How to Draw with Soft Pastels: Painting with Pastels Tutorials
Do you want to paint with soft pastel colors but have no idea how to get started? Well, don't worry. Check out these basic techniques and start your painting. Soft pastel colors are the best fun medium for painting. It does not require any preparation, you don't have to wait for it to dry, and you don't need any other material. Soft pastels colors are easily accessible to all. So what you are waiting for? Get your pastel colors and follow these basic techniques.
Get the Right Paper:- If you are into painting for a long time, then you must be aware that not all papers are the same. Textured, rough-grained papers that provide pigments to hold well to their surface provide the right adhesion. Smooth papers are less suitable for this. When starting out, try not to make things too complicated for yourself and pick special papers available in shops designed for pastels. Such papers provide the best possible surface and give you the liberty to fully concentrate on drawing.
Hatching:- Hatching is not the most important drawing technique for soft pastels. But it is a fun way to add style and can be used in combination with other drawing techniques to draw an interesting visual element. Use a tip or edge of pastel to create accurate and expressive hatching.
Mixing and Blending:- In this technique, apply color over and beside each other. You will fall in love with this technique as the hue will come out beautifully after mixing and blending. Always blend colors from a lighter area towards a darker one. You can mix soft pastels directly on the paper. And blend the layers with fingers. You can refine it with more layers of colors.
Color Gradients:- Creating a color gradient is a specialty of soft pastel. You can create gradients with such flowing and high quality like no other painting medium. Start applying colors you have picked for gradient beside each other. After that, blend the colors together only at their interfaces, using a blending stump.
Brighten and Darker:- You can use black to darken colors. However, try using contemporary colors to do that. Blue and orange are opposite colors. When you layer these colors over each other, you will get a shade of grey. You can adjust the shade by balancing the ratio of the two colors. On the other hand, blending with white color is a perfect way to lightening it. Depending on the shades of colors, you will get mixes with warm shades. You can watch a pastel drawing tutorial for a better understanding.