CREATING DEPTH WITH 3D DRAWING

Learn How To Do 3D Drawings

One of the most aspired to techniques of pencil drawing is learning how to create shapes and texture using 3D drawing.

3D means ‘Three- Dimensional’. Three-dimensional refers to the number of axis running from an origin point. Like 2D has two axis, X and Y are running from one origin point, 3D has three axis, X, Y and Z run from one origin point.

The most visible difference between 2D and 3D is a 2D drawing is flat, whereas a 3D drawing stands out from the page. This is because the added Z axis has added a perspective angle to the drawing.

Create 3D Shapes

This will show you how to draw a 3D square; called a cube, and is very simple.

For it, you will need;

• Your 2B Pencil
• A Sheet of Paper
• A Ruler

1. ) Draw a  5cmx5cm square. This is square A.

Tip; A square has four 90° angles where each two sides meet.

Use the corner of your ruler to ensure you create these 90° angles, and create a proper square.

2.) Now draw another 5cmx5cm square slightly higher and to the left of the first square, making sure the two squares overlap. This is square B.

You should now have three points on square B outside of square A, and one ( bottom right) inside square A.

4.) Using a ruler, draw lines to connect each corner of square A to the corresponding corner of square B. For example, top-left corner of square A should connect to the top-left corner of square B, and so on. Refer to the diagram on the left to avoid confusion.

What you now have is a transparent cube. However, to add the illusion the cube is ‘standing out’, we will need to do a bit more work and add some shading.

6.) First, erase the three lines which emerge from the one point we have in square A.

We don’t need these, as the cube will no longer be transparent once we have shaded it in.

You should now have something like this, with 3 sides; or, 3-Dimensional. Or, 3D.

A Bit More About Shading Elements That Create 3D Shapes

Before we do though, I would just like to introduce you to Highlights, Shadows and Mid-tones.

These are essentially your building blocks for creating depth and texture within a pencil drawing.

Highlight; This part of the subject will be the part which is directly facing the light source.

Shadow; This part of the subject will be the part which is facing away from the light source.

Mid-tone; This part of the subject will be the part which is neither directly facing the light source, or the part facing away from the light source. It is the bit in the middle.

With our shading guide, this is how the highlight, shadow and mid-tone would look.

We are going to add these tones to our new 3D cube we have created.

7.) First we will add the highlight. This is the side of the cube facing the light. In this case it is the front which I have labelled Side 1.

For this we will use shade 3 on our Shading Guide.

8.) Next, we will add the shadow. This is the side of the cube facing away from the light.

For this we will use shade 7 on our Shading Guide.

9.) And finally, we will add the mid-tone. This is the side of the cube which is neither in the light or the shadow. It is in the middle.

For this we will use shade 5 on our Shading Guide.

And there you have it! …a very basic, but effective 3D drawing.

In the next tutorial, we will use the above methods to create a 3D Sphere. This is a little harder than drawing a cube, because a circle has no origin points, or a million origin points depending which way you look at it.

Spheres are important in portraiture because a lot of the contours in a human face resemble a sphere-like shape.