Portrait

Drawing a portrait by copying a picture may be a daunting task for many people. However this activity makes the task a lot easier by breaking down the picture being copied into sections and focusing on the lines and shading in a small section rather than the whole picture. Before doing this activity students will need the basic knowledge of shading, the different tones that different grey leads make and how to use different pencils to get a shadow effect. Pencils can be explored by doing a view finder activity where students cut out a small square out of the middle of an A5 piece of paper. Students then place the viewfinder over a section of a black and white portrait picture. Students then experiment with different pencils to copy this section of the picture.

Materials

Various grey lead pencils (HB, 2H, 2B, 4B, 6B, 8B)

Magazine picture of a face (A4 size)

A4 paper

Procedure

- Hold an A4 black and white magazine photo so it is portrait orientation. Fold it in half so that the top edge and bottom edge meet then unfold it.

-Fold the upper half of the paper so that the top edge meets the line in the middle then unfold.

-Fold the bottom half of the paper so that the bottom edge meets in the middle then unfold.

-Turn the photo so it is landscape orientation and repeat the folding process. The end result should be the photo being in 16 sections.

-Repeat the folding process using a blank A4 piece of paper.

- Fold up the magazine photo so that only the first square is showing

-Using the grey lead pencils draw the lines that are seen in this square into the first square on the blank piece of paper. Use shading to create the shadows.

- Once the first square is done move onto the next and continue until the whole picture is copied

- When the portrait is completed compare it to the baseline data to see the improvement.

Picture to be copied

Finished Portrait