Tutorial Step by Step:

Woodland walk as autumn approaches in Pastel

Step 1

To help establish dark tones instantly work on a dark background. Using a pastel paper with good tooth allows more application of pastel without slippage. First sketch basic land line and road position with spectrum blue. Start at the bottom of the paper. To create perspective the lines of the road should slope closer together.

Step 2

Introduce first marks and positions for the main tree trunks with Indigo Blue. This can be done freely, so don’t worry about perfection at this stage. Add some spectrum blue to the trees in the background and smudge a little with your finger or a blending tool.

Step 3

To create a sky use a mixture of white and spectrum blue and smudge/move around to cover the top of the paper. You can leave some of the paper untouched if you want some of the deeper colour to show through. At this time you start to develop the roadside banking by adding shadows cast by the trees. Add in more tree trunks to make the forest thicker using dark violet and Prussian blue.

Step 4

Now start to add foliage in at the side of the road. Use a selection of may green, dark olive, Zinc yellow, indigo, Terre Verte, forest green and olive green. When drawing foliage consider the size of each leaf; they are smaller in the distance and at top of trees and larger lower down and in the foreground. Add some spectrum blue to the road and foliage at the end of the road.

Step 5

Add warm autumn colours into the foliage with crimson lake, terracotta, burnt sienna, burnt carmine and deep cadmium. If required add more branches into sky using dark violet and then add more foliage higher on the page.

Step 6

Apply final touches by strengthening darker tones for impact where necessary and then use ivory black on the darkest side of the foreground trees to complete the scene.

Step 7

The completed pastel with depth and colour.