Try This - Flowers in Shallow Bowl

Updated July 2009

First, please read my post, "Anybody Can Draw," if you haven't already. And please don't copy my drawing - but do feel free to use it to inspire your own.

This drawing looks complicated, but it's not. It is time consuming to draw and color, but you may find that you enjoy the process (I know I did). To try it, draw a 4x6" rectangle, or use an unruled 4x6" index card.

With pencil, very lightly draw a shallow bowl shape, a little more than 1" high. (Look at the right side of my bowl for its height, because the left and center is partly covered with flowers.) Or, to get a more symmetrical shape, fold a piece of paper or an index card (lined paper will make it easier) and cut straight across the top and bottom, with a curve for the sides. Unfold it and trace around it lightly with pencil.

Next, about halfway down the side of the bowl, lightly draw a straight horizontal pencil line for the table top. Do NOT ink your bowl or table lines yet.

Now switch to ink. Draw a few flowers scattered above your bowl. My flowers have circles or ovals for their centers, just big enough to color, with 6-8 wedge-shaped petals. Try curving both ends of the petals.

Continue drawing with lots of similar flower shapes in varying sizes. I have dozens of flowers, but you can do fewer. Don't try to make all your flowers identical, just similar. Let some flowers overlap the bowl or table lines.

Be sure to show some flowers from a side view, by drawing a narrow oval center (vertical or horizontal) with very short petals on one side.

Add some stem lines in the blank areas between your flowers, and some pointed oval leaves poking out of the mass of flowers.

Ink the bowl shape and the table line, where they are not covered with flowers. Before coloring, gently erase any pencil lines that are still visible. Add a pattern to the bowl or table top if you like. My coloring was complex for the flowers, but simple coloring would also look good.

Color. Enjoy.

For more drawings to try, click on "try this" just below, or in the menu bar in my blog header, or in the label list on the right.