Pastel for drawing - an artistic material that was born much earlier oil paints. Such great artists as Leonardo da Vinci, Degas, Renoir painted their masterpieces not only in oil, but in pastel.

Art pastel (from the Latin “dough”) is a soft and pleasant material to work with. Usually produced in the form of crayons and pencils.

The composition of the pastel is quite simple - a pigment plus a binder. As binder adhesives such as wax, mineral oils or gum arabic can be used.

Pastel for drawing can be of four types:

• dry pastel (hard, soft, ultra-soft (soft))

Let us dwell briefly on each of the listed types of pastels.

Dry pastel

Such a pastel lays down on paper easily and softly. Gives a stroke ranging in size from 2 to 5 mm. It can be blended with your finger, turning the strokes into an even tone.

Superimposed on each other, the colors are easily mixed and allow you to get new shades. Thus, even a small set of crayons will allow you to create a picture rich in color.

A good pastel should not scratch the paper, crumble and break when working.

Depending on the ratio of pigment and binder, dry pastel is divided into:

• hard hard
• soft soft
• super soft extra soft

The more binder content in pastel, the harder it is. At the same time, some types of pastels, the softest ones, can consist only of pigment. H Often they are easy to distinguish by the shape of the crayons - soft pastels are most often made with round crayons, and hard ones with rectangular sticks.

hard pastel for drawing, it gives sharper and thinner strokes than soft. It is convenient for her to draw the details of the picture. It crumbles less from the surface of the paper.

soft pastel for drawing contains more pigment. It allows you to fill large surfaces with color, it is easy to shade.

It is more pleasant to handle, gives a beautiful velvety texture to the picture, makes it easy to create bright strokes.

However, it is not easy for novice artists to control this material - the crayons break easily, the previously applied layer is smeared, crumbled. Drawing with soft pastels requires special care.

Therefore, in the work it makes sense to start the picture with a soft pastel to clog the pores of the paper, and complete it with a harder one.

Pan pastel ("ultra soft" pastel) Available in special jars, which are very similar to palettes with shadows. Each such jar contains 35% more pastel than a regular stick of pastel.

Pan pastel mixes well and gives the most accurate color reproduction. Therefore, artists usually work with it in the technique of realism.

They draw with pan pastels using special foam sponges, mixing colors directly on paper.

This pastel is not yet very common, it is rarely sold in Russia.

The most famous imported pastel manufacturers:

• French company Sennelier(produces a palette of 525 colors from high-quality pigment - this pastel is quite expensive).
• Good quality pastels are produced by companies such as
• Rembrandt,
• Schminke,
• Faber-Castell
• Talles(Holland)
• Korean-made pastel is no less attractive in quality. Mungyo with a good range of colors. Very affordable, it is half the price of Faber-Castell, but no worse in quality.

More foreign pastel brands:

Koh-I-Noor (Austria, Czech Republic), Conte (France), Lyra (Germany), Caran d'Ache (Switzerland), Stabilo (Germany), Cretacolor (ТМ Koh-I-Noor Hardtmuth, Austria), Derwent (England) ), LeFranc&Bourgeois (France), Adel (Turkey), Jolly (Austria), Sakura, Daler Rowney (England), Maimeri (Italy), Bruynzeel (Holland), Apa-Ferrario (Italy), Bosung (China), Pentel (Japan) ), Titi (Korea), Crayon.

Common Russian brands of pastels:

• Podolsk Art Center
• Sonnet
• Aqua Color
• Spectrum

pastel pencils

This is a kind of dry hard pastel in the form of ordinary pencils. Such pencils have a number of advantages:

• convenient to use,
• allows you to apply more accurate strokes,
• don't get your hands dirty.

Indispensable when drawing small details and creating, for example, smooth textured transitions when colors are mixed with pencils directly on paper. They are best used for depicting animals and portraits of people, because you can draw hairs and feathers to make them more similar to the original.

Pencil manufacturers:

• Faber Castell
• Derwent
• Cretacolor
• Stabilo

All of them also differ in hardness, for example, the most soft pencils- Conte. The hardest ones are from Faber Castell.

oil pastel

Despite the fact that these crayons are also called pastel, this pastel has completely different qualities and, accordingly, ways of drawing.

Oil pastel is made from pigment with linseed oil by pressing. Her crayons are hard and greasy to the touch. Over time on the works done oil pastel even greasy spots may appear.

Oil pastel crayons leave bright, crisp strokes. The colors don't mix well. Pastel strokes are almost impossible to blend with a finger.

The colors of oil pastels are not as matte as those of dry pastels. Also, oil pastel differs from dry pastel in that it practically does not get dirty, finished drawings are more difficult to smear and do not require fixation.

You can paint with oil pastels on any surface. She doesn't need special paper like dry.

In addition, oil pastels can be blurred. Blur-shade the oil pastel with a solvent (special or for oil paints). For this, a brush or shading (a special stick made of pressed paper) dipped in a solvent is used.

As a result, the result of drawing will look like a painting with oil paints, and not like working with dry pastels.

Manufacturers are basically the same as for dry pastels. The firm is the best Sennelier.

wax pastel

Wax pastel is created on the basis of wax (most often polymeric) in combination with natural fillers.

Drawings made with wax crayons are juicy and bright.

Wax crayons can be used to draw on paper, cardboard and even glass. Wax pastel can be used in mixed media - paint in watercolor or gouache. Since water does not fall on such a pastel, with the help of such crayons one can draw using the “sgraffito”, “stained glass enamel”, “encaustic” and “frottage” techniques.

Wax crayons look like oil crayons. what is the difference?

Most often, wax crayons It's cheap stuff for kids. They are harder than oil pastels, so they don't get your hands dirty. In the professional field, oil pastels are mainly used.

watercolor pastel

Watercolor pastels also have a waxy, wet texture.

But this is a unique material. It combines all the advantages of pastel, and at the same time it contains water-soluble components.

A drawing made with such a pastel is similar to an oil pastel drawing. However, it can be blurred by turning it into watercolor!

If you have dealt with watercolor pencils, then you will understand the principle of operation of watercolor crayons. Unlike pencils, crayons are softer and brighter, more easily paint over large surfaces and blur.

Thus, under the same word, one can understand completely different crayons.

I hope that after this article you will not be mistaken in choosing the pastel you need!

I will be glad to your comments and very grateful for the reposts!

Italian drawing technique: watch the video for free!

1. The versatility of pastel drawing.

Pastel can be used in a wide variety of ways, any of those listed here. Each of these methods can be used on its own, or combined with others to produce interesting new results.

There is no absolute right or wrong way.

As with so many things in painting, pastel painting comes down to what you love and want to do with it.

Don't forget to try various techniques follows with different pastels - hard, semi-soft and soft - because each gives a different result from the others, as will give different brands of pastels.

2. Drawing with a pastel tip.

The easiest way to use pastel is to draw with the tip, holding the crayon like a pencil or pen. The resulting line conveys the gesture you made.

Change the thickness of the line by changing the pressure on the crayon. The harder you press, the more pastels will remain on the sheet. For finer lines, press more gently or use the edge of the pestle.

Use the whole hand when drawing, and not just the wrist, then the drawing will be more free.

3. Use the edge of the pastel.

If you want to work quickly creating large blocks of color, use the side of the crayon. For optimal results, break the pastel (yes, I said break) in the middle and draw, remember - even a small piece of pastel is still usable.
Changing the pressure will create a different texture on the pastel paper. When the side of the pastel has worn off, leaving two sharp edges, use it to create lovely thin lines.

This method is best used with semi-soft or soft pastels.

4. Hatching and intersecting hatching.

If you have done any drawing before then this technique will be familiar to you - in fact it is best for pastel pencils or hard pastel sticks. Hatching is simply a series of parallel lines, preferably regular lines (hence pencil) drawn closely together. Cross hatching is the next step, drawing the second row of lines at an angle (most often at right angles to the first row).

This method allows you to freely experiment with color and tone.
Use this method to create a sense of shape and volume by changing the direction of the hatching.

5. Mixing pastels (shading).

Unlike other drawing media, pastels cannot be mixed before being placed on paper. There are two ways to create color and tonal smooth transitions - optical blending, which is achieved by having colors in close proximity (see shading), and blending, where the pastel blends already on paper.

You can use a wide variety of blending tools, but the traditional one is your finger (you can do this with gloves to protect your hands, or just smear with your finger). Also available tool: hand side - useful for blending large areas, but not suitable for precise results; they also use cotton wool, pieces of paper, an eraser, etc.

1. When using your finger (or hand), remember to clean it regularly to avoid contaminating your work with other colors. I always keep a box of wet wipes.

2. Tortillons can be washed for later use, remove the dirty layer at the end with a sharpener.

6. paint coating.

One of the great advantages of pastels over other mediums is color variation. maybe best method for getting it - inking. After the pastel layer has been applied, lightly apply a layer of paint on top. This will create a new color overlay.

The result is visually stimulating, careful selection of colors will produce amazing results.

This method works best with the softest pastels.

7. Pastel decoration.

Embellishment is a finely tuned form of shading using short strokes. The result is more like scumbling - it can give a vibrancy to the painting. Embellishment will also work for optical color mixing (as with pointillist paintings), where the eye blends colors together instead of blending them on paper.

Tip: This method is especially good for giving the appearance of iridescent fabric, feathers, and weights, or for creating atmospheric effects with light.

8. Sprinkling with pastel.

The image of a human head, namely the transfer of facial proportions, is a very complicated matter. It is especially difficult to make a painting in color. Special crayons are best suited. They allow you to create smooth transitions of shades and even a beginner can get quite realistic image. If you want to know the portrait, study the recommendations of the article, and most importantly, view the step-by-step creation of a drawing with comments. This will help you complete the task yourself.

Types and their characteristics

To obtain Good work, you need not only to learn how to draw a portrait in pastel, but also to understand existing types this material. He may look different. On the shelves of domestic stores is presented in the following versions:

• multi-colored crayons in a box;
• sticks in an individual wrapping set or individually;
• in a wooden frame in the form of an ordinary pencil.

The former are the most traditional and are represented by sets of a wide range of shades. The latter are easy to use, as they do not get their hands dirty, and the third is good for small details, such as eyes, lips, and to draw the structure of the hair. The latter type is suitable for such purposes not only due to the form of execution, but also due to greater hardness. In addition, there is a special technique, however, working with it is much more complicated, and it is better for beginners to take the usual dry one.

Paper selection

If you decide to make a portrait in pastel, pay attention to the basis that is best suited for this material. There are special sheets that have a soft velvety textured surface. It is on such paper that pastel holds best and looks spectacular. You can use, of course, any material, but you should first try how the crayons will fall on it.

To make a portrait in pastel, very often they use not white paper, but a light shade, such as beige. It will give a certain tone to the face, and the impression of such a drawing will only improve. Do not take too bright background colors. If you have only white paper on hand, let's say watercolor, it can be easily covered with a transparent layer of paint.

Features of work

It's amazing how vivid pastel portraits turn out. Photos of the work clearly demonstrate this. Obtaining such subtle color transitions is possible due to the structure of the paper itself. artistic material and the technique of shading or rubbing the applied pigment. To do this, you can use a napkin, a piece of soft cloth, or even a cotton swab to work out small details. You should not use a finger, as it will get dirty too quickly and will give a dirty shade on paper, and besides, with this method, dust particles of the pastel may begin to roll due to the presence of sebum on the surface of the finger.

It should be borne in mind that a portrait in pastel must be stored very carefully. In a folder or album, you will definitely need tracing paper to separate the sheets in order to cover the side with the image. Most often, pastel requires fixing. Special fixing compounds are sold. However, they are quite expensive. Instead, you can use regular hairspray. It often gives a darkening of the color, but this can be taken into account when making a picture, making it a little lighter than necessary, or correcting it after processing. If you are going to store a finished pastel portrait framed, it is better to make a mat from thick cardboard so that the sheet with the image does not adhere to the glass surface.

Line drawing preparation

Before making a portrait in pastel, you need to outline the contours of the face. Better do it with a simple pencil or the crayon itself, which differs in color from the shade of the paper. You can use the method of observing cell proportions or use the standard scheme:

1. Perform an oval face, shaped like an egg. Mark out the main horizontals, focusing on which you will draw all the elements.

2. Outline the ears, the shape of the eyes, nose, lips in accordance with the proportions.

3. Add hair, eyebrows, neck line.

4. Detail the image.

The preliminary stage of work has been completed. Move on to the most interesting.

Pastel portrait: master class

The sequence of actions when applying color shades will be as follows:

1. Do the overall skin tone of the face. You can pour powder from small dust particles onto a sheet, grind them evenly with a napkin.

2. Gradually add new shades: white in the highlights and brownish in the shadows. Draw the neck.

3. Gently use your eyes to perform. In this case, you can evenly distribute the tone over the surface with a cotton swab.

4. The next step is to make lips.

5. Be sure to work out the light and shadows around small details. Outline your hair.

6. Start drawing hair, shirt collar. Try to gradually complete the face.11. Put the finishing touches on the clothes.

Summing up

So, you got acquainted with how to draw a portrait with pastel. Having studied the step-by-step sequence of work, you can make your own picture in the same way. For the first experience, try to choose the most comfortable sheet size for yourself. It is worth constantly moving away from the image, evaluating it from afar. This makes it easier to spot and correct errors. Prepare all the materials, be inspired and patient and go to draw your first portrait in pastel.

I painted poppies in the winter, during the holidays.
Then I matured to draw with pastel not a flawed landscape, but something adequate.
To this end, I dug into the people in ICQ in order to find out their favorite flowers. No one really inspired me, and I got into Google. On request "flowers" he gave me beautiful poppies... And I fell in love. With all the dislike for red ... I decided that this would be the leitmotif of my new attempt at pastels. Moreover, I have excellent English paper in warm colors:

The quality of the photos is working, so I apologize in advance.

The first sheet of paper is red. Let's leave it:

Why I decided to choose red - I don’t really know myself. But I decided to plunge into meditation in the hope of awakening intuition, because here it is even more than in watercolor. Direct skin contact with a color pigment - what could be more pleasant?...
What is required besides paper?
1. Pastel - I have 72 Spectrum colors and 12 Gamma colors. Cheap and angry. I'm afraid to even dream about "Unisson" and the like.
2. Applicators for shadows (can be seen in one of the previous posts). Strictly speaking, special shading is needed, but I have never seen them in my city. So we will use non-standard tools.
3. Fingers. I use nameless, occasionally - average.
4. Wet wipes - periodically wipe dirty fingers so as not to stain the drawing.
5. Some plain paper, any - we will pour pastel dust on it.
6. Well, where am I without green tea from my favorite mug:

First of all, we take a clerical knife, pastel chalk and make dust:

I didn’t really remember the colors, I typed them at random:

My conclusions:
1. The dust in each pile was enough for me to dip my finger once. It is necessary to plan more, but it is also possible in the process to control the consumption.
2. At first, without getting used to it, it turned out not dust, but chips. It is not suitable for drawing, I just had to sweep it away from the drawing. Then I learned to still cut the dust.
3. The colors of pastels in chalk and in dust are very different. In dust, most often, the color is brighter and deeper.

Initially, I sketched the contours of future colors with white pastel chalk (sorry, I forgot to take a photo). This is one of highlights for me personally - I feel fear of white (in this case red) sheet, close my eyes and apply the first small strokes, as if trying the paper, establishing contact with it. Once the first contact has been made and the first slight balance between me and the texture of the paper has been achieved, I open my eyes and work more confidently until the contours are complete.
Fill the space with the color of the beginning from the background. I took the dust on my finger and rubbed it into the paper in a circular motion (attension - despite all the lessons on the Internet, I don’t know and don’t follow the technique of drawing with pastels!). At first I didn’t understand the chip of paper - the pigment leaves significant gaps in the rough texture of the paper. Then, for some reason, I got upset, stepped up and decided to sketch the background simply with small strokes:

This is nowhere to be seen, but in those places where I hatched the background with chalk, a dirty surface turned out. It's good that I only worked on a small piece with chalk.
Here you can see part of the original sketch and how I completed the top part of the background with brown tones:

Background finished:

My conclusions:
1. Still, the contact of fingers with a coloring matter is an amazing feeling ... Imagine - there was just a blank sheet of paper, and now a drawing appears ...
2. Chalk blends badly in isolated form, but excellently - in the form of dust.
3. While I was painting the background, I started to like the paper feature - the color of the paper peeps through the pigment, creates a mood for the picture - in this case, warm, sunny. The red paper supports the poppy spots in the background and should shade the poppies on foreground.
4. At the end of the post I will show the reference of the painting, but I will make a reservation right away - I did not set out to create a photographically realistic work. As a basis, I took only the contours and colors. Further, as the fingers lead.
5. Fingers are sometimes (read "constantly") wiped on a damp cloth, very convenient. Two napkins were spent on the background for this drawing.
6. Dust had to be added from time to time, because it constantly ended.
7. Feathers (applicators) are not suitable for the background at all (maybe only I have such a problem?), They erase the pigment more than they bring it onto paper.
8. Drawing greenery is the most fertile occupation. The eye rests, the soul rejoices.
9. Before (before this drawing) I was a big fool and did not understand the chip of colored pastel paper at all. Therefore, apparently, my first attempt (unconsciously), painted on white watercolor paper, was unsuccessful. The color of the paper is selected individually in each case and allows you to emphasize the depth of the colors of the pastel and bring out its brilliance.

The background is ready, and you can proceed to the poppies themselves. And then I was overtaken "suddenly" - I do not have a red chalk!!! Well, that is, he is. But it's not red, it's pink. I sat in chagrin for half an hour, shook the ICQ, and then remembered that I have a small Gamma set for 12 colors. There was red crayon, not the perfect scarlet, but at least not pink.
Let's start with the petals:

Here it turned out to be more convenient to work with feathers, since the object in this case is quite small.
In the process of work, I needed an orange crayon. It turned out that all the orange crayons were also close to pink (although I may be paranoid), which did not suit me at all. How to be? The answer turned out to be super-simple: mix red and yellow crayons, or rather their dust. The result is excellent.
We finished with the flowers, only the stems and the bud remained:

And here is the finished result, photographed the next day in the morning, in sunlight:

Colors are slightly duller than they actually are, but generally close to the original. Upon closer inspection, you can see how the small particles of pastels sparkle in the light, refracting and reflecting it. The picture seems to glow.
Promised reference:

Phew. Tired.

Thank you for attention! I will gladly answer all your questions!

Pastel is a wonderful "tool" visual arts, allowing you to create amazingly sincere and lively pictures. There is a great variety of pastel techniques, each of them can be safely used both separately and in combination with others. Combining different drawing techniques, it is possible to achieve new pictorial ways - expressive and extraordinary.

When choosing a technique for working with pastel, you should not think that there are any canons of drawing - “it’s right to draw like this, but not like this.” Painting is a free, creative thing, it loves a flight of fancy and requires inspiration. The main thing in drawing with pastels is to do what you like. And do it with pleasure.

1. Drawing with the tip of a pastel. Keep in mind that when trying different pastel techniques, you need to work with bars of different softness. Each pastel - hard, soft, semi-soft, gives a different result. The same applies to different brands of this pictorial material. Drawing with the tip of a pastel crayon is the easiest way to create a drawing. The bar is held in the hands like a pencil. The created line accurately repeats every gesture of the artist. By changing the pressure on the chalk, you can change the thickness of the lines created. Press harder - more pastels remain on paper. To make the line thin, try to soften the pressure as much as possible. When drawing, work with your whole hand, and not with one wrist - the drawing will turn out to be more free.

2. Drawing with the edge of the pastel. This pastel technique is good for quick work when you need to paint over large areas. To make it easier to work, break the bar in the middle. But be careful, remember - the smallest crayon is useful for drawing. By adjusting the pressure, it is possible to create sections of different structures. A pastel with worn sides can be used to draw thin lines - its sharp edges are just right for applying fine shading. This technique is recommended when working with soft and semi-soft pastels.

3. Hatching: simple and intersecting. If you have ever drawn with ordinary pencils, you are already familiar with this technique. Pastel work is about creating closely spaced, parallel lines. This way of drawing is more suitable for hard pastel sticks and pastel pencils. By drawing a second layer of lines - usually, it is applied at an angle of 90 degrees with respect to the previous one, an intersecting hatching is obtained. Applying hatching, you can experiment with color and tone of drawings. By changing the direction of the lines, it is possible to achieve a sense of the volume of the depicted objects.

4. Shading (mixing). Pastel can not be mixed in advance - before applying to paper. Blending is used to blend colors. The pastel technique, which involves creating smooth transitions from color to color, can be implemented in two ways. You can simply place colors in close proximity, or you can mix pastels directly on paper. Feathering can be done with the help of any improvised tools or just with your finger. You can wear a glove to protect your hands from the paint. Large areas can be shaded with the side of the palm of your hand, small areas with cotton wool, a piece of paper, an eraser and other suitable items. In order not to harm the drawing, when shading the pastel, try to adhere to the following rules:
. Using your finger or your whole hand to mix the colors, be sure to clean it from time to time. Otherwise, you will inadvertently pollute the work. The easiest and most convenient option is to have a pack of wet wipes handy.
. Pastels can be washed after use, and the contaminated layer at the end can be removed with a sharpener.

5. Sgraffito (from the Italian sgraffito - to scratch). This method involves scratching one color in order to show the bottom color lying underneath the top one. It is somewhat reminiscent of scratching through a layer of ink, but only lines can be drawn there. white color on a black background, and oil pastel gives you the opportunity to get more diverse color effects.

This technique is one of many that have been borrowed from oil painting. Rembrandt himself often scratched the wet layer of oil paints with the base of the brush to convey the texture of the details of the lace located on the collar, or the hairs on the face.

Although the technique can also be used for other visual media, especially colored pencils. It is almost ideal for use with oil pastels as it can be applied in a relatively thick layer that will remain damp enough to be easily removed with a sharp tool.

Drawings made in the sgraffito technique should be thought out in advance. This method is not compatible with improvisation - it is necessary to constantly keep in mind the final image of the drawing, carefully planning the sequence of overlaying layers, each step.

The first stage is to cover the paper with a sufficiently dense layer of color, strongly pressing it into the canvas (if desired, watercolor can be used for the first layer, acrylic paints or ink).

The second layer lays down more freely, so that it can be easily removed with some sharp tool, for example, a craft knife. To draw thicker lines, you can try the brush handle.

Helpful Tip Scratching will work better if you work dark on light, as oil pastels have limited coverage, which means that the pale color on top will “sink” into the darker base color. You can achieve variety by applying several colors to one of the layers of the picture.

Scratching is an excellent method, as it is impossible to achieve such fine lines when working with oil pastels.

6. Decoration. This pastel technique is essentially a type of shading done with short, point strokes. It turns out a kind of picturesque vibration, similar to scumbling (glazing, coating with translucent paints). Thanks to this decoration, the colors are mixed optically - with the eyes, and not on paper. The tip technique is very often used to convey the iridescence of fabrics, feathers, atmospheric effects using the play of light.