Drawing realistic water with pastel pencils! How does it work?

Hi everyone, welcome to a new video. Thanks for joining me today. Today. I have a pastel drawing for you again I've really been into pastel drawing lately. So I've been doing a lot for patreon as well So this one is also on patreon. It's a full four and a half hour real-time Tutorial with reference and color list. So if you want to draw this one Because we're going to be drawing a swan You can have a look in there. It's available for the $4 members and Let's get started. So as always I am working with the below carpothalo pastel pencils on pastel matte I'm working on a brown pastel matte this time and the size is 8 by 12 inches So I found the reference on pixabay and I fell in love with it right away I love the colors on this photo and I love how well The swan stands out from the background and how the reflections are. So I really wanted to draw this one So I'm getting started with the background. I'm working from background to foreground and The background was just very blurry bushes and trees There is a purple and brownish Brownish hue in this drawing in the background, especially So I made sure to really put that in I've worked with lots of browns and a bit of purple a bit of pink as well So I'm just building up the layers right now So the background looks a bit weird if the swan isn't there yet So the first layers or the first part of a pastel drawing always looks a bit weird But when you get to the foreground and to the main subject suddenly it all comes together So I didn't spend too much time on that first part of the drawing So I made sure to leave it very nice and blurry. I did a lot of blending for the blending I just used my fingers, but I did make sure that there was that That line between the water and then the trees and the bushes above But I did that quite quickly so then I moved on to the water in the foreground which had a lot more detail and Quite a lot of different colors as well. So I started off with the left side and I decided to leave open the whole reflection of this one So I saved that for last but I did the water on the left and on the right So the water has a lot of contrast in it and that contrast is what's going to create the water effect the transparent effect So I made sure to build up the layers Quite neutral first. So I started off with the brown and the purple just putting down a light base layer And then I started adding some of the darker contrasts in the water the darker shadows The shadows in the waves basically with a darker gray and then on top of that I started adding the lighter highlights So really make sure when you're drawing water to put that that highlights in there and that contrast So because of the lighting in this photo the water has a purplish tone to it So also don't be afraid to put that in because I think it looks very nice And then for the water on the right side it wasn't as detailed as The area on the left side So I left that a bit more undetailed to really put the focus on this one in the end and the area on the left and Then I moved on to this one itself So the reflection of this one is completely open I wanted to do this one first because I felt like it would be easier to do the reflection last And I started off with the beak so I'm working from left to right as much as possible to prevent any smudging and I always leave a Paper or a different piece of paper underneath my hand to also prevent smudging that way And the beak had a lot of nice reds and oranges into it And I did enhance it a little bit compared to the reference. So I made the beak even more red and orange because I just like the look of it and I did make sure to mix in some browns with it and some dark purple to still make it look natural and then of course we have that large dark area next to the beak which I filled in with black right away and That was done pretty quickly. So then I moved on to the head and the neck so When you're drawing a white animal It's super important to not make it completely white and especially with this one Actually the feathers on the head and the neck were pretty dark brownish So I enhanced that as well because I really like the look of it So I started off with base layers of gray and then I glazed all the darker colors on top of it so I glaze some brown and some orangey tones and glazing is basically Going over a layer with a very light hand and another color just changing the tone slightly so you can still see the previous layers underneath, but you're just changing the tone and After I had that darker undertone down I could draw the lighter feathers on top with some beige Also, I decided to highlight both the top of the head and the neck and the bottom with some blue and some very light yellow beige and I just did the breast the same way just putting down a darker undertone and then Highlighting the lighter feathers with lighter grays and light beige And then the rest of the body was a little bit lighter than the neck So I started off with the lighter base layers there I didn't put in as much brown so I started off with Grays a bit of beige and I mixed in quite some pink with it and a bit of purple Because it's important to make the subject fit in with the background so it would be weird if I had put all these purple and pink tones in the background and Then make this one completely white then it wouldn't fit into the background So make sure to also put the colors that you used on the background Make sure to put those in inside the subject as well as I wanted the main Focus of the eye of the viewer to be on the head and the neck I decided to leave the body a bit less detailed So I did put some detail on the on the feathers Just highlighting some of the feathers with lighter colors And then I decided to leave the body as it is and after that It was time to move on with the reflection in the water So that was I think one of the most difficult parts of this drawing Actually, I have never drawn water like this. So for me, it was the first time So I had to figure out a little bit how to go about it, but that's very interesting as well Also in the real-time tutorial to see me just figuring out how to do it actually pretty helpful So I started off with a lighter base layer in the reflection Also making sure to put in those pings that I also put into the swan and the rest of the background So I mixed in pings with some beige on the right side, you can see those very high contrast between the Reflection and the rest of the water so you can see that those lines are very tight And that's very important for the for the transparency of the water So that contrast between the really light highlights in those reflections and then the dark water right next to it That's going to create the water effect. So after putting down my first quite thin base layers I started putting in some of the darker values in the water, especially at the bottom there was More of a darker shadow in the waves. So I added that with the darker gray tones Also for this I used a Faber-Castell Pitt number 175, which I really like The Stabilo set doesn't have such a dark gray in the set So I would really recommend getting the 175 if you can get it individually And then finally I decided to add some fireflies because I really like the look of those just give my own touch to it and After four and a half hours this drawing was finished. So I really really enjoyed this one This might be my new favorite pastel drawing that I've done for patreon so far. So very enjoyable Very informative as well. So if you're looking for a project like this to follow Definitely have a look. It's available for only four dollars and all the patrons that have pledged higher than that as well So definitely recommend to check it out. And I hope you like it. Let me know in the comments what you think of it And if you have any questions, let me know and then I see you in the next video Thanks for watching and I'll see you next time. Bye. Bye