Realistic Fruit Illustrations with Colored Pencils : Learn Techniques to Create Textures

1. Introduction : If you're looking for a slow, relaxed medium that lets you enjoy the process yet add the finest of details, then colored pencils is a perfect medium for you and drawing still life is a great way to learn and practice any medium. Hello everyone. I'm Smitha, an artist and an art instructor based out of Bangalore, India. You can find me on Instagram and YouTube as art_by_smitha. I have been working with colored pencils for about five years now. My art style is hyper realism, mainly because I have a keen eye for details. I have designed this class through the illustrations with colored pencils so that you can explore various colored pencil techniques and textures and apply the same onto your subjects. I highly recommend that you watch my first class on Skillshare that covers all the basic techniques in detail before you start with this particular class so that you have sufficient hands on experience on the basic techniques. In case you are not able to watch the previous class, I have included a quick recap of all the basic techniques and information regarding the art supplies as well in this class as one of the lessons. Here's what will be covered in this class. First, we'll start out with the basic techniques and understand a bit about the art supplies that we'll be using in this class. After that, we'll start with our fruit illustrations. We will be drawing four different types of fruits that will cover different techniques and different textures. For your class project, you can draw along with me any one of these four fruit illustrations. By the end of this class, you will have an in-depth understanding on the basic colored pencil techniques, how to use different tools to achieve realism and how to render various colored pencil textures. Alright then, let's grab a set of colored pencils, a sketch book, and get started. See you in class. 2. Class Project: We'll be learning to draw four different fruits in this class. We'll start with a kiwi, followed by a dragon fruit, avocado, and lastly, a watermelon. The reason why I've chosen these four fruit illustrations is because they come in different shapes, sizes and each fruit has a unique texture. By practicing these four fruit illustrations, you'll be understanding several colored pencil techniques, and textures. For your class project you can attempt any one one these four fruit illustrations. You're welcome to attend more than one fruit as well. What you need to do is first watch all the four fruit illustration lessons, where I'll be explaining in detail the different techniques and concepts. After that, you can head over to the projects and resources section, download the reference picture, and the color chart of the fruit of your choice. Draw and upload the same so that I can give you my feedback. See you in the next lesson, where we'll be understanding the basic colored pencil techniques, the art supplies that we'll be using in this class. 3. Basic Colored Pencil Techniques- Recap: In this lesson, I'll briefly explain to you the basic colored pencil techniques that we'll be following throughout this class. Make sure your pencils are sharpened well. A sharp tip penetrates easily into the tooth of the paper. Now, let's understand pressure control and how to hold a pencil the right way. Hold the pencil further up like this and shade gently whenever you want to get a very light layer. You can observe that by holding the pencil this way, you'll be able to get a smooth and uniform layer. Whereas if you hold the pencil too close to the tip, you tend to exert a lot of pressure and your layers look streaky and non-uniform. I'm just demonstrating what happens if I hold the pencil closer to the tip. There are certain instances where we need to hold the pencil this way closer to the tip. I'll explain to you shortly when we do that. [MUSIC] Let's understand layering. Suppose you want to shade a rectangle, this is not how you do it. That is by applying a lot of pressure and trying to fill out the rectangle in one code. This is not the right technique. What you need to do is you need to add multiple layers, starting with light pressure and gradually increasing the pressure. Make uniform circular strokes overlapping each other like this. Here, for the first couple of layers, I'm holding the pencil further away from the tip and applying very light pressure. After that, for the next couple of layers, I'll be applying medium pressure. Then towards the end, I'll be increasing the pressure and I'll be holding the pencil closer to the tip. Always stick to one particular direction while shading. Once you're satisfied that you have added enough layers, you can start burnishing. What is burnishing? I'll explain to you. [MUSIC] Burnishing is a technique where you press very hard by applying a lot of pressure and bring all the layers together. Burnishing flattens the tooth of the paper. Hence, burnishing should be done in the very end, because once you burnish, it's quite impossible to add more layers on top. Burnishing gives a glossy and smooth finish to your drawing. In case you observe some streaks in one particular direction while burnishing, you can burnish in the perpendicular direction and flatten out all the layers. In this case, I've just used one particular color, but in case you're layering multiple colors on top of each other, you must burnish with the lightest color that you have used, or you can also use a white colored pencil. I'll demonstrate this with an example. Suppose I want to shade an object that looks bright red, instead of directly shading it with red, what I would do is start layering multiple colors on top of each other. I first start with a light cadmium orange and then with a darker orange, after that, a red in the end. For burnishing, I would use the light cadmium orange, that is the lighter shade that I have used. This gives more depth to the drawing and will not make it look flat. Let's understand a bit about the materials needed for this class. You will need colored pencils, a set of 48. Any decent brand would do. I'll be using professional grade pencils. That is the Caran D'Ache Luminance pencils, which are wax-based and the Faber Castell Polychromos pencils, which are oil-based. You need not use these professional brands, instead you can use any beginner friendly, decent brand of your choice. I have explained in detail the difference between wax-based and oil-based colored pencils in my first colored pencil course on Skillshare. Here's a quick recap for you of the same. You will also need a white gel pen that is mandatory for adding highlights. Other than this, you'll also see me use a couple of other tools in the future lessons. That is, a craft knife and a battery operated eraser. These two tools are not mandatory for you, they are just for your information. I'll demonstrate to you soon the significance of these tools and how to use them. As for paper, I'll be using this toned gray paper. You can use a white paper as well, as long as it's suited for colored pencils. That is, don't use a very rough or a very textured paper. You can use a slightly textured paper. This slide contains some useful information on how to choose the right paper. Please go through the slide. Now that you have a good understanding on the basic techniques and the art supplies, let's start with our fruit illustration series. See you in the next lesson where we'll be learning to draw a kiwi fruit. 4. Kiwi Illustration: Now let's understand how to draw this kiwi fruit. Before we begin, let's have a look at the reference picture, color chart and the line drawing. I have used the triangular slice on the right as my reference picture, and these are the colors that I've used. This color chart is just to give you a rough idea of what colors to pick. Your set may not contain the same sheets, or your set may contain less a number of colors. That's not a problem. As long as you have a decent set of 36-48 sheets, that's fine. Just try to pick the colors that are closest to the ones that you can see on the screen. You can download the reference picture and color chart from the projects and resources section. You will also need a white gel pen for highlights. I have also used a couple of other tools that are optional. It's all right if you don't have these tools, they are not necessary and they are just for your information, I've used a craft knife and a USB rechargeable eraser for highlights and texture. I'll demonstrate to you shortly on how I use them. I've used this tone gray paper by Arteza for this drawing. You can also use a white paper. The reason why I've chosen a gray paper is because the colors and highlights pop on a gray paper. Here's a drawing that I made on a white paper. If you can see in this particular drawing, there's a white portion at the top and this would be quite difficult to achieve on a white paper, that's the reason I chose a gray paper. The line drawing for this one is quite simple. You just need to get the basic shape and the proportions right. You don't have to add too many details or try to make it look exactly like the reference. In the end, make sure that you lighten the sketch up so that the graphite marks are not visible. I'll be starting with a lemon yellow and a very light green. With colored pencils, it's advisable to go from light to dark. That's the reason I always start with a light tones and gradually build up the mid tones and then the dark tones. For this portion, you can use a green and a white. If you observe the reference, you can see that there are these partitions in the kiwi fruit, so if you're using a white paper, please make sure that you leave those pieces white because once you add in all the colors, it's difficult to go and make it look white or cream later. Since I'm using a gray paper, it will be quite possible for me to go over this with a white later. But still, I've left these blank spaces and now I'm adding a greenish shade on it. I'm using very light pressure and gradually building up the layers with yellows and light greens. I'm using Faber-Castell Polychromos and Color Dash pencils here. After about 2-3 three layers move to the mid tones. Remember to shade very lightly, only once we have added enough layers we'll slowly increase the pressure. Also, it's better to keep your pencils sharp. Always keep your reference picture handy on your phone or your laptop so that you can zoom it in and observe the details and the colors. Even after adding the mid-tones, if you feel that the drawing needs more yellows are light greens, go ahead and add them. Picking the right colors comes with practice. You can also use a color picker tool on Photoshop or MS Paint if you're not sure. For the dark tones, I'm using a slightly darker green, somewhat like an olive green here. [MUSIC] The number of layers that you can add depends on the kind of paper that you're using. Certain papers take in a lot of layers and certain papers don't. Remember that it's extremely difficult to add in more layers once you have burnished and flattened out tooth of the paper. Although the seeds look black, don't try to then go in and add black, it will make them look flat. Instead use these very dark tones like, dark indigo, maroons or dark violets. Adding these dark tones on top of each other will make the subject look naturally black and will give it some depth. Don't make the seeds look very uniform, vary their sizes and their darkness, it will give an illusion that some seeds are embedded deep inside and some are at the surface. [MUSIC] I'm using a white gel pen for the highlights. If you observe the reference picture carefully, you will notice that towards your right-hand side, the subject appears quite bright, that's why I'm using a white pen here and quickly smudging it. You can also use a white pencil. [MUSIC] For this portion, that is the peel, I'll be using raw sienna, burnt sienna on certain grounds as well. You can check the projects and resources section for the color chart so that it's clear on what colors I've used here. The process that I follow here will be the same, that is, going from light to dark. [MUSIC] Since the cast shadow is towards the left hand side, the peel appears quite dark here, so I'm using very dark browns and dark sepia here. In order to replicate the grainy texture on the peel, I'm using a battery operated eraser. You can also try to carve out your normal eraser and make it look pointy and try to achieve this. I'm also using a craft knife to get some texture and to replicate the hairy structure on the peel. You need to be quite careful when using the craft knife, otherwise, you might end up damaging the paper. When you gently scrape it off like this, what it does is, removes the top most layer of colored pencils and reveals your very first layer. For the shadow, I'm using a normal graphite shading pencil and smudging it with a blending stump. You can also use a gray colored pencil here. A graphite pencil produces smoother and quicker results, that's all. For these seeds, I'm using indigos, purples and violet like I did earlier and for the shadow there, I'm using a gray pencil and a white pen for the highlights. [MUSIC] For the other kinds of seeds, I'm using ivory and a couple of very light grays. Here's a closer look of the finished drawing. Please feel free to post your questions in the discussion section. In case you have tried this drawing, don't forget to upload it in the projects and resources section. In the next lesson, we'll learn to draw a dragon fruit. 5. Dragon Fruit Illustration: In this lesson, let's understand how to draw this dragon fruit. Before we begin, let's have a look at the reference picture, line drawing, and the color chart. You can download the reference picture and the color chart from the Projects and Resources section. [MUSIC] Just like the previous lesson, I have used the toned gray paper for this drawing, and you will also need a white gel pen for the highlights. Now, let's have a look at the line drawing. [MUSIC] I'll be using a combination of oil-based and wax-based pencils here, namely the Faber-Castell Polychromos and Caran d'Ache Luminance. You can use the ones that you have. I'll start with light pinks. Start out with light layers and gradually increase the pressure as you build up your layers. [MUSIC] If you carefully observe the reference picture, you can find hints of reds towards the edges, and that's why I'm using a dark orange and a red here. For the mid tones, I'm using a magenta and something like pink. [MUSIC] For the highlights, I'm using a white pencil, and for the dark tones, I'm using red violets. [MUSIC] For this section, I'll be using lemon yellows, bright greens, and a few darker greens like the yellowish green or the olive green. At certain section, I'll also be using a few browns to get very dark tones. You will be able to see them shortly. The colors that I've picked here are similar to the ones that we used for the kiwi fruit. [MUSIC] For the inside of the fruit, I'll be adding warm grays and cool grays and then a little bit of white. Here's a tip for you. Whenever you see a subject that looks like it never really is white, you will need to add a lot of grays or violets or blues depending on the light and shadow. Here in case you are using a white paper, you can leave a little bit of white at the center and then add grays at the sides. In my case, since I'm using gray paper, I'll be adding white at the center. [MUSIC] Adding hints of pinks at the sides. Don't forget to keep looking at a reference picture before each step and observe the details. For the seeds, I'll be using a dark indigo and a few grays. For the darker seed, the one that looks blackish, I'll be using the dark indigo and I'll use a black only if necessary. For the lighter ones, I'm using a couple of grays, and for the highlights, I'll be using a white gel pen. Don't add the highlights on each and every seed, make it look a bit random. For this fruit, I decided to use colored pencils for the shadow instead of the graphite pencil that we used earlier. I'll be using a dark gray and a light gray. The shadow that is cast closer to the fruit would be darker and hence the dark gray and away from the fruit a light gray. [MUSIC] Here's a picture of the finished drawing. I'm looking forward to seeing your drawings in the Projects and Resources section. I'll be happy to give you my feedback. In the next lesson, we'll learn to draw an avocado. 6. Avocado Illustration: In this lesson, we learn to draw this avocado. Before we begin, let's have a look at the reference picture, line drawing, and the color chart. You can download these from the projects and resources section. Here is the reference picture. I've chosen the avocado on the right as my reference. This is an interesting subject to draw because the single fruit contains three different textures, and hence it's slightly different from your previous illustrations [MUSIC] The line drawing for this one is pretty simple. For this illustration, also, I have used the toned gray paper and the Caran d'Ache Luminance and the Faber-Castell Polychromos. Let's start coloring. Let's start with the creamy section first. For this, I've chosen very light tones like a couple of creams and a bright yellow. I've also used a bright green, a grass green, and a yellowish green. Since this part of the fruit is quite soft and buttery will be using circular overlapping strokes, start out with your light colors and gradually move to the mid-tones, and then the dark tones. Remember to start with light pressure and gradually increase the pressure once you have a few layers down. [MUSIC] For the darkest tones, I'm using an olive green. If you carefully observe the reference, you can see there are certain marks or scratches in this section. I'm marking those with this green along with a light brown. The seed is quite rough and textured. I will be starting out with the light tones like a cadmium orange and an apricot shape. For the mid-tones, I'll be using terracotta, and for the dark tones, I'll be using red violets and dark browns. In order to replicate the texture of the seed, what you need to do is start out with your lightest tones, make sure you leave some spaces blank for your highlights. In my case, I'll go over the highlight area with a white or a cream later on. After the light tones, you can go over to your mid-tones. Don't cover the light tones entirely with your mid-tones, reveal certain portions of the light tones because we don't want to get a smooth shading here. Follow the same process when you're adding your dark tones. Add the dark tones only at certain places and not entirely, this will give a three-dimensional look to the seed. [MUSIC] If you carefully observe the reference, you'll notice that the seed appears to be having some avocado flush on the top so I'll be using a creamy shade for the same. I will also be using a white pencil for the highlights. At certain places, I'll be using a USB rechargeable eraser to lift out some colored pencil pigments and to give it more texture and highlights. It's not mandatory for you to be having this tool or the craft knife for these lessons, but you can still see me use these tools in almost all the lessons because they are quite handy and they let you come back and fix your mistakes or add more texture, highlights, or details. They are very useful, especially in animal drawings. [MUSIC] Using a craft knife to mark all these scratches that you can see on the seed. For the shadow underneath the seed, I'll be using shades like a golden yellow or a yellowish green. It will be more clear to you what colors I've used if you refer to the color chart. [MUSIC] For the peel, first, I've added a yellow ocher, and now you can see me add a very dark indigo, and a violetish brown. Just observe the reference picture, and you will understand where to add the dark portions. Don't make the peel look very uniform. As you can see, I'm making it look a bit curvy to make it look more natural. Also use a sharp pencil because we don't want the peel to look very thick, using a white pen for the highlights. Now, let's move on to the shadow. For this fruit, I decided to use a charcoal pencil for the shadow. You can use a colored pencil or a graphite pencil like we did in the earlier lessons. Just showing you a different technique here, that's all. Using a blending stump to smoothen the shadow. [MUSIC] You can add more pigment towards the peel because the shadow is quite dark there, and as you move away from the peel, the shadow gets fainter. [MUSIC] This is the finished drawing, do let me know if you have any questions regarding this, I'll be happy to guide you. Also, don't forget to upload your work in the projects and resources section. In the next lesson, we'll be drawing a watermelon. 7. Watermelon Illustration : For our final lesson, let's draw a watermelon. This one is quite vibrant and detailed as compared to the previous illustrations. Let's have a look at the reference picture, line drawing and the color chart. You can download these from the projects and resources section. I have chosen the watermelon slice towards your bottom left as my reference and these are the colors that I have used. Just like the earlier lessons, I have used a toned gray sketchbook and fabricast polychromos pencils and current dash luminous pencils. I'm going to start with an initial layer of light pink. Then I'll mark the highlight areas with a white pencil so that I accidentally don't shade over those areas. After that, you can add a layer of cadmium orange, or cadmium red. Since the watermelon slice has somewhat like a grainy texture, you don't have to do much of smooth shading here, just observe the reference and try to replicate the texture. After this, you can add a layer of reds, say scarlet or a darker red. I'm just marking out all the darker areas here. You can also add a few pinks here and there. I'll be adding a carmine pink soon. [MUSIC] For the darker tones, you can use a dark red or something like maroon especially near the seeds. I'm just repeating the same set of colors over and over again for each layer, gradually increasing the pressure. Wherever I have a very dark tone, I'm applying slightly greater pressure. I'll be doing these steps until I have significantly covered the tooth of the paper. [MUSIC] For burnishing, you can use something like a very dull pink, or in my case, I'll be using this shade in this set. It's called the burnt ocher. You can have a look at the color chart so that you get a better idea of how the color looks. I'm also using this shade that is like a flash shade or a salmon pink for burnishing. [MUSIC] Towards the bottom, the slice looks a bit brighter, so I'm using this apricot shade. I'm using a white pencil again to intensify the highlights. [MUSIC] For the seeds the colors that I'll be using are similar to the ones that I've used in the kiwi illustration. I'm going to add a dark brown or somewhat like a maroonish-brown and then a dark indigo. I'll be using a white gel pen for the highlights. [MUSIC] For this section, you can use a very light tone, like an ivory or a cream, and then bright greens towards the bottom of this slice. Try to blend in the pinks at the top into this creamish section. Don't make it look abrupt or don't make it obvious that there's a partition between the two sections. Make it look seamless. [MUSIC] I'm using a darker shade of green towards the bottom of the slice and also marking out few scratches that I can see in the reference. [MUSIC] Now let's add the cast shadow just to observe your reference and you'll be able to see that there are hints of pink reflected from the watermelon onto the right-hand side where the shadow is cast. In order to replicate that, you need to hold your pencil at an angle. Don't hold it close to the tip. Hold it this way and just shade very gently and you'll be able to get a very light layer. [MUSIC] Alternate between these two colors with very light pressure and then add a darker shade of gray. [MUSIC] If you want to give a very smooth finish to the shadow, you can use a very light gray for burnishing, or you could also use a colorless blender. A colorless blender is basically a pencil without any pigment. This one is from the current dash. It just brings in all the colors together and gives somewhat like a smooth, glossy finish in the end. It's not mandatory to use this. I rarely use a colorless blender. I prefer layering the colors on top of each other and make them blend naturally. But I just wanted to show you that you could also use this tool. [MUSIC] This is how the drawing turned out in the end. I'm looking forward to seeing your drawings in the projects and resources section. 8. Closing Thoughts: [MUSIC] Congratulations on completing this class, and thank you for taking out the time to watch this class. Here's what we learned in this class. We first understood the basic colored pencil techniques and how to choose the right art supplies, namely colored pencils and papers, to achieve realism. After that, we applied all the basic techniques that we learned and illustrated four different types of fruits. We also learned about different types of tools that could be used along with colored pencil to achieve different textures. I'm sure by now you are confident enough to attempt any still-life drawing of your choice. In case you have any queries, you can post your questions in the discussion section on Skillshare and I'll be happy to guide you. I'm looking forward to seeing your drawings, so please don't forget to upload your projects in the projects and resources section on Skillshare and tag me on Instagram as well if you posted there. My Instagram ID is art_by_smitha. Please share your valuable feedback and suggestions for the upcoming classes. See you soon. [MUSIC]