Whether or not you believe in the 10000 hour rule, it’s indisputable that simply collecting shelves of books and reading about how to make art is no substitute for actually putting in the practice of applying medium to substrate over and over again until you learn your craft.

On the other hand, we all need teachers, whether we were born with artistic gifts or not. And sometimes the person who has the knowledge you need lives on the other side of the country and has written a book.

I have no formal training in art – merely informal classes which I loved. (I have a fine arts degree, but the focus of that was creative writing.) And I also intend on taking some more painting classes.

But it’s been awhile since those previous classes, and I wanted to do a portrait of my grandson over Xmas break, so I got Ann Kullberg’s Colored Pencil Portraits Step-by-Step to give me some pointers, especially about what colors to use together to create for skin tones.

Wow. Following her advice made a huge difference. The first helpful tip was to work in layers. I always forget this, no matter what medium I’m working with. It was good to be reminded.

The second helpful tip was that she not only told me which of the 120 colors in the Prismacolor spectrum to use for skin tones, but in what order she recommended them based on the subject’s actual tones and the values in the reference photo. She groups the hues by color group (yellow, pink, orange, brown) and also by value (see pages 43-44), but for some reason fails to show them grouped by both value and color group. So I made my own color chart based on her recommendations.

My Chart based on Kullberg's Advice

Since then, I’ve done more than 5 renditions of my grandson’s face. While each is better than the 3 attempts I made prior to the arrival of the book, I also haven’t managed to capture his grinning cherubic face to my satisfaction.

(Plus, it doesn’t help that his hair is actually blond, but appears brown in the photo. Maybe a different reference photo would be a better choice. Phooey.)

Five of my attempts plus the reference

Things I still need to work on: getting a smooth gradient, like the one Kullberg shows on page 47. My first one looked a lot like the “Example of Poor Color Introduction” at the bottom of the page. I’m improving.

On her website (which, btw, is a different URL than given in the book), she offers a lot more tools for colored pencil artists, including a magazine, kits, and video lessons. I haven’t decided yet whether I’ll invest in any of them.

What’s your experience with Kullberg’s book or website? Do you have another colored pencil instruction book that has helped you?

UPDATE as of Mon 19 Feb 2012:  I’ve created a download-able chart based on my color chart above which is based on Kullberg’s advice.  Click on the “Downloads” tab at the top of the page, then click on the link to the chart.  It should bring up a PDF in your browser that you can save and print, then color in with your own pencils.