penchills

纸 How is paper made today? Is acid-free paper just a myth? I think it is necessary for artists to understand why we can use just any paper available in the market today (Yes! Any paper that is made in the past two decades! Read further). So let’s dig in… The English word for ‘paper’ comes from Greek ‘ Papuros ’, but the modern paper is similar to the version created by Cai Lun, a Chinese guy in 105 CE. Bark from the Mulberry trees were mixed with hemp. Pulp produced through this process would then be soaked in water and flattened before drying, to form thin sheets of paper. Process of creating paper today stayed pretty much the same. These days Cellulose, Hemi-cellulose and lignin extracted from various plant based sources are converted to a pulp which is mixed with water and some chemicals. It is then flattened, dried and cut to make into individual sheets of paper. Major difference is in the chemicals and the additives, and the new and improved mechanica

Many artists find it difficult to practice art without good references. Here is a small collection of references I use to get some features right. I know I go on and on about using references. I find using references very useful. Here is another post on that topic . I may update this blog as I collect more references to use. Hope you find them useful. Happy Sketching! Please note that all my references are sourced from Pinterest. None of these images are copyrighted by me, so please use these images with caution. Copyrights belong to the original content creators or the content owners.

Many budding artists like me feel drawing hands is a difficult task to accomplish with accuracy. Either a hand drawing looks stiff or disproportional, and it is probably so because of the way we artists perceive hands. Drawing hands may require the artist to have a basic understanding of the underlying skeletal structure. Here is how I try to overcome difficulty in drawing hands. When it comes to drawing hands, one has to observe them before starting to draw right away. Understand proportions of the fingers, palm and the thumb. A closed fist may be a lot more difficult to represent accurately compared to an open palm. Identify the shapes: In this example, I will try to layout steps with a technique I used to draw a palm facing down. After thorough observation, draw some rough shapes of the reference to begin with. Then it is a matter of getting the proportions right followed by drawing nails and smoothening the edges. Sounds simple I guess. Steps to drawing a hand: Draw a s