Pencil and Charcoal Portrait of an Old Mountain Man.

I drew this picture while in the waiting room at the doctor's office today. It started as a piece from my imagination. I let it develop on its own. I did not want to do something common so decided to draw a rugged old outdoors type of guy. At first, I was going to draw him face forward but instead give the face a turn to give the picture more interest.

The Mountain Man a Pencil and charcoal Portrait.

After I did a rough draft in pencil I looked around the room and began to get inspiration from the people in the room. Several old men had beards so I worked it in. The winter clothing was an invention of mine. I was trying to get a fleece texture on the cap and collar of his coat

After I finished the face I decided the picture needed something. I feel it is important for a picture to tell a story not just be a picture so I observed a man holding a cell phone and it gave me the idea to put his hand holding something in the picture.

I used a mixture of charcoal and graphite to draw this picture.

I am happy with it,

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I hope you enjoyed seeing my work. Thanks for taking the time to look. 
Adron 

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Watercolor Portrait Of An Old Guy With A Ponytail

This was a project I worked on for about a week, off and on. I know some people can create a masterpiece in a day or less but I just don't know how they do it. I find that I need to study a picture for a while, sketch it a few times to work things out and then paint in stages with constant revision and critique along the way.   I wonder if I get done or just get tired of the project.

I liked his face it had deep complicated shadows, contours, texture, and wrinkles so it was a joy to make something out of it.  I wanted to make it more ethereal so that you needed to look at it for a moment before you realized it was a face but I got involved with the image and kept adding detail.

Watercolor Portrait of Old Guy With a Ponytail.

I used the brush very wet and kept splashing color into puddles of color sometimes letting it dry and then splashing fresh color on top. I regretted not leaving more of the paper empty on the far left side of the face and a few other random places.

I think I made it too representational and should have kept it more impressionistic especially with the shadow being so dramatic.  It is not my goal to make a super-realistic picture but to try to find something spiritual and give that voice.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my work. Thanks for taking the time to look.  
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Adron 

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(C)Adron Dozat

My Secret Sketch In The Cafe

I carry a small 4x6 sketch book and drawing supplies with me whenever possible just in case of an urgent urge to sketch.

I was in the courtyard at the mall having a cup of coffee and across the courtyard was a face I couldn't resist drawing. The man was about 65 years old and a little portly, but he had a lot of character in his face. His long silver hair came out of the black beanie and the white goatee was beautiful.

Man's face sketched in mini pocket sketchbook

I tried to draw his face without him knowing, but I think he figured it out and he go up and left the area. I finished the drawing from memory. I spent about ten minutes on it.

I used a pencil to start and then switched to fine tipped markers. I had a brush marker that is going dry and it was not my intention to use it the way I did but the dry brush effect was a nice contrast to the sharpie markers. I do not carry an erasure with me so the pencil shows up as a medium gray.

I have never regretted having my my little sketch book with me but I often regretted not having it.

Pencil and Charcoal Sketch Of An Old Man, Old Willie

This is a sketch I did while on vacation. It was of one of the locals. I liked his face- it was full of character. I liked the contrast of the bushy eyebrows and the thin hair. I did not use any blending technique in this project but let the pencil marks show their strokes and movement; I felt it gave the face an older look without adding  age to the subject. The charcoal was used with reserve since I didn't want the portrait to start getting too dark.

I wanted to capture not just the fullness of his face but that it expressed that he had a full and honest life.

The eyes were dark but I lightened them a little on purpose since I was afraid that the values would contrast badly.

Charcoal and Pencil Sketch of Old Willie

 I am very happy with this drawing. I hope to do more like it.

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Minimalist Pencil and Charcoal Sketch of Man Smiling

This is a sketch I did while teaching a class of kids to draw a face. The point I was trying to make is that you need to keep loose and enjoy the drawing process. I used a casual scribbling technique to make the image of the man smiling. I first did it in pencil and then deepened some of the lines with charcoal. I think it turned out very expressive. I could have done a lot to develop the picture but I like the minimalist effect.

Charcoal and Pencil Quick Sketch. 

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Charcoal And Pencil Portrait of Man With Bushy Eyebrows

Portrait of Older Man With Bushy Eyebrows.

This is a drawing I did when I had a little free time one afternoon.

I drew it in charcoal and graphite pencil.

I spent about an hour on it and unfortunately it doesn't resemble the model as closely as I wanted but I ran out of time.

There are a lot of little things I would fix before I can feel good about it. The eyes need a lot of work, there were a lot of wrinkles and laugh lines. I would make the value a little darker and the shadow a little deeper around the brow ridge. There is a lot that could have been done with the hair, it was not grey but not black either.

Maybe I will work on it later and do an update.

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Pencil Sketch of Nice Old Man Gregg

How does pencil differ from charcoal in drawing a portrait? I normally draw in charcoal but did this one in pencil almost by accident. It was a pleasure.

I have been doing a lot of charcoal portraits and I usually start my charcoal drawings with a rough sketch in a pencil; but this time I just keep on drawing in pencil. I had forgotten that it is softer and does not have the deep dark value that charcoal has.

PENCIL FEELS
Pencil feels more silky than charcoal. I know that is a strange thing to say, you would think that drawing is drawing no matter how you do it. I enjoy the experience of drawing; part of that experience is the reaction of the pencil to the paper I am drawing on. I come to expect a grinding effect of the charcoal on the paper. It was refreshing to draw in pencil.

I found I needed to keep changing the value of the pencil. I started with an hb pencil and had to go to a softer and darker pencil and finally had to go to darker, softer pencil like a 4b to get the dark I wanted, but it was not as dark as a charcoal.

BLENDING
I used a blending stub just a little to soften the tone, Because of the finer graphite medium I felt the stub was moving too much medium on the page but it was easy to lift out with my kneaded erasure.  Afterward I ended going back over the blended area with a pencil again to restore the values and texture.

DETAIL LINES
The pencil was better to get the fine lines. You can get fine lines with charcoal but it takes a lot of discipline and you have to maintain the point with an obsession.

This was a quick study I did it while waiting in for my kid.

Anyone can draw a pretty face of a young beauty but to draw a happy old man with the character of a life well lived- now that takes talent!

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Charcoal Portriat of Robber Man

Charcoal Pencil Portrait of Bank Robber in Old West

Bank Robber Man was a sketch I drew this to emphasize the frown around the mouth and the squint of the eyes but still show that he had a meaty heavy face. He is an actor portraying a bank robber in the old west.

I purposely left large areas blank to give focus to the expression of the face in the portrait. I wanted to express the seething anger and bitterness in the spirit of the man and yet create an intriguing picture. I used the blending stub to give the hair a foggy misty edge without clear definition. Another expression of the "Lostness" of the bank robber's soul, is the background shadow that reaches into the hair like fingers express the creeping darkness of the robber's heart.

Aside from the negative connotations of the theme the face is a beautiful face and full of expressiveness.

I used a 2b charcoal pencil and several blending stubs. The paper was a sheet of practice paper in a sketchbook; it was not the best paper but since this was a drawing for fun and practice I don't mind. It is so true in art that you must use good materials to achieve good results. If I was drawing a commission piece for a fee I would have bought a sheet of cold press acid free paper for it.

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Charcoal Portrait of Old Man With Glasses

At first glance, you think the photo or image is over exposed but I purposely drew Mr. B as an unfinished or minimalist drawing leaving the right side of his face undeveloped. In fact, I feel as if I even overdrew this picture a little. I think now that I should have left out the shadow on the left and worked the values of the left side of the portrait a little deeper instead.

Charcoal Portrait of Old Man with Glasses

I drew this sketch in a light charcoal pencil. I used a lot of blending technique with the stub. It was the first time I added chalk to a drawing but I thought I wanted to do a little to bring the eye- glasses forward. I wanted to lighten up his white hair and mustache so I used a little chalk on those elements too. I think I will need to practice using the chalk pencil more; it has a lot of potential, of course, the results would be more dramatic on a grayer paper. (I drew sketch this on white paper but my camera and the internet seem to make it gray).

I was working from a photo the size of a postage stamp and there just was not much detail to bring out in the picture.

Sketch of an Old Man.

I did this picture in wax pencil. I wanted to capture the playfulness in his expression. He was a grandfather that was famous in his rural community. He loved his hat.  I wanted to show up his white beard so I toned down the paper by rubbing pencil all over and smearing it in with a stub. It was a quick sketch and looks better than the camera made it out.

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Sketch of an Old Man.

Charcoal Drawing Of A Happy Old Man

I started to draw this while waiting for my kid at her music lesson. It was a picture from a magazine. I used charcoal pencils that were hp, soft, and extra soft. The slight tilt of the head gave me some trouble and keeping the features in proper angles in relation to the tilt was a challenge.

Charcoal Portrait of a happy old man

I always tell my art students to not blow off the ears since most beginners give more attention to eyes and mouth. So I was embarrassed when one of the ears was too low, so I lifted it out some and used my blending stub to mask the mistake by blending a background over it.

The paper was not designed for the abuse I give when I am drawing. It was a  common sketchbook and fine for all dry mediums and I only used it out of lack of having anything else in my art bag. I now realize how critical it is to have a good quality paper to draw on since the sketchbook paper was not giving up the charcoal when I tried to lift it out or it didn't blend as smoothly as I am used to.

Please see the tab for pricing options to commission your own portrait in charcoal.

I hope you enjoyed seeing my work. Thanks for taking the time to look. 
Adron 

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Charcoal sketch of a good man.

Charcoal sketch of a good man

I did this quick sketch while waiting for my daughter to finish her music lesson and then touched it up later that evening.  It is a picture from a magazine of a very good man who is a volunteer chaplain at a hospital. I used an medium and a soft charcoal pencil. I could have gone a lot further and filled in the left side of the face with more detail but I wanted to do something more minimalist and still capture the character of the man. I think his smile and his eyes are all that was really needed to express his kindness and care.


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Wax pencil sketch of the Professor.

The Professor, a wax pencil drawing

This is a drawing I did in my sketchbook this week. I didn't take as much time as I normally do but it turned out nicely. I used only conti wax pencils to draw it.  I was surprised that they blended so nicely this time, but I wasn't asking a lot of them I only wanted to have a smooth even under drawing to do the top sketch over it. He had bright smiling eyes and a lot of neat smile lines around the face. I think I gave him a little grace and restored his hair to an earlier time. I kept the drawing to just the face and did nothing for the background and little of the attire so one will continue to focus on the lively intellectual spirit of the man. It was a delightful picture to draw.

Pencil Sketch of a Woodcutter

Here is a sketch I did of a man who was carving a ladle out of wood using old craftsman's techniques.  Portraiture of people in the work place are great, they show action without too much drama so the viewers attention is kept on the subject and not carried away by events.

I drew this in pencil in a sketchbook. It took a couple of hours. I was hoping to have a strong contrast with the apron. I wanted to keep the background simple but also wanted to give him a place of being so I put in a few details around him, but I didn't want to distract from the woodcutter so I kept it simple. I experimented with blending stubs on this quite a bit.



This is a pencil sketch I did of a man who was carving spoons out of wood at a historical fair. It was drawn in pencil in my sketchbook.


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Portrait of a Country Doctor

Here is a portrait I drew from a picture in a magazine of an old man who was a rural doctor and was famous for making house calls at any time and no matter how far away.  My Goal in this picture was to capture a noble face of a man who lived his life in service to others.

I drew this on a practice sheet from a Strathmore pad about 9x11 inches.  It was drawn in charcoal while sitting in a coffee shop at the mall. I finished it while waiting to pick up my daughter from a church meeting. I keep all my drawing supplies in a messenger bag (but my wife calls it my man bag), it is easy to grab it and take my drawing supplies whenever I need to go. I was pleased with the texture of the background; I used a soft dark charcoal pencil on one side and a hard lighter charcoal pencil on the other. After laying down the charcoal I used a soft brush to blend the powdery charcoal, it gave a textured background that contrast with the other elements of the picture, and I finished the background with a light rub with the vinyl eraser to lighten the tone up a bit. I am a little unhappy with the final picture, but the photo I was working from lacked any dramatic shadows to develop the character of the portrait. None-the-less it is a fine effort for the short time I spent on it.  

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Pencil Sketch of an Old Man.

This is a pencil sketch I did of an old man from a newspaper article. I love to sketch people of any age, I get bored sketching only beautiful young people.

It was drawn in pencil on a 5x9 practice pad it took about 2 hours. It is a lovely picture to see but the camera failed to capture all the tones of the pencil very well. If I drew this again I would have used more mixed media to capture the character of the man. 

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