drawing Cheat Canvass". And then, I'thou going to break down the cheat canvass into isolated, practicable skills and drills, piece of work on those individual skills for 1–2 weeks, and then start working on my self-portrait to finish off the month.

Here is my "Portrait Drawing Cheat Canvas", which features step-by-stride instructions on how to draw a portrait.

These steps are based on the excellent portrait drawing course past Vitruvian Studio, which I highly recommend you lot purchase if you are serious nearly learning how to draw.

The Instructions

1. Mark the top of the head. Arbitrarily draw a line towards the top of the page. This represents the pinnacle of the head.
2. Mark the lesser of the chin. Arbitrarily draw a line near the lower 3rd of the folio. This represents the bottom of the chin.
3. Marker the notch of the cervix. On the bailiwick, using your pencil as a guide, mensurate the distance from the lowest indicate of the caput to the notch of the neck. Decide how many of these distances tin fit inside the vertical distance of the head. Use this is equally guide to depict a horizontal line towards the bottom of the folio to correspond the notch of the neck.
4. Find the highest betoken of the head. Arbitrarily determine a point on the meridian line. This represents the highest point of the head. Often, on the subject, this point sits far back on the head.
5. Find the lowest point of the chin. Using your pencil as a guide, determine the bending from the highest bespeak of the head to the lowest point of the chin. Draw a line at this angle from the highest signal of the caput (as marked on the page) down towards the bottom of the chin line. Draw a nuance where these lines intersect. This intersection represents the everyman indicate of the chin.
6. Find the leftmost boundary. Identify the leftmost boundary on your subject. Decide the angle to this leftmost point from the highest point, and draw a line at that angle from the highest betoken towards the leftmost boundary on the page. Do the same from the lowest bespeak. Draw a mark where these two lines intersect. This intersection represents the leftmost purlieus. The technique used to find this boundary is chosen triangulation.
7. Observe the rightmost boundary. Over again, triangulate from the highest and lowest points to find the rightmost purlieus of the caput.
8. Check the bending. On the subject, use your pencil to find the angle between the leftmost and rightmost boundaries. Check if this angle matches the angle represented on the page. If not, retriangulate and check again.
9. Depict the outer-purlieus of the head and hair. Triangulate points around the head and connect them with straight lines. Once the general shape seems right, smooth out the kinks. Check the angles betwixt various points on the subject and on the page to make sure everything looks right. If there seems to be inconsistencies, retriangulate and suit. Do the aforementioned for the hair line.
10. Describe the vertical centre line. Selection some cardinal point that looks like its on the vertical center line. Triangulate from outer-points inward to find this central point. Check the bending from the bottom/centre of the chin to this signal. Apply this as a guide to draw in the entire vertical middle line. As the center line approaches the top of the head, information technology typically flattens, as it rounds dorsum backside the head.
11. Draw the level of the eyes. The level of the eyes typically falls about halfway between the top and bottom of the head. Use this as a starting indicate. Draw in this level, then bank check angles to confirm. Move upward or downwards until everything checks out.
12. Describe in the level of the brows and lesser of the olfactory organ. If you lot carve up the face up length into thirds, typically the level of the brows autumn on the upper 3rd line and the level of the nose falls on the bottom third line. Employ this every bit a starting signal. Draw in these level, and the check angles to confirm. Movement the level up or downwardly until everything checks out.
13. Draw in the level of the first of the nose. The nose begins somewhere betwixt the level of the brows and the level of the eyes. Guess where this is and draw it in.
14. Draw in the bottom and middle of the lips. If yous dissever the distance between the lesser of the nose and the bottom of the mentum into halves, the level of the bottom of the lips typically falls at the halfway indicate. Utilize this as a starting signal to draw in this level. Then, guess where the middle of the lips falls relative to the distance betwixt the bottom of the lips and the lesser of the olfactory organ. Draw that in.
15. Adjust the center line for the nose. Starting from the level of the commencement of the nose, adjust the middle line so its angle matches the center line of the nose. Typically this will exist in two parts. The angle outwards from the level of the beginning of the nose to the meridian of the nose, and the bending inward from the peak of the olfactory organ to the bottom of the nose.
16. Adjust the center line for the mouth. The mouth typically has some book, which pushes the center line forward. Adjust the eye line forward below the nose to account for the volume in the mouth.
17. Depict in the shape of the eyes and eye sockets. Triangulate the corners of the optics, and then describe in the consummate shapes. Do the same for the lids and the eye sockets.
18. Draw in the shape of the brows. Triangulate the corners of the brows, and so describe in the complete shapes.
19. Draw in the shape of the nose. Triangulate the summit of the nose and the wing of the nose. And so, draw in the complete shape.
20. Depict in the shape of the rima oris. Triangulate the corners of the mouth. So, draw in the complete shape.
21. Draw in the level of the chin. Triangulate the level of the chin, and draw a line to distinguish the shape.
22. Draw in the shape of the ear. Triangulate points of angle-change around the ear. Connect these points with appropriately angled lines, and then smooth out the kinks.
23. Draw in shadow shapes. Identify shapes of master shadow areas. Triangulate their boundaries and draw them in.
24. Darken the shadow shapes. Lightly shade in the shadow areas of the portrait. Apply a soft, clean paint castor to smoothen out the material on the page. This will introduce some 3-dimensionality to your portrait, which should help you better visualize if anything doesn't seem quite right. If there is something that seems incorrect, ready information technology.
25. Particular the eyes. Draw in the iris, pupils, and other details.
26. Item the nose. Describe in the nostrils and other details.
27. Detail the lips. Smooth out the shape of the lips.
28. Detail the ear. Draw in some of the chief inner land marks.
29. Central the drawing. Identify the lightest and darkest tones on the subject, and add these tones to the page.
30. Modeling an expanse. Pick an area of the caput (like the forehead), and detail some of the primary places of tone-change. Identify and add in the main light and night areas. Using a shading stump and the necessary pencils, fill in the transition tones. To improve see the shapes of highlights and shadow, squint your eyes until the confront isn't recognizable every bit a face up, but rather a collection of tonal blobs.
31. Model the remaining areas. Continue as above until all areas are modeled.
32. Sign information technology. And you lot're done.

A few days ago, I finished cartoon my first portrait. Since and so, I've reread my notes, reviewed some parts of the form, and wrote up my "Portrait Drawing Crook Canvass".

With all the steps documented, it'due south at present time to deliberately do the most important skills.

In particular, every bit I said on Twenty-four hour period 35, I believe that it's most important to accurately capture the proportions of the head, the head shape, and the level of the features. If these things are done correctly, the rest of the process is very forgiving. If not, the portrait will end upwards beautifully shaded, but won't look like the subject.

Today, I'k going to exercise finding the correct proportions of the bailiwick's head using a few celebrities: Matt Damon, Natalie Portman, and Morgan Freeman.

Matt Damon

Here's the photo I'one thousand using.

Here'south my endeavour to locate the tiptop of his caput, the everyman point of his chin (which is located on the chin'south left side), the leftmost point of his cheek, and the rightmost point of his ear.

In Photoshop, I overlaid my sketch on the photo to cheque. I was pretty accurate.

Natalie Portman

Here'due south Natalie.

And here's my attempt to locate the peak of her hair, the everyman point of her mentum (again on the chin's left side), the rightmost signal of her cheek, the leftmost point of her hair, and the notch of her neck.

Checking in Photoshop, everything seems pretty accurate. Although, the low signal of the chin may exist slightly likewise far left.

Morgan Freeman

Here I endeavour to locate the pinnacle of his head, the lowest point of his mentum, the rightmost point of his ear, the leftmost bespeak of his ear, and the notch of his neck.

This one looks right on the money.

With each of the sketches, unlike with my Derren Brown portrait, I felt that I was able to see the angle on the subject and accurately replicate it on the page with limited effort.

This is a good sign…

Yesterday, I practiced triangulating the proportions of a few celebrity heads.

For example, here'south 1 I did of Natalie Portman.

Today, I good triangulating the complete head shape and gauging the level of features.

It took about 45 minutes.

To assess my work, I overlaid the sketch on Natalie.

My Critique

• The face shape is accurate
• The level of the features is accurate
• The angle of the features is accurate
• The center line curves a little as well quickly as information technology moves up between the eyes
• The neck shape is inaccurate — I especially misestimated the starting point of the neck on the correct side.
• Above the right center, the bending of the caput/hair is too steep
• The elevation of the head is too steep
• The bending of the hair above the ear isn't steep plenty

Overall, I'd requite the sketch a B-.

Since I was accurate with the confront shape and the level of features, if I continued working, I suspect I would develop the confront fairly accurately. As a result, I would likely have enough accurate information to gradually correct the major mistakes with the caput and hair shape.

Tomorrow, I'll practise again on a different celebrity.

Today, I didn't have as well much time to draw. So, I chop-chop progressed the Matt Damon sketch I started ii days ago.

Hither's what I shared on Sunday.

Today, I spent 30 minutes sketching the head shape and feature guides.

Just looking at the sketch, the head shapes seems a little narrow for Matt Damon. Just, overlaid on the photograph, it seems to match up.

With the exception of the oddly tiny ear, everything else seems to line upwardly well. The head shape, face shape, and hair shape seem accurate. The level of the features and the center line seem accurate. The wing of the nose is a chip likewise far to the right, but I really merely threw that in for fun.

Overall, I'thou pretty happy with the outcome — specially since I sketched this adequately quickly. I guess that means I'm improving…

Last calendar month, when I was learning to memorize a deck of cards at grandmaster speeds, I started unintentionally seeing playing cards in the existent-globe. In particular, existent-earth things (like wheelchairs and airplanes), which take association in my mnemonic arrangement, were triggering images of playing cards, without any witting thought on my part.

Simply, I was rewiring my encephalon.

This calendar month, as I acquire to describe faces, I'm experiencing a new phenomenon… For the past few days, I've establish myself scrutinizing and deconstructing other people's faces on the railroad train, at work, on the street, at Whole Foods, etc. Wherever in that location is a face, I can't help merely attempt to clarify it, and imagine how I'd draw it.

Now (and I promise this eventually wears off), when I see a new face, my first instinct is to gauge the ratio betwixt the peak and width of the head. Other times, I just wait to encounter what shapes the middle sockets are. Or how prominent the brow ridge is. Or if the nose and brows equally pause the face in thirds.

Basically, I can't finish staring at people.

So, thank you people of San Francisco for not getting totally creeped out. I promise I'll stop shortly.

For the by couple days, I've been itching to offset my self-portrait. So, today, I did just that.

After working for about an hr, I was able to finish sketching the outline of the head, hair, and neck.

And hither's a video of today's progression.

So far, so skilful. Tomorrow, I'll start blocking in the features.

Today, I connected working on my self-portrait. Although it's meeting nicely, I made a mistake upfront that's definitely costing me at present.

Before, I get to that, though, let me offset share today's progress.

My mistake

Although I'thou loving the composition of my self-portrait, I've sadly depict everything ten–20% likewise pocket-size.

Take a await at the cocky-portrait side-by-side with the Derren Dark-brown portrait. My head is noticeably smaller.

Again, I recall this is okay compositionally, simply it's all the same a scrap of a trouble — especially, for 2 reasons.

1. A smaller drawing offers smaller margins for error. If I slightly misplace the corner of the rima oris or the elevation of the brow, the distance between the correct and incorrect placements represents a proportionally larger difference on a smaller drawing. In other words, smaller drawings are less forgiving and errors are more pronounced.
2. A smaller drawing means finer details. My pencil sharpener doesn't seem to piece of work very well with the pencils I have, which means I'm cartoon the tiny eyelids on my self-portrait with a tree trunk. Basically, the smaller drawing requires that I work in finer areas, which is challenging with the tools I have.

Nevertheless, I volition persist, since, even with the sizing mistake (and the associated challenges), I'm quite happy with the portrait so far.

In fact, challenges are probably a proficient affair (I hope). Ideally, they push me to become a better artist.

Anyway, I call back the takeaway is that I demand to invest in a amend pencil sharpener…

Today, my cocky-portrait progress is broken into ii parts:

1. Finishing the sketch
2. Defacing the sketch (a.k.a. calculation tonal values)

Finishing the sketch

Yesterday, I was able to sketch about 80% of the portrait. Today, I just need to add the final details.

I start past blocking in shadow areas near the mouth, on the brow, and on the neck.

Then, I darken the pilus and eyebrows.

I add together detail to the optics, and the portrait jumps to life.

Finally, I detail the ear, which is one of my favorite parts of the whole process. (Ears are just weird looking and fun to describe)

With the ear done, my sketch is complete.

Interestingly, this completeness is a fleck problematic: Because the sketch feels whole (and, from my perspective, represents an interesting, standalone piece of art), I struggle to go on working on it.

The portrait just feels balanced at this point. As soon as I beginning adding tonal values, that balance will be disrupted, and won't return until I'thousand nearly done with the whole portrait.

Information technology about feels unnatural to add together tonal values to the sketch, as if I'm defacing something I worked hard to create.

Nevertheless, I must continue. So, hither I become… Time to temporarily deface my work.

Defacing my portrait

I kickoff by blackening one of the eyebrows. This is piece of cake, and hopefully will help me build momentum.

I continue with my black pencil, darkening the other eyebrow and the hair.

I tin't seem to easily get the hair to exist one smooth black mass. Instead, the grain of the paper is very noticeable, giving me a nice salted await. Even after aggressive blending with a blending stump and a dry out brush, I still can't get the material distributed nicely on the paper.

I may need to invest in some powder graphite (simply I'll return to this later).

Next, I kickoff on the prominent eye. This is where the real defacing starts, as it's going to be a while until it doesn't look like I'm wearing makeup.

After many more minutes of work on the eye, I cease for the night. I'll continue more tomorrow.

Today, I spent a couple hours working on the eyes and nose area of my self-portrait.

My tonal approach is noticeably unlike than that used on the Derren Brown portrait.

With Derren, I wanted to ensure the portrait emanated three-dimensionality, then I pushed aggressively on the dissimilarity of the portrait. I besides didn't intendance much for the micro-gradations of shadow/calorie-free, as I was more concerned with the correctness of the bigger shapes.

Equally a result, the portrait definitely has a stunning roundness, but I wouldn't phone call it photorealistic.

Thus, this time around, with my cocky-portrait, I'thousand aiming to more closely match tones, while besides paying attention to the smaller areas of light fall-off. With this attention, my hope is to create a more than realistic rendering of my face.

It's still hard to tell whether I'll exist successful, but we'll detect out soon…

In nearly of my posts, I tend to be pretty positive (i.e. "Whoa, today went better than expected…", "I'thou really pleased with today's progress…", "I can't believe how adept this is…", etc.).

This is mostly because I'm very bullish on this entire project.

However, in my by three posts (I made a mistake, Intentionally defacing my self-portrait, and Fighting for photorealism), I've tried to interrupt this tendency, and share some of the day-to-day challenges I face.

While I am still very positive about this projection, and happily take on the micro-challenges, I thought sharing some of these things would be more than interesting than writing virtually how every twenty-four hour period is always amend than the concluding.

Anyway, continuing with this theme, today, I want to share an interesting struggle.

The Lite Situation in San Francisco

For some (perhaps, legal) reason, nigh apartments in San Francisco don't have overhead lights in their principal living areas. Usually, apartments but have overhead lights in the bathroom and (sometimes) the kitchen, which is the case for my flat.

As a upshot, the rest of my apartment is lit via Ikea flooring lamps, which, although they exercise a 90% expert chore, information technology turns out, at night, there's just not enough light for detail-oriented drawing.

During the sketching phase of my cocky-portrait, I didn't need to see precise tone, and so sketching at dark was no problem.

However, now that I'm trying to carefully model the lights/shadows of my face up, I need more light.

I considered cartoon in the bathroom, but this isn't entirely comfortable. Especially because I was worried that the portrait would become wet/damaged on the sink, whose counter is the most viable drawing expanse.

Since, without deconstruction, the kitchen table doesn't fit through the bathroom door (I tried…), I needed to find somewhere else to work tonight.

I ended up across the street from my apartment at a well-lit coworking space, which was great for drawing, just not-and then-great for picture-taking. The affluence of overhead lights meant that, yet I positioned my body, I was always casting a shadow on the portrait.

Thus, once I finished drawing, I came back to my dark apartment to snap a photograph.

After my light-seeking gamble, hither's what I was able to accomplish.

Today, I but had ten minutes to draw, so I spent all ten darkening the hair and eyebrows on my self-portrait, until they were as black as I could get them.

This greatly improved the portrait in two ways:

1. The relative tones of the face to the pilus are much more accurate now, which helps with realism.
2. The shape of the hair on the left side of the portrait wasn't quite right, so this gave me the chance to fix information technology.

Here'south the before…

And the afterwards

At starting time, the black of the hair is a bit jarring, just it accurately represents the "exposure" I'grand going for (where the hair is emitting no calorie-free, and thus, shows up as pure black).

Although today's darkening session improved things, the portrait still seems a bit odd and unbalanced because of the nakedness of the oral fissure and cheek. I'll start tackling those areas tomorrow.

Yesterday, I alleged that today I would outset working on the mouth and cheek areas of my self-portrait. And yet, somehow, the solar day is over, and the mouth and cheek areas are still naked.

Instead, I got caught upwards making micro-changes to the parts of the portrait I've already worked on (the eyes, nose, brow, etc.). It seems I can make small improvements forever.

This is clearly not the right approach. Especially considering… As I begin shading the mouth, I will need to make adjustments to the nose area, so everything fits together. Every bit I begin shading the cheek, I will need to brand adjustments to the eye expanse, and so everything fits together. And and then on.

Perhaps, I'thou just stalling out of fear: Once the oral fissure and cheek are adult, I'll take a much better thought if the portrait is any practiced.

If I am fearful, I definitely demand to get over it.

To exercise so, tomorrow, I'll focus, non on perfectly detailing the mouth and cheek, merely instead, broadly blocking in the correct tonal values.

With the full general tones in place, I'll have enough momentum to push the portrait towards completion.

Today, I spent an hour developing out the rest of my self-portrait.

It went from looking similar this…

To looking like this.

It's starting to expect similar me, but it however looks like a drawing — mostly because I haven't composite the newly developed areas like the cervix, cheek, mouth, ear, brow, etc. Pretty much the whole thing.

I've been holding off on the blending considering my blending stump is unusably dirty.

Tomorrow, I'll go swing by the art store and option upward a few fresh ones.

I picked up some new blending stumps today, and went to work smoothing the value changes over my face and neck. Here'south the outcome…

When compared with the earlier, the divergence is pretty hit. In the before portrait, I look like a sickly, pencil-sketched version of myself, while the after version has a much nicer roundness and weight to it.

Tomorrow, I'll make some minor tweaks, sign it, and hang it on the wall.

24 days ago, to kick off Dec'southward claiming, I tried to draw a self-portrait.

Then, over the next 3.5 weeks, I completed a x-hour drawing course, drew a few other people, then spent 8 hours on a new self-portrait.

Here are the before and after.

And here's a time-lapse of the 8 hours of drawing.

I'm happy with the result, and actually think the cocky-portrait looks a lot like me.

Tomorrow, I'll write up a more thorough critique. But until then, I'chiliad declaring this calendar month's challenge a success.

Yesterday, I declared this month's claiming a success, noting the differences between my before and subsequently self-portraits.

And while my most recent cocky-portrait is a major comeback, and does look very much like me, I still practice accept some quick disquisitional thoughts on it, which I've broken downwards into ii parts: i. Likeness and 2. Artistry.

1. Likeness

• Overall, the likeness is strong. The portrait unequivocally looks like me. Although, information technology isn't perfect.
• My expression/emotion in the portrait is plausibly mine, particularly in the eyes.
• The shape of hair most the ear and back of the head is very accurate. Even so, the hair line doesn't seem completely right, and it's probably the second biggest reason why the portrait doesn't look perfectly like me. The pilus line should probably come down on the forehead and should be less rounded. When I snapped a photo of myself (on which I based this portrait), I had only gotten a shorter-than-normal haircut, which is probably why I'g not used to the haircut I drew.
• On paper, I feel I captured the olfactory organ perfectly, but, as a result of the shadow, it may seem slightly too small/short. To address this, I could have accentuated the tonal difference between the cheek and the shadowed part of the olfactory organ, but I wanted to remain as tonally accurate as possible and chose not to.
• I'grand very happy with how the cervix turned out. Its weight and main features (the Adam's apple tree and the notch at my collar line) seem accurate.
• There is something odd almost the ear. Information technology seems a bit out of place.
• The eyebrows may exist the slightest flake thin, only they are very close to reality.
• The biggest potential miss is my cheek. While I do have prominent cheeks when I smile (which I'thou not doing here), I also have a fairly slender face and a reasonably defined jaw. Depending on how I look at the cheek, it sometimes appears too round and besides full. Other times, when I look at the portrait, my eye renders this area properly. If anything, I probably could have made the bottom of the confront (in the rolling shadow) a bit more angular.

Nevertheless, even with these critiques in isolation, the portrait as a whole comes together nicely and captures a strong likeness. Thus, I've left information technology as is, since I care more about an overall likeness (versus a non-cohesive collection of individually accurate features).

ii. Artistry

Before I drew my self-portrait, I drew a portrait of Derren Chocolate-brown.

This portrait has two big advantages over my self-portrait: i. The tonal range over the face is much greater, and 2. The midtone of the face matches the tone of the newspaper.

With my self-portrait, I strayed from both of these advantages. For one, on purpose. For the other, less then.

1. Narrow tonal range

Purposefully, I chose to base my self-portrait on a photo with a tighter tonal range, since I wanted to challenge and button my abilities (Cartoon a portrait with heavy contrast requires less subtly and is, in my stance, easier).

Arguably, the contrast of the Derren Brown portrait makes information technology a more than visually compelling portrait, but this is another topic completely (kickoff, I wanted to chief accurate portraiture before tackling well-composed portraiture).

Even with the narrow tonal range, my self-portrait still maintains a believable roundness and depth.

2. Dark midtones

Less purposefully, I chose a photo where the midtone of my face was darker than the paper.

This was a bit of a mistake, but a practiced learning opportunity. As a outcome of this decision, unlike with my Derren portrait, I had to pencil-shade the mid-tones on my face, leading to a slightly dirtier portrait. (In the instance with Derren, where there were midtones, I left the blank paper untouched and clean).

Specially before I smoothed out my face, information technology looked equally if I had just been cleaning chimneys.

While the Derren Brown portrait (with its ultra-contrasty tonal range) may be a more than dynamic portrait, my self portrait seems closer to photorealism, which is the main improvement I was aiming for.

Overall, I'thousand very happy with the result.

After spending nearly a month learning to draw portraits, I'm more than convinced than e'er that anyone can draw. Even if you don't accept any creative talent.

To me, cartoon is a fleck like doing your laundry. Before yous do it for the first time, you feel it's much more complicated than it actually is, and thus, y'all experience incapable of trying. And then, yous're shown that doing your laundry is only a matter of putting your clothes in the motorcar, pouring in some lather, and clicking a button. Much easier than you thought.

It turns out drawing is very similar. From the outside, it seems much more complex than information technology actually is. However, once y'all learn the two or 3 bones principles, drawing (at least, at my level) becomes most as direct forward as doing your laundry.

In fact, in club to depict a reasonable portrait, you only need to know the two post-obit skills:

1. Triangulation

2. "Exterior-in" Shading

One time you're equipped with these two techniques, you'll be fix to follow the "Portrait Drawing Cheat Canvas" and depict your get-go portrait.

Yous'll be surprised at how well information technology goes. I know I was…

As I mentioned at the kickoff of this calendar month, British illusionist Derren Brown originally inspired me to start cartoon portraits. In fact, to acknowledge this inspiration, Derren was the subject of my first portrait.

Yet, Derren didn't inspire me with his drawings, but rather, his paintings, like these…

Of class, these paintings are built on a prerequisite foundation of drawing, only they also innovate a whole new skill gear up that I would love to cultivate.

Watching Derren paint, it seems like there are clear parallels betwixt shading a cartoon and painting a portrait: He sets a mid-tone colour, adds the lights and darks, works his way towards the eye, and then adds particular.

There are also conspicuously major differences, like evaluating and mixing colors, general painting hygiene (letting paint dry, etc.), and best practices I'm probably non even so enlightened of.

And while this seems similar a major jump from my drawing studies, I now have the creative confidence to attempt a painting like this, without whatever (or very little) additional instruction.

In the coming months, I plan to start sketching a portrait on sail, and and so experimenting with pigment.

Last calendar month, I memorized a shuffled deck of cards in under two minutes, which required obsessive, consistent do. If I were to stop practicing, over time I would lose this skill.

Still, I don't think the aforementioned is true for my newly-institute drawing skills. Mostly because… I didn't learn anything new this month.

Well, that'south not exactly right. While I didn't cultivate whatsoever new drawing-enabled motor skills or artistic skills, I did learned to construction my already-existing skills inside of a improve drawing process.

In other words, if I can remember the procedure, which, in my stance, simply depends on ii very straightforward insights, I will always be able to describe at the level I can now.

In 20 years, even if I don't practice from at present until and so, equally long as I can remember triangulation and outside-in shading, I will be able to fully replicate my results from this month.

I call back that's a pretty absurd thing, and so wait out for my Medium postal service in twenty years.

On December 1st, I drew this.

26 hours of practice later, I drew this.

In other words, after practicing for about an hr per day for 26 days, I majorly improved my portrait drawing skills.

Terminal calendar month, it just took me 22 hours to go a grandmaster of memory.

I think this is going to be a theme for the entire Calendar month to Master project: If my do is deliberate and consistent, it's going to have a lot less time than expected to master these seemingly expert-level skills.

The trick, then, is to create a machinery to forcefulness deliberate and consistent exercise month afterward month. This is the hard part nigh learning these new skills, not the fourth dimension required.

Something to think near as you start planning your 2017 resolutions…

Today, I flew from San Francisco to Florida to meet up with my family for a few days. I'll exist here until Jan 4th.

I left all my cartoon supplies backside, so I'm definitely not drawing any more than this calendar month.

I did, however, bring a Rubik's Cube with me in preparation for Jan'due south challenge (which starts in ii days).

I'chiliad definitely eager to outset a new challenge, since I similar the idea of always being in pursuit of something (which possibly suggests that I need to learn how to relax). Nevertheless, instead, these past 2 months, I've finished both challenges on Solar day 24 (of the month), and thus, needed to wait, without a challenge, for a calendar week, until the next one began/begins.

Should I just start the adjacent challenge once I stop the previous one? I'm not sure. On one hand, this seems reasonable and fourth dimension-efficient. On the other hand, in that location is something very tidy well-nigh starting on the first of each calendar month.

Clearly, I have some amount of obsessive compulsiveness going on, merely I'm curious to know what yous think…

Should I wait for the first of each month to start a new claiming, and enjoy my few days of relaxing (if bachelor), or should I just utilise my extra time towards time to come challenges and offset immediately?

Permit me know.

Today, to gloat the New year's day, I decided to compile my personal highlights from 2016, which includes Calendar month to Master, but also everything else from my life.

Rather than writing another M2M post today, I'll encourage you lot to check out that mail if y'all're interested.

This post is part of Max's twelvemonth-long accelerated learning project, Month to Master.

Max Deutsch is the co-founder of Monthly — an online education platform that partners with some of the world'southward biggest YouTubers to create ane-month, highly-immersive online classes.

If you want to follow along with Max's year-long accelerated learning projection, make certain to follow this Medium account.

For exclusive content on accelerated learning, discipline, and lifestyle design, subscribe to my once-in-a-while newsletter.