Sketchbook Techniques- Portraits in Ink 

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people wonder why they develop same face syndrome in their art, but never realize that they have only ever drawn smooth faced young people. instant cure...draw older people from different parts of the world. you'll be better within the hour.

"There are people walking around who just look like straight-up cartoon characters, and that is something very valuable to know." Not something I ever expected to hear, but I couldn't agree more.

Freaking amazing! Thank you so much for sending all these new folks my way. Can't wait to see what everyone creates!

it's so cool hearing someone describe people's unique features in a similar way to how I do. I always feel like such a weirdo describing someone's nose as beautiful when it's, by general standards , considered ugly. I found your channel today and it's really relaxing and inspirational listening to you while I draw.

I came for the technical advise but stayed for how beautifully you spoke about the unique quality of these human faces. Drawing my own face helped me get over my hatred of my features and I began to realize that perception of self is like a piece of art - highly interpretive. I like how you were able to fit that ideal into what could easily have been a simple tutorial.

From a young age on, when I started drawing portraits, I was always drawn to, if not fascinated, by lively facial expressions. Especially men are captured more often making weird faces. That is the reason, why I never felt challenged by smooth, perfect, similar looking pretty girl faces. Strong shadows, wrinkles, strange angles taught me so much. Great Video!

I was struggling with the idea that how much anatomoical drawing matters when we draw real portrait...thank you for your explanation . Its so good. The tutorials vdos usually choose actors, beautiful jaw line and with light and dark contrst photo. But in real people are there in world, and real human being. Not a showpieces. I am so happy to get this.

i hope anything and everything good happens to you dude

drawing is one of the most wonderful things about being alive!

Holy shit, it's like you know exactly what I'm into right now 😭👌 pen and ink is my first love. Drawing portraits and figures is something I'm working on/having fun with right now, so this will be great for a background video 🙏

Woah I actually knew about Earth World before this video. Found this video in my recommendations, but saw Earth World in the video preview and had to watch it. Love Earths World. Archive of thousands upon thousands of faces.

JUST WHAT I WAS LOOKING FOR!! REAL PEOPLE FACES PHOTOS WITH UNIQUE FACES AND EMOTIONS

2:20 thanks, this is something i was genuinely fristrated with, you put it into words perfectly why my pen drawings looked significantly harsher than the reference because I'd been using refernces with smooth photoshoot lighting, your reference suggestion makes so much sense now

Hey Steven, I just want to thank you your thoughts and videos. Because of you, I re-found my perfect tool for drawing (a simple ball pen). After 33 years I'm finally free again. Thank you.

The precision you show drawing w/ ink straight out is impressive. Nice!

You are just great, this is very cool.

youre advice is so fucking abstract that I need to hardcore focus just to hear and think hard on what you're saying, you earned my sub

Wow, that earth's world link was an incredible share!!

Late but this just showed up for me! Just wanted to say I feel the same way about how I learned to draw with pen first and it actually prepared me for other mediums. Also taught me a lot about planning enough to not make mistakes while also being able to intuitively correct them as I'm processing the drawing

Every single one of your videos are helping me a lot just learn about light and shape and general when I had problem seeing how light interacts in general with forms

I really appreciate the mention of ball-point pens! I have a fountain pen but mostly use it for writing and scribbles, but my ball point is really perfect for fully rendered drawings, sketches, etc. I switched to drawing in pen only sometime in high school since I hated the my sketchbook drawings were smudging a lot. Pen has done so much for me, absolutely love ball point for more detailed drawings! I have used at times my fountain pen for more "proper" drawings and it's definetly hards, but mostly a different process/style, one I do kinda wanna try more often...

thanks so much for this video. about a month ago i promised myself i'd practice at improving my portrait drawings. i kind of hit a slump because i didn't know where to find references for normal, everyday looking people. earthsworld is a great reference for artists who want to stray away from generic images of conventional facial structures.

I never drew a full page of faces, for some reason this video inspired me, so thank you

Ohhh am I in love with your video's. Inspiration, tips, jokes, and amazing Illustrations. Great as background noise while just drawing! Thank you Steven

Thanks of sharing this tutorial on Pen sketching, your art is some of the best I have seen, thanks for sharing the earthsworld page too, lots of great images to use there.

I'm getting back into art and its so relaxing playing this in the background while I'm doing face studies :)

Yes. Thank you. I DID enjoy watching you draw. It was great!

That insta page is brilliant. Thank you so much for bringing into my life. Some real gems on there. Love your work too.

so interesting for an amateur to listen to the talkthrough whilst watching the progress of the drawing. very helpful for us lesser mortals

I am currently studying the art of pen and ink and being at your skill level is my goal. You are my "it" artist.

Don't ever be afraid of failure, each of my failures I've considered teachable moments. I keep every sketch that I've done wrong and after a few weeks I've gone back to it and made notes on the page of what I feel was wrong and what I need to learn to overcome those challenges. It's only a piece of paper and ink or pencil, you must have lots of spare paper so why not take chances without fear of failure.

That's was really wonderful. I teach window painting on RU-vid and patreon but I am also an eternal student. I spend at least two hours a day practicing with pencil and also ink. I love the pentell brush pens, microns and also ball point. I totally get what you mean about ballpoint and it's ability to create subtle light lines. A great tool

Steven, thanks! your work is perfect!

Love the art

loving these

This is soooooo helpful. For years I struggled with sketching faces. Now I can follow along with this video in slow motion gaining all of your excellent suggestions in this GREAT LESSON....thiks sooooooooo much for doing this.

GREAT! Glad I found your channel. Thanks so much!

Hey Steven. Firstly, wow! I am continually in awe of your artistic talent. As I watched this video, I started to think that you had a preference for heads facing towards the left, until you started on the other page. As I reach the end, I see that composition plays a strong part. Being right-handed myself, I have a preference for left-facing heads. I need to push myself more to draw portraits facing the other direction.

thank you for your videos! they’re very inspiring

Thank you so much for this! The instagram is so anti-instagram-- I keep going there to find unique references and I'm blasted with contour makeup selfies.

This was amazing. Thank you.

Ok man you got me . Im drawing Im sitting listening and drawing

wonderful sketches. Your comment and skills are of the highest level. Thank you for sharing this knowledge.

Super inspiring video and beautiful sketches, Steven! For me it's almost always the same. It starts good but I get carried away with the rendering, which leads to unorganized values and therefore a lost sense of light. The sketches get that overworked, insecure, unfocused look with muddy patterns all over. It's definitely a challenge to stay structured and focused. What I find the most interesting with your videos is your curiosity and eagerness to ask the "right" questions, try different techniques out etc. I think I'm letting the fear of doing an error hinder me from having that curious and exploring internal dialogue.

Your comment about being intentional with what reference you choose to draw really struck a chord with me. Some combination of popular appeal and the platforms artists tend to use to find reference can easily lead you to end up doing the same thing everyone else is doing. Just looking around on the internet, you quickly find a lot of people drawing from the same old references of cute pinterest girls.

So insightful and I have to agree with what your saying. Going straight in ink does lend for a different drawing. I always start with the geometric form and kinda find that my drawings almost look “formulaic” im going to do some more practice!

Its so true when you said ppl actually look like cartoon characters😂.

Hi Steven, great artworks, happy to find your channel! Thanks :)

Thank you so much for sharing this insta profile. Also, as always amazing art thanks for sharing the tips!

It's really amazing, I Absolutely love it!!! Thank you for sharing. 👀👀👀

Your lines are inspirational ❤️

Amazing I really learned a lot by watching how you map a face out, great videos your an amazing artist

These people have no idea they were an inspiration and a model for the artist.

I like this channel i think because unlike others that start with white paper at 1 min and done a life size portrait by the 7th minute. Kinda hard to follow those steps in 7 mins with any expectations other than mastering a forehead lol. 👍

wow, really enjoyed that! you are amazing

I Love drawing with you taking. I went to he phots and started drawing keying in on what you were and applied it to whatever on my drawing. Plus you have a nice voice to draw to.

Yes I enjoyed ,I was looking for similar video that's here thankyou for sharing your technique it's helpful to me ❤️

Amazing work

you are incredible!!!

what a great performance!

Awesome skills....Awesome tutorial

I hope you know I cannot resist commenting and turned into a bugaboo---LOL I get a lot out of your videos and they bring me joy. Also holy f**** that instagram with the faces is amazing! And like I never thought about "lines doing the work" just like doing acrylic nails (which is my profession) you let gravity do the work by pointing the finger down....so sick..THANK YOU

Amazing and hugely useful ... Many thanks

Some of these drawings remind me of Bernie Wrightson’s ink style! Great video!

Hey man. That is really awesome. I like your drawing style.

Amazing content and I actually love the fact that Infeel that Michael Scott is talking hahahah, thanks a lot for this great video

If you like folds, draw old people. So much fun. You got a lot more "meat" to work with, which makes it easier as well. More shapes more shadows. You can go to an old folks home and you will most likely find one of them sleeping on a bench or in front of the TV posing for you involuntarily. You can ask them to pose for you, which they do most of the time, but I especially like it when they are asleep.

Thanks for Resources, earthsworld

wow i love it ❤️

I've never been able to draw and I've started at an old age, I've decided from the beginning to draw like that, direct with dip pen or fountains pens and black ink, without pencil sketches or guidelines, embracing failure and learning to observe more and fail again. I'm slowly getting better and I still like those unpredictable ink blotches ruining my sketches... nobody, apart me and some friends, will see my drawing anyway :)

great reference source, thank you!

No se puede creer la mano que tenes, eso es genialidad para el dibujo. mis felicitaciones!!

Man you are awesome !

Thanks man, awesome stuff

Nice fountain pen. Looks like a sailor.

Yees my favorite channel

magnific art

I love the way you describe different kinds of lines like “squaggles“ 😂

just started the video then saw the link to your Instergram ....wow inspired ....ok back to your video.

I love how mean you are to young bloods but motivating to make me better. I want to improve mysteriously like u always sayin in your videos.

you should've made them all zombies lol, such great artwork bravo and thanks for adding some insight into your thought process

So much wow.

love it

BRAVO!!!!

Thank you for this!!!!

Ballpoint? My favorite three Parker Jotter (they have nice ink in my opinion), Pentel Energel 0.5, Uniball Jetstream 0.5 and my favorite fountain pen is Moonman Vancai mini (it's so small and it writes well). P.S. Love your art!! Great channel also! Cheers 👍

great work!

Enjoyed the vid and the drawings a lot, you also made me want to draw so bad but I have work!

Hola Steven. Un gran canal y un gran talento. Sería genial activaras en la configuración para subtítulos en español. Gracias

amazing drawing technique, no grid👌👍👍👍

Great job friend congatulations

Wow that Earthsworld thing is hilarious! Americans are really funny looking. Thanks for telling us about it. These photos make for much more interesting drawings than that booooooring pretty girl warrior babe art that everybody does.

I use the uni ball air .05 ballpoint in my watercolors. And I don't know much about pigs and lizards but monkeys and apes are crazy fun to draw

Loved the way you explained unique faces...I'm into portrait drawings at the moment and this was perfect ...your art is spectacular 🥰

Very helpful, thank you!

Thank you!

inspiring video. I got a lot from this. Subscribed.

Subbed. Such an amazing demonstration of skill and so eloquently explained. I am working on learning pen drawing and it's been a task. I love you style. Jung Gi is one of my inspirations, and you have some similar techniques. Love your hatching, it's so impressive.

Great video!