Bring your drawings to life with smooth, realistic shading.
Imagine looking forward to the shading stage of your drawing.
You feel calm, focused, and confident. You reach for the ideal pencil without second-guessing. Your hand glides across the page, creating subtle transitions and lifelike depth and dimension.
You know how to create believable light and shadows, and how to smooth out uneven values.
Your drawing comes alive before your very eyes. You can almost reach into the paper and pick up the 3D object you’ve drawn.
This confident, flowing shading experience isn’t just for “naturals” or pros. It’s a skill that you can learn:
"The Techniques I Now Use in Every Drawing"
"I was attracted to this course by the exquisite, smooth, soft shading Marina achieves in her eye drawings. In contrast, my own shading was grainy, choppy, patchy, with similar edges overall, and no clear separation of dark and light values in the right places.
In this course, Marina taught me that we begin to shade by learning to see and organize values. She then introduced me to shading techniques that yield beautiful, soft, even value transitions throughout the drawing, and I use them for all of my drawings now.
I draw with new confidence having acquired these new skills.
Marina is an absolute gem of a teacher! I heartily recommend this course to anyone seeking quality art education in representational drawing."
-Tepor E., Graduate of Intro to Smooth Shading and the Eye Drawing Intensive
In this 6-module video course, you'll learn the essential components of smooth, realistic shading, and practice each one through targeted, focused exercises.
You'll develop the technical skills, knowledge, and modes of seeing that make smooth shading not only possible - but enjoyable.
Curriculum: Intro to Smooth Shading in Graphite
Module 1:
Shading Smooth, Even Values and Gradations
Build the foundation of realistic shading by learning how to control your pencil and apply smooth, even values.
You’ll explore graphite pencil grades, practice three essential shading techniques, and learn how to draw value scales and smooth gradations.
You’ll also discover what causes scratchy, uneven shading - and how to fix it with simple evening-out techniques.
Module 2:
Simplifying and Organizing Values
Learn how to see like an artist by understanding how light behaves on form, and how to translate that into simplified, organized values.
You’ll explore a core concept that makes realistic shading much easier, then put it into practice with a powerful exercise designed to train your eye and strengthen your shading decisions.
Module 3:
Blending Tools & Drawing Nuanced Value Differences
In this module, you’ll explore how to see and draw subtle value differences
Plus, dive into blending tools: when to use them, when not to, and how to avoid the most common mistakes that lead to messy results.
Module 4:
Shading Convincing Edges (for Depth and Dimension)
Move beyond “flat” drawings into ones with true dimension by learning to see and draw accurate, convincing edges — a key to realistic depth and form.
You’ll train your eye to see different types of edges in your references, and practice techniques for softening, sharpening, and blending them to create a polished, three-dimensional look.
Module 5:
The Edge Design & Gradation Design Exercises
Put what you've learned about values and edges into practice with more advanced shading exercises in this module.
Then, you’ll apply everything you’ve learned to design and beautifully shade your own unique composition — a personal piece that reflects your growing skill, confidence, and vision.
Module 6:
Drawing a Realistic Sphere
Start learning the shading process, how to 'turn form' - creating the illusion of a round, three-dimensional object - and how to shade the elements of light and shadow convincingly.
Whether you want to draw the portrait or figure, shading a sphere is an essential precursor because:
All complex forms are built from combinations of simple ones, such as spheres, cubes, and cylinders. To shade complex subjects convincingly, we first need to be able to shade the basic forms they’re made of.
By the end of this course, you'll have the foundational skills you need for smooth, realistic shading. Whether you're a beginner learning how to shade for the first time, or an intermediate artist looking to elevate your shading skills - you're in the right place.
Who You'll Learn From:
Hi! I'm Marina.
I'm a professional visual artist, arts educator, former Tenure-Track college professor of visual arts, and Founder (or 'Drawing Source'ress') of TheDrawingSource.com
In my creative practice I make 'drawing installations': large-scale drawings that transform an entire space, such as the one below. (Yes, entirely hand-drawn using charcoal on white paper!)
I wasn't born with smooth shading skills! When I was learning to draw, realistic shading was the ability I most coveted. It also seemed like the most unknowable and impossible area of drawing.
So, if smooth, believable shading seems like sorcery to you – you're not alone. It’s often perceived to be a magical ability that you're either born with or not. However:
Smooth, realistic shading is an entirely learnable skill. I would love to guide you through it.
Take Intro to Smooth Shading in Graphite in The Atelier at The Drawing Source.
This course is part of a larger realistic drawing learning path. It’s the fourth course in a progressive curriculum designed to help you build strong foundational skills for realistic drawing — preparing you for more advanced subjects like the figure and portrait:
