How To Draw How To Draw Flowers

Guide for Drawing Flowers with Pens

Updated: 01 February 2022

Guide for drawing flowers with pen and ink

In this guide, I demonstrate how to draw any flower, from simple to complex, using a pen.

Well-executed flower pen-cartoon is all well-nigh accuracy of the structure (class), with attending to foreshortening and overlapping.

Concept Art

First affair get-go, exercise not use concept images that are protected by copyright law.

In case someone likes your cartoon and wants to buy information technology, information technology is best to utilize images that are costless for ANY use.

Hither are some websites that let you lot download Costless stock images:

Pixabay

Unsplash

Pexels

StockSnap.io

FREEIMAGES

*Taking your own photos is the all-time solution to create unique drawings and compositions.

How to Create Smooth Lines with a Pen

For a pen drawing to look nice, draw each mark with conviction. Significant, a smooth line.

That is easier said than done!

With time and practice, the lines will flow. Until then, beginning with a pencil.

The advantage of a pencil is that it is erasable. Therefore, you tin gear up mistakes until yous are happy with the result.

So take hold of your reference image and draw it with a pencil. Draw it gently, so it volition be piece of cake to erase later.

Note:

The pencil drawing does non accept to be perfect. Call back that nature is abstract. There are no two identical flowers.

Pencil sketch of a hellebore flower from reference Reference prototype & pencil sketch

Once the pencil-sketch is ready, it is easy to go over it with a pen. Do it in a confident and smooth style, even if the pen marks are not exactly on height of the pencil marks.

When drawing with a pen, it is of import to pay attention to overlap.

Draw the foreground parts first. In this example, depict the stamens outset, and merely and so depict the petals.

Afterwards the ink from the pen is dry (usually less than a minute, depending on the pen make), it is safe to gently erase the pencil-cartoon marks.

Pen and ink drawing of a hellebore flower Hellebore flower pen drawing

How to Describe a Complex Bloom

Some flowers or compositions are quite circuitous. You should pay attending to proportions, foreshortening, and perspective.

This is also much to deal with when starting to draw.

A solution to this problem is to create a grid of guidelines. Then, instead of ane complex image, you lot have several smaller and simpler images.

To find the middle point of an image, describe two diagonal lines from the image corners.

Next, draw horizontal and vertical lines from the midpoint.

Finding the center of an image Finding the centre & creating a grid

Do the aforementioned for the drawing-paper. Make sure the ratio between height and width is the aforementioned for both the reference image and the drawing-newspaper.

You can crop the reference paradigm to get the aforementioned ratio.

Now it is easier to draw with a pencil.

Note:

If the image is yet complex for y'all, you can go on calculation grid lines for each rectangle.

Pencil drawing of a lily flower Drawing with a pencil

Remember to apply the pencil gently. It will be easier to erase after you draw with a pen.

Pen and ink lily flower drawing Lily blossom pen drawing

Good to know:

If you do not fully sympathise terms like overlapping, perspective, and foreshortening, I highly recommend reading my guide on drawing the illusion of depth.

Which Pen to Use for Drawing Flowers

While it is possible to draw or sketch with a regular pen, there are many advantages for using pens for artists.

These pens are called fineliners or technical pens, and their ink is normally black, though some brands offer additional colors (more on that later).

Fineliner pens for drawing flowers Fineliners

Pens for artists create lines of uniform thickness, and they come in different sizes, therefore enabling to draw thick contour lines, or thin lines for details.

The ink for these pens is fabricated of pigments and therefore very durable.

To learn more about which pen to utilize, visit my review for recommended pen brands for drawing.

Line Width & Size

When drawing with a pencil, you can depict soft edges for far away objects.

Pens have one brightness value, and therefore cannot produce soft edges.

Instead, yous can use a pen with a smaller nib size to create thinner lines for background objects, and bigger nib size to create thicker lines for foreground objects.

Using different nib sizes to draw flowers Different nib sizes

Using lines with dissimilar thickness to add together depth:

Pen and ink tulip flowers drawing Tulip flowers

Another way to add together depth is with size.

When drawing in perspective, the farther away an object is, the smaller it looks.

For that reason, draw bigger flowers in the foreground, and smaller flowers in the background.

Sunflower pen and ink drawing Sunflowers

Tip:

To add depth, depict the background flower smaller, utilize a pen with smaller nib size for it, and make the foreground bloom overlap it.

Hatching and Crosshatching

Hatching is a cartoon technique that uses parallel lines.

A pen produces lines with one brightness value (usually dark).

In order to create the illusion of unlike effulgence values, meaning areas that wait lighter and areas that wait darker, use different types of hatching.

Hatching and crosshatching types Hatching types

Utilize sparse hatching lines for light areas.

By using unlike degrees of crosshatching, yous tin can create the illusion of different brightness values:

Hibiscus flower pen drawing using hatching Hibiscus flower

Line Types with Pens

As mentioned above, a pen has a single brightness value, but when belongings a pen in a sharp angle, information technology can produce a less defined line, and therefore create a second effulgence value, which is lighter.

This does not piece of work with all pen brands, or on super smoothen paper.

For this to piece of work, depict swift yet gentle strokes (do non press hard).

Holding a pen in different angle Pen property angle

Case:

Pen and ink drawing of a rose flower Rose flower

How to Add Insects

Drawing takes fourth dimension.

Trying a new thing, like adding insects or other objects, can exist risky.

A applied way to deal with this situation is to first by drawing the new object.

Pen drawing of a ladybug Drawing a ladybug

When the result is successful, you can go along drawing.

Pen drawing of narcissus flowers & a ladybug Narcissus flowers

To describe insects, visit my insect drawing guide.

Keeping it Simple

Sometimes, but a few lines can be more than plenty.

It is possible to draw lines with a short line or a dot at the end, suggesting a line that gradually disappears.

Types of lines with pen Dots and short lines

The middle part of a bloom may seem complicated to draw.

The way to draw it, is to look at the bones shapes it is made of, and their direction.

How to draw the middle of a flower Paying attention to shapes and management

After cartoon the basic shapes, it is important to look at brightness values.

For areas that wait darker, draw more than lines to create the illusion of darker brightness values.

Common daisy flower pen drawing Common daisy

The next instance is a step-by-stride cartoon for a Muscari constitute (grape hyacinth).

It usually has some closed flowers and some open flowers, so practice both:

Step-by-step drawing for muscari flower Flowers step-by-step

Now you tin draw the whole plant.

Muscari pen drawing, aka grape hyacinth Muscari pen cartoon

Ink Color

Pen drawing is not limited to blackness ink. Every bit mentioned above, some brands offer additional colors.

Nevertheless, the drawing process is similar.

First, focus on accurate drawing. Pay attention to foreshortening and overlapping.

Then, get the brightness values right. Call up, depict more lines to create the illusion of darker values.

Lastly, some artistic license is more welcome.

Blue ink example:

Drawing of an anemone blanda flower with blue pen Anemone blanda bloom

Red ink example:

Anthurium flower drawing with a red pen Anthurium flower

Remember, endeavour to be as accurate as possible and so focus on brightness values.

Brand sure there is enough contrast between calorie-free and nighttime areas. That style, the drawing volition stand out.

Sepia ink case:

Argyranthemum, margerite with sepia pen drawing Marguerite flower

Foreshortening

The object in front of you looks smaller when it is far, but it keeps the ratio between height and width.

Foreshortening is a distortion that occurs when looking at an object (or a aeroplane) along the line of sight.

In this case, you lot can see how a remote control looks shorter in height than in width, equally yous look at information technology along your line of sight:

Distortion of a remote control by foreshortening Foreshortened remote command

When drawing flowers, pay attention to foreshortening in club for the drawing to look realistic, and interesting!

Side view flower pen drawing Foreshortened bloom

In many cases, some petals are foreshortened, while others are less foreshortened.

Pen drawing of a Gazania flower Gazania flower

Contrast & Image Editing

Dissimilarity is essential for an appealing drawing or painting.

The blackness of a technical pen on the whiteness of a drawing-paper will produce contrast.

The problem lies when taking a photo.

For me, the best time to take a photograph is at daylight. Merely, when completing a drawing at evening or night, I am eager to upload it to my website or to social networks.

My apartment lighting is less than ideal, and it produces a warm, weak low-cal, resulting in a yellowish flat photo.

To fix that, I use an image graphic editor (Whatever image editing software will work) to subtract saturation and increase dissimilarity. Problem solved!

Lotus flower pen and ink drawing Lotus blossom

Killing information technology on Social Media

To succeed on social media, you take to consider many factors. For example, practiced content or SEO.

After analyzing successful flower-drawing Instagram accounts, I found a few tips and techniques that work.

1. Draw bold!

Meaning, depict thick, noticeable contour lines:

Poppy flower pen and ink drawing Poppy flower

2. Small images

A pen drawing has its limitation. A pocket-sized pen-drawing image looks better than a shut-upwards.

To do that, take a photo of your blossom cartoon (or sketch), including its surrounding.

For instance, the actual flower you used as reference, a step-by-step process, pens you lot used, and so on.

In add-on, recall that most people use their smartphone for social networks, then a tall image occupies more screen space, and therefore has more presence.

Snowdrop flowers pen and ink drawing Snowdrop flowers (Galanthus)

iii. Describe big

Drawing on a big paper sail, like size A4, allows you to add together more than details so, the small photo for your cartoon volition look more refined.

That said, unproblematic drawings with trivial detail-work, do well also.

Go on in listen:

Complex flowers or compositions are challenging and time-consuming, fifty-fifty for experienced artists.

Carnation flower pen drawing Carnation

4. Floral fine art

Once you are comfortable drawing a specific flower, y'all can draw a full paper canvass of that blossom. (Another option is to draw several types of flowers).

Pen and ink drawing for cosmos flowers Creation floral art