Step By Step: Drawing An Old Stump With Pen And Ink

March 31, 2019

Bark texture is ideally suited for drawing with pen and ink and one of really fun drawings in this regards is drawing an old tree stump with deep crevices and grooved bark. Here I will show how with simple stroke and technique you can draw one. There are limitless variations on this and one can be drawn from imagination anytime.

Step 1: Draw the Outline.

Notice the irregular edges used to draw the outline.

Step 2: Draw Main Crevices

Main aspect of an old stump are deep grooves and crevices in it's body with age. Draw them as shown below with bigger towards the centre and smaller towards the edge. Use the irregular outline and taper them. Also add them irregularly to avoid any pattern.

Step 3: Darken Crevices

Darken the crevices using parallel lines or you can even use a brush.

Step 4: Add Bark Stroke

Add bark stroke to bring out the feel of bark on the stump. Bark stroke is discussed in detail in drawing tree trunk tutorial.

Step 5: Add Small Tapered Crevices and Edge Irregularities

Add small tapered crevices by darkening the bark lines as shown below. Make it irregular. This starts to bring out the feel of rough bark texture on the stump.

Step 6: Darken One Side More

Darken one side more to bring out the feel of roundness for the stump. Light doesn't fall uniformly on a curved surface and such tonal differences are needed to bring out the form of a curved object. This is discussed in detail in vol 1-2 of my pen and ink drawing workbooks. Rough bark texture with deep grooves and rounded feel of stump is now established.

Step 7: Texture Roots

Use curved parallel lines as shown below to give a curved form to the roots.

Step 8: Finish

Finish by adding small tapered crevices and darkening one side of roots to bring out their form as well. This completes this drawing.

As you can see above the technique and stroke used are very simple and and by using different shape of outline and size and placement of crevices different variations on this can be easily drawn from your imagination. Following is another example.

In yet another variation, holes in the stump can be indicated to indicate further decay. Following are 2 additional examples. In the following examples, grass is added to ground the stump as well.

This completes this post. Hopefully you found it useful and motivated you to try doing such pen and ink drawings. If so, you can further check out my FREE pen and ink drawing tutorials and pen and ink drawing workbooks to learn to draw pen and ink landscapes in step by step illustrated manner.

Happy Drawing,

Rahul

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