I really like it but I feel that the hair isn't as curly as the reference, but amazing drawing

wow Daniel ! these look really impressive. I think the next step would be able to master different hair textures. Right now everyone seems to have silky, glossy hair; but I notice that for some of the more dramatic lighting you prioritise the hair detail / gloss over the shadows. (c.f. the upper black and white ones on photo 3). It's ok if it's a conscious choice or if you are selling shampoo, but make sure it doesn't limit your range as an artist. Ditto for the guy with the beard on fifth photo - I wonder, now that you have mastered dimensionality + gloss in hair, how you can create the hair texture in his beard. Anyone have good ideas on how this might be achieved ?

Excellent Camellito!Yes these studies of ribbon and hair are very good.You nailed how the hair wrapped around with the Gibson girls (also the value too) Now I suggest applying all you learn from this excercise to your own reference and trying to make your own personal art. Anyway solid job all around,please keep going,we want to see your progress,Camellito (Also thank you for doing the exercise I recommend.)

The hair looks a little flat, the textures look great, but I think some of the larger volumes are missing (e.g., layering texture). Perhaps drawing the heads larger would provide you more room to include details, layers, texture, etc. I notice when my drawings get too small, just physically, it gets difficult to work in certain details. But they look really nice to me overall, I haven't personally gotten to the hair lesson(s) yet.

Hey Camellito,I can definelty see you improve,your added of highlight made the plane of the hair more obvious and easier to read. My biggest critism is that on your third drawing.It seemed you are not familliar enough with the plains of the hair on a curly model. For example,judging from only your lines ,some part the hair seemed to stop and start and randomn point.The ideal way is to make it so the hair is wrapping around the head.Here's an example I did I hope will help. [There's also 2 blog post by James Gurney talking about this problem if you want to read it http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2008/04/hair-string-mop.html http://gurneyjourney.blogspot.com/2008/04/hair-ribbon-secret.html) I would suggest trying to copy the drawings of Charles Dana Gibson and Alphonse Mucha.But not be too concern of the value,instead just try to copy how their lines wrap around the hair. Well hopefully that was somewhat useful(if not best regards anyway)

Nice phot and good attempt. I like the hair!

Hello Camellito,I think you did pretty good in separating the big shapes of the hair.I also think you design the half tone and dark shape pretty well. If I were to give a critique (and actually it may be more of a suggestion)I think you can make the hair more interesting by adding in highlight shapes.(For example,here's a drawing by Adolph Menzel adding in strand of highlight in the hair.) in the reference photo Specifically I can see some subtle highlight in the top right part (here's something I did real quick on my ipad) When adding the highlight try to not copy the exact shape of the highlight,but design it so it looks better than the reference(2 Example from Leyendecker) Well that's all I got,hopefully this is was all somewhat useful.If not I apologize (best regard anyway)

Really nice studies! I think you're at the level where you can start thinking about different edges. This video makes a good introduction https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnhj5efzN_w&t=1s When you vary up your edges, your drawings will feel more natural (in photos there are usually only hard edges). I did a paintover where I tried adding some soft edges to your 3rd study. I'm not that good at edges yet, but hopefully it gives an idea of their use. I hope this was helpful :)

Nice work, Chris The forms are reading well, but I do think that you're struggling with the half tones in the light. It may be because you're pressing the pencil too hard, and if you're doing that it's really hard too achieve subtlety. When shading try grabbing further back the pencil than you'd normally grab if you were writing, and hold it like you'd hold chalk. Doing value scales would help also as you understand better the range of your pencil, chalk, pastel... One last unrelated tip. I don't know if you're using toned paper or if you have a warmer bulb and the camera is picking some warm light from the environment. If it's the latter case, beware when you're painting because that would alter your perception of color. Keep Drawing and best regards

I'm not an expert by any means but what helps for me is just rough in some lines---kind of like a gesture, and then pick the ones you think best capture the shape of the hairstyle. After that, you pick and choose which strands/ribbons get rendered with the usual attention to light and shadow as any other solid object. Hair is semi transparent though, so there is subsurface scattering (i.e. light enters one place and exits "nearby"). So it's more like jade than a chunk of granite.

Hey Chris, think of hair like ribbons. Many artists like Alphonse Mucha depicted hair like ribbons. This simplification allowed them to get the bulk of the hair without having to draw every single strand. If realism is what you want, start with the larger "ribbons" and then accurately find the highlight. Working away from the highlight, draw individual strands and then use a blending stick to blend the hair strands so they don't look like hand drawn lines. Repeat this process until the details are to the level you desire. Then use a lighter color or an eraser to work in those lighter strands. Here's a good demo: https://youtu.be/nzyi3OPz5WU

Try to think of the hair as a simple 3D form of its own that just drapes on top of the shape of the head. Because the head is like a sphere at the top, the hair form follows that sphere. Because the head is flat on the sides, the hair falls straight down. Here's an example for you. You can think about her hair as an archway/cave/hollow mailbox that sits on top of her head. That's what her hair is, except the cave/mailbox shape isn't just a half cylinder. From the side, it angles down, which you show in your drawing too. I think the biggest thing for you to improve would be to use cleaner lines and focus on the simple forms. Your shading isn't 'wrong' for the hair that you drew, all the highlights and shadows are in the right place. It's just that the hair you drew isn't well defined and doesn't have much 3D form of its own. Sharp, clean lines will improve your drawing a lot. Hope that helps.

Hi Chris! Nice drawing! Take a measurement from ear to tip of nose and compare it to the length of the face from chin and up. The ear needs to come in closer to the face. The drawing is a bit too wide and this is partly why the neck is too wide as well. Also use a horizontal line to check relationship of top and bottom of the ear with the eyes and nose. The ear looks to be too small. Hope that helps. Good drawing and I like the eye and the hair looks great!

Looks good to me! The highlights and shadows on the hair make the texture look very realistic.

Hi @DuDung Tak Nice drawings! I´m not sure if I understand what you´re confused about, but I´ll give answering a try: "I think you need a strong spacial awareness to plan and map out strands so the shadows and texture makes sense in form" Yes, when drawing hair, or anything 3D it´s helpful to think of space and structure. You seem to be aware of this; in your 2nd drawing for example the strands are wrapping around the cylindrical form at the forehead. Great! "plan and map out strands so the shadows and texture  makes sense in form" Remember that you´re free to design the strands as much as you want. You don´t have to copy each strand exactly. Compare Stan´s drawing to the photo reference and you´ll notice that he didn´t copy all the strands. As long has he draw lines mimicking hair, wrapped around the major form, it works. Also pay attention to how he groups the strands into to larger groups. Hopefully this was helpful :)

Very nice Atharva. Keep going like this

Great work and I can see you used the idea of form first for the hair. I agree with João's perfectly explained critique on using less lines in the lighter values.

Those are very nice and they show a lot of form! The only thing I would advise you is to be more judicious with your lines in the lighter values. Sometimes too many lines can dirty the lights and break the 3-d illusion. Try working mainly in value and use the lines to show the texture in the half tones. It will strengthen your designs even more. Keep drawing and best regards

Nice work! I feel like the half tones could use a bit more gradation towards the highlights in the hair.

@Christopher Lebreault Nice work! For your first attempt and considering all the doubts you mentioned before, I think you did pretty good. I can see there is a sense of mass and volume and that the hair is fit on top of the head structure. I also like the overall sense of texture in your drawing. Maybe the lighting and the rendering of the texture could get more elaborate, but this is something to keep working over time. This hairstyle, in particular - it's a bit wavy, and it also has a gradation of length from longer on the top to shorter as it gets near the neck and ear, and these things can make it more complex to draw, especially since you're starting out. Perhaps, for your next few practices, try straight hair, either long or short - I think these should probably feel a bit easier, so that should help you get more familiar with the techniques and the process. As you keep studying, you can look for variety, and as a general note to really get the hang of this, practice with all other kinds of variations you can think of: curly, afro, dread, tousled, thin, thick, tightly combed, stylized or natural, in various types of lighting scenarios. Hope this helps!

Hey, @Christopher Lebreault! I think one of the drawings Stan shows in the lesson is actually a great example of the process breakdown - I'm attaching an image here, and I guess we can call the first frame (top left) a lay-in - or a linear lay-in, to be even more specific. Very simple, almost abstract, just establishing the areas of shape. The second step (top right) is kind of a shadow map - just main lights and darks, no detail, sort of like a flat silhouette. On the third step (bottom left), that's when things start to get more volumetric: he adds halftones and reflected lights, and also works a bit on creating more variety in value. The last frame (bottom right) is where the "texture" thing really comes into play - but notice it's only possible because of all the previous light and shadow "grounding" provided before. In other words, to draw hair texture in a realistic way, it's pretty much essential to understand how basic lighting works. If you feel like you need a refresh on it, maybe (re)watch this: Shading Light and Form – Basics Hope this helps clarify the lay-in question! And yes, as Jesse mentioned, of course graphite can be used. It certainly won't work exactly in the same way as charcoal (for example, you won't get such a deep dark shadow, you might stay more within the range of dark-middle grays, depending on which type of granite you use) - so you can't expect every little bit of Stan's explanation to apply in your case - but I'm sure that, with some intuition and experimentation, you'll quickly figure it out on your own and adapt however possible. Hope this helps!

If it makes a mark you can use it. Whether it'll be a little easier/harder with graphite as compared to charcoal I don't know, but whether it can be used is a yes. While each drawing tool does have its own unique properties, the muscle memory and knowledge you gain about drawing hair/faces/anatomy/environments/etc. will carry over. If it wasn't that way art would be a nightmare; imagine learning all these figure drawing fundamentals in graphite and then having to go back to learn them again from scratch in pen or in digital. No one would want to do art if it was that way LOL At the end of the day it's still the same arm, the same hand, the same brain that's doing these exercises and drawings. And as long as those are the same, the medium shouldn't matter. Especially in terms of graphite - charcoal, the two are so similar that it shouldn't really make a big difference in the *mark* making at least. The shading might be a little more different. Also Stan has a supplies video in the figure drawing course which is free to view for everybody. He explains the difference between charcoal and graphite there, which is that graphite can produce a shine when heavily shading, and charcoal doesn't. And charcoal is a bit softer, a bit darker, and a bit blunter than graphite.

@Trancematica Good effort! Adding the texture is really sort of a delicate process, there is balance to where exactly add the strands, how thick, how dark and how much. One thing to keep in mind is that the texture will not appear with the same intensity all across the surface of the hair - in some parts, there will be more texture, in some others, there will be less, and in some, there might be none at all. Usually, the texture should show more where there is just enough light - not too much, not too little (that means the halftones). If there is too much light, the light "bleeds" and "blows out" the texture; if it's too much into the shadow, there won't be enough light for us to perceive the texture. Another important thing is that the texture usually help define the quality of the edges. For example, in your first drawing, I think there is still too much of that smooth edge in the transitions from dark to light, there should be some more strands suggested right there, instead of that soft edge. In other words, you can use the texture precisely to help break the smoothness of the edges. Also, don't forget the outer contours - generally the silhouette of a head with hair won't be too linear, there will always be signs of the texture on the outer edges too. I did a quick painting over a small part of your drawing for the sake of example, hopefully you'll see what I mean. Your second drawing actually looks pretty nice! It certainly has a lot of the things I mentioned before. Perhaps, just try to make it slightly more gentle and subtle in the are where the very bottom of the strands merge into the scalp and forehead. Hope this helps! Feel free to ask other questions if you might have!