• Cross hatching is the method of using black and white lines to give the illusion of tone or shade in a black and white drawing , which by definition, has only two tones or shade – Black and white

    Hatching is filling in an area with parallel lines to create an illusion of tone or shade.

    Adding another layer of lines, drawn in a different direction, gives the illusion of a darker shade.

    Adding more layers in different directions, darkens the filled area more with each layer.

    Used simply it is a way of filling areas with tone or shade.

    Used creatively, cross hatching can also give the illusion or impression of depth or 3Dness.

    It requires fine motor skills, patience and persistence to learn to draw lines at equal distances and make the tonal vale look even.

    Practice a little bit everyday and you will soon be a master of Coss hatching.

  • Archimedes lived over 2,000 years ago in Syracuse on the island of Sicily.

    He was a mathematician, astronomer, physicist, engineer and inventor.

    Many of his great inventions came about while defending Syracuse when it came under attack from the Romans.

    Click here for signed copies with free poster.

    The leader of the Roman army was Marcus Claudius Marcellus. Eventually Marcellus won the war. Archimedes died in the Siege of Syracuse, even though Marcellus had given strict orders that Archimedes should be captured alive. Marcellus admired the genius and knew that he had more invention to offer the world. Who knows how history may have changed if Archimedes had lived to live the rest of his life in peaceful study and contemplation?

    In this book, Marcus Claudius Marcellus looks back on his life and explains to his young son exactly why Archimedes was possibly the cleverest person that ever lived.

    Here are a few videos that show you how to draw Archimedes and how to get to grips with drawing circles and spheres, the subjects that fascinated Archimedes so much, a fascination that led him to his greatest invention Pi – the number that lets us work out the circumference of circles and the area of the surface of a sphere.

  • I was asked how to draw a 3d landscape from a 2d garden plan. So many people have asked me about landscapes in the backgrounds of drawing that I thought it was about time a made a video about it.

    I am very spatially aware, so most of this comes to me without thinking. I can look at a floor plan and do a sketch for you, but not everyone can.

    The way to do it is by making a floor plan and then transposing it to a 3d perspective plan and work it out from there.

    You can download a Hi res scan pdf of the images on my Patreon page.