Tuesday Tutorial: How NOT to draw Silhouettes

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When you read most instructional books on drawing, the advice given about drawing silhouettes is usually: draw in your figure as if it's not going to be a silhouette, then silhouette the drawing.

That's terrible advice.

A silhouette has to convey all the usual information about a figure solely through the outline. If you draw in the whole figure you cannot tell if that information is coming through until you fill the whole thing in, at which time it will be too late.

Take your favorite illustration and fill in the figures. Do they still read? Do they still work the same way? Now go find a great silhouette and fill in the details of the figure. Do they make sense?

The fact is, what works as a silhouette may not work as a fully fleshed-in drawing, and vice versa. You need to draw the silhouette AS a silhouette to make sure your pose, your details and your composition all work AS a silhouette. Those interior lines you're relying on are giving you a false impression of what your final drawing will convey.

By all means, if you need to sketch in the rest of the figure to help you figure out proportions or anatomy, do so. But as quickly as you can, get rid of those interior lines. It doesn't matter if the figure looks good with all those interior lines drawn in, does it?

Also: Another pitfall to avoid when drawing silhouettes is looking at the inside of the outline. Most artists, when they draw, they see the inside edge of their outlines as the edge of their object. But when that object is filled in, it'll be the outer edge that is seen. Make sure that outer edge is the one that has all the right details and proportions. Use the thinnest line you can to make sure your outer line is true.

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