10 Drawing Photo Selection

Selecting a Photo for Your Drawing

Your photograph (not a drawing or cartoon) must be printed on an 8X11 sheet of paper and fill or almost fill the page. YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR PRINTING

Choose a subject matter that means something to you.
It can be a person, place, thing, hobby, sport, food, pet, animal, object, etc.

Some Photo Sites Besides Google Images
Unsplash
Pexels

More importantly, choose a good photograph. Here are some tips:

Avoid photos that are:

Too washed out. (not enough middle greys)

Only 3 values (not enough middle greys)

Trees are tricky and there are not enough values

Buildings and Cityscapes are tricky and not super fun to draw as a tonal drawing.

You must use a high quality image. It cannot be blurry or pixellated. If using Google Images to make sure it is high quality select the TOOLS bar and then under SIZE select LARGE. See below. This will then display only large quality images. See below:

Once you have found a photo you must actually click VIEW IMAGE and then FILE SAVE AS. Do not just save the icon or it will be blurry.

You can select a color photo and print it in black and white but the photographer did not intend this so make sure that it actually looks good once the color is removed.

Pretty Flowers

Not so Pretty Flowers because without the color it is dull and doesn't have the highlights that make a great photo.

These floral photos but were shot in black & white so the photographer paid attention to highlights and lowlights and all the values in between.

Don't be intimidated by drawing people. It's totally doable. However, close ups are better. Group shots are not good. These are all good.

Look for photos that have some personality or a different perspective.

Animals with fur are more difficult than those with skin. That being said, we've seen some successful furballs in the past. If selecting or taking a pet photo go for personality shots. These two photos are of lovely cats but lack personality. The background is plain and perspective typical.