For those of you who are just starting out with coloured pencils and may be looking for a little help or a place where you can improve your skills and grow as an artist, I wanted to give you a quick introduction to my online teaching channel, Patreon, and tell you just a few of the reasons how it could help you in your journey as a coloured pencil artist. 

To begin, I’ll explain that Patreon is a really brilliant platform where artists like yourself are able to come together, learn, and hone their skills. On my Patreon channel, I already have hundreds of tutorials that can help you with everything from learning how to draw dogs, cats, horses, fur, eyes, noses, ears (I could go on!), to understanding the pencils and paper you’re using and knowing what materials are right for you.

All of my tutorials are filmed in realtime with a live voiceover, so you get the chance to see every part of my drawing process from start to finish and hear my entire thought process, which can really help to train your eye and teach you new techniques.  

Below are just a few of the ways that my Patreon channel can help beginners learn more about coloured pencil artwork and improve their skills when it comes to drawing incredible, lifelike animals.

1. Getting to Know Your Materials

With so much information out there about pencils, papers and all of the different tools you could be using for your coloured pencil drawings, it can be really hard to decide where to begin. With so much choice, it can be difficult to know what would be best for you to use for your drawings, and you can’t always just go out, try and buy every pencil and surface available (as amazing as that would be!). Knowing this, I try to share as much information possible about the materials I use, my opinion of them, and how well they work for a particular drawing and in relation to each other. Hopefully, this gives you a really good idea of what would be best for you to use on your drawings, and will help you decide what to buy to get the most out of your money and the best results in your artwork.

I have tutorials on Patreon that take you through a complete guide to the pencils I use and couldn’t live without and the different types of paper, giving you a good understanding of what you need at hand to create realistic, high quality coloured pencil drawings.

2. Drawing Realistic Eyes, Ears and Noses

These are three things that can definitely make or break any drawing of an animal, and knowing how to create really lifelike eyes, ears and noses can be difficult, but not impossible! I have several tutorials that really focus on each of these aspects, giving you a chance to get to grips with the key do’s and don’t’s, and learn my tips and tricks for drawing amazing, realistic features.  

Alongside these focus videos, I always go into full detail in my main tutorials, giving you my thought process while I draw eyes, ears and noses, so you understand exactly what I’m thinking while drawing these features.

3. Mastering the Art of Lifelike Fur and Hair

Of course, this is another incredibly important part of any animal drawing, and takes time and practice to perfect. It can also be a really daunting part of your drawing, especially if you’re tackling a large piece with lots of texture and detail.

Luckily, with having so many tutorials on my Patreon channel, there is a choice of every type of fur you could think of. From white, black, brown, grey, tabby, to curly, straight, wavy and fluffy, there is so much for you to choose from, and all will help you improve your skills and train your eye so you can focus on the detail and colour of any drawing you’re working on.

As I said above, all of my tutorials are filmed in realtime with a live voiceover, so you always get the chance to hear exactly what I’m doing as I draw, my entire thought process from the moment my pencil hits the paper to the moment the drawing is complete, and the tips and tricks I use on each of my pieces. From this, you’ll quickly pick up techniques that could help you in your artwork, and will start to learn the things you need to think of even before you’ve started drawing.

4. Discovering New Tools and Materials 

Not only do I try to make sure you gain a better understanding of the materials I use, I try to introduce you to new tools that you may not have been aware of before. Whether that’s a tool I use in many of my drawings, like the Slice tools, or showing you how you can use something as simple as Scotch tape to remove pigment, I often give my full and honest opinion of many tools in hopes that it will not only help you with your technique and the final look of your drawing, but also help to save you money as you’ll have a better idea of what to buy in the future.

I have also done reviews of tools like projectors, which can be hard to decide on but really useful when it comes to creating your line drawings, and one of my favourite pieces of equipment, my Icarus board, which is a real joy to have in my studio. Put simply, if I use it, you’ll hear about it, and hopefully that will help you to decide if it’s something you need in your arsenal.

5. How to Rectify Mistakes

It goes without saying that, regardless of whether it’s your first day of drawing or your tenth year, mistakes will be made. We’re all human, after all, and a little blip here and there is inevitable! Because of this, I never edit anything out of my tutorials, and you get a chance to see any areas I struggle with, any areas I mess up on, and how I go about rectifying them.

For me, this is such an important thing for artists, especially those just starting out on their journey, to see. As I say, we’re all human! Even the best, most experienced artists make mistakes! And, I know that it can be really disheartening sometimes when you’ve spent such a long time on a piece, to look at it and think you’ve made a mistake that will just ruin the whole thing. Hopefully, from seeing the mistakes I make and how I go about getting into a positive mindset and fixing them, you’ll learn how to do the same thing. That way, you can continue on with that drawing instead of writing it off as ruined, and feel a real sense of achievement in knowing you fixed what you thought you couldn’t.

If you’re interested in signing up to my Patreon channel, you can do so here for as little as £5 a month. It is a monthly subscription, and there’s no tie-ins, so you can leave at any time you’d like without a worry (although I’m always sad to see people go!). Hope to see you on Patreon soon!