Drawing Animals: How to Create Realistic Drawings of Animals Using Graphite Pencils

(Paperback)

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Brand-new, updated edition of the bestselling book,Drawing Masterclass: Animals by popular artist, Lucy Swinburne.

Whether you want to capture a beloved pet cat or a magnificent wolf on paper, this book provides a complete course in how to draw them. All the essential drawing techniques and materials you need are explained clearly and simply by Lucy, and two brand new sections show you how to sketch the key features of a wide variety of animals such as eyes,ears and fur, and how to capture movement. The 20 step-by-step exercises inside draw on a diverse range of subjects from various continents, including meerkats, lizards and horses.

This inspiring book is a must-have for any artist seeking to capture the spirit and character of animals in their drawings.

Reviews

This is another revised and expanded re-issue (it was originally published in the Masterclass series) and is the complete guide for anyone wanting to tackle the rewarding subject of drawing animals. Although they're an understandably popular subject, animals can be one of the hardest, because of the difficulty of persuading them to pose. Sure, your cat or dog will look at you appealingly and you know instantly that they want food, exercise or just affection - it's one of the pleasures of owning a pet. However, it's almost insanely tricky to capture that moment and get the expression, the perspective and the proportions right. It's all about the moment, and the moment is gone in... well, a moment.

One of Lucy's first lessons is about using photographs and tracing the outline onto a grid that avoids the perennial long nose/short ears problem which besets even quite proficient artists. She also gets you practising eyes, ears, skin and fur. Although these are necessarily rather technical sections, they'll stand you in good stead for the exercises and demonstrations that follow. These cover a wide variety of animals, from small to large and both domestic and wild.

Lucy's drawings are exquisitely produced and it's impossible not to be inspired by her work, but shes's also excellent at explaining her methods and making them accessible - there's never a sense of 'if only' here.

Although there is plenty of advanced work here, this is nevertheless a thoroughly approachable book and should certainly appeal to anyone with reasonable drawing skills who is wanting to turn their attention to the animal world. Domestic, wild and zoo animals are included and theres plenty of information on structural features such as eyes, ears and noses as well as complete projects that put the techniques youve developed into practice. Theres also a handy section on working from photographs and transferring that image to paper using a grid to get the proportions right.

After some introductory material on history, materials, and getting started drawing animal portraits, UK based artist Swinburne (Drawing Masterclass: Animals, 2013) delves right into the hardest features to capture correctly: facial structures like eyes, ears, and noses; hands and feet; and texture and pattern. Swinburne chooses a four-footed creature for each example: a giraffe's eye, an African wild dog's ear, a buffalo's nose, squirrel hands, leopard paws, the texture of a snake, and the pattern of a Scottish wildcat. In the same way, she walks readers through the steps of ten full portraits, from the exotic red panda and cheetah to the domestic short-haired cat and lop-eared bunny. Nearly the same process guides each drawing: outline, background, unusual features, eyes, shading, depth, and final touches like tone and impact. An almost hand-holding course in capturing animal portraits that are so lifelike itll be difficult to understand why no one can hear or smell them. Full-size, ready-to-copy photographs are available on the authors website to aid with drawings.

Author Bio

Lucy Swinburne was selected as a finalist in theDaily Mailsfirst Not the Turner Prize competition in 2003. She has also exhibited at the Mall Galleries and the Society of Feline Artists exhibition. Lucy has written many articles for theLeisure Paintermagazine and has held numerous animal subject workshops for artists, where she has tutored students in pastel techniques. In her spare time, she enjoys painting commissions and spending time with her family and pets at her home in Hertfordshire, UK.