How To Draw: Roses (Valentine's Day Special)

Today is Valentine's Day and though I don't have anyone to celebrate it with (I'm still single ladies), I thought I celebrate today with a How To Draw instead. And what celebrates Valentine's Day more than roses. Roses are actually very tricky to draw with their many folds of petals. So here is my methord that I came up with for drawing one...

Stage One

Start with the basics. A large, rough circle for the flower head, two lines for the stem and a series of round shapes for the leaves. If you want a leaf to droop, create and connect a few shapes to appear like it is drooping as I have done for the leaf to the left.

Stage Two

Now here is where it gets complicated. To create that iconic rose head, start with the outer petals first and get the shape right before getting to grips with the rest of the petals. These outer petals were a series of shapes with a slight bumpy outline. If you have a rose at hand, study it well. Then on the page, shade in the dark shadows in the creases of your rose. Leave every other part of the petals white for now. After you have finished with the flower, shade in the stem, add in the thorns and add veins to the leaves.

Stage Three

 Next, redraw the rose in pen. I would start with the stem and leaves before working on the petals. Shade them in and give the outline of each leaf a slight zig-zag effect. For the petals, again, start with the outside petals first, adding a slight shading to any areas in shadow. I work my way round the head in a spiral. By carefully studying my subject, I build up the shadows through shading and use them to help plot the outline of each petal. Shade heavily for really dark shadows and lightly for light shadows. Don't worry if it looks like a mess of scribbles, I find that colouring it in creates an illusion that distracts the viewer of the truth (hopefully).

Stage Four

Colour the whole of your rose with a light layer of yellow. This acts as a foundation for the rest of your colour layers that are bulit on top of it.

Stage Five

Once the whole rose is yellow, you can start layering on the other colours. As you may know, I'm using pencil crayons. The petals had a layer of orange over the yellow and then I layered over that with red and on top of that, I use a darker red to highlight the shadows and creases on and between the petals to make it appear more 3D. The stem is brown and the leaves are green, leaving the veins yellow. I use a bit of black crayon to highlight the dark areas on both stem and leaves to finish the drawing off.

And that is how to draw a rose. I wish you a happy Valentine's Day and I hope you will draw something nice for your love one. Until next time, good luck with your drawings!