Draw a Shiny Ornament in Six Steps

Ornament drawn with graphite pencil.

Draw this ornament with graphite pencil. To help create a shiny looking texture, I worked with sharp pencils points to make this hatches for this ornament. Here are the supplies you’ll need:

  • Drawing Pencils – B and 2B
  • Drawing Paper marked “smooth.”
  • Kneaded Rubber Eraser
  • Electric Eraser (For the small reflection details.)
Ornament Line Drawing 1
Ornament Line Drawing 1

Step 1
Shiny ornaments are challenging to draw because of all the reflections.

To keep things simple, I chose a round, gold colored ornament. I placed it in lighting that cast one clear shadow, got comfortable, and started to draw.

Using a B pencil, I drew a circle and added a cap.

Ornament Line Drawing 2
Ornament Line Drawing 2

Step 2
Next I added the hook and the shape of the shadow the ornament was casting.

To help myself draw those lines in their correct positions, I drew the negative spaces between them and the ornament. For instance, while drawing the hook, I paid more attention to capturing the shape between it and the ornament than to the hook itself.

Ornament Line Drawing 3
Ornament Line Drawing 3

Step 3
Then I drew in the shapes of the largest and most clearly defined shadows and highlights.

I saw three major shapes on the ornament and two on its cap. Each of these areas had many more reflections, shadows, and highlights within, but I ignored those smaller details.

Ornament Shading 1
Ornament Shading 1

Step 4
Still using the B pencil, I hatched in each area of the ornament and its cast shadow.

I made the hatching in each area a value that was between the darkest and lightest values within it.

The dark round top on the ornament body is the reflection of the room I was drawing in. In the last drawing, you will see the windows in that room as details in the reflection.

Ornament Shading 2
Ornament Shading 2

Step 5
Switching to the 2B pencil, I hatched in the darkest values of each area like this:

On the top of the ornament, the edges were the darkest part and gradated to a lighter center point. There were some mid-dark reflections in this area that I hatched around.

The middle section was darker near the edges and gradated to a lighter value near the middle, too. I added the reflection of the hook, curving it a little to make it follow the form of the ball.

The bottom of the ornament was also the darkest near the edges.

The cap had dark areas on both sides, down the middle, and where it met the ball.

The shadow cast by the ornament was darkest near the ball’s bottom edge. There was a secondary shadow between the ball and the cap that I hatched in. I darkened the hook and added a cast shadow underneath it.

Ornament Shading 3
Ornament Shading 3

Step 6
To finish, I added the highlight details as follows:

I used a kneaded eraser pinched into a point to lift out the next to the brightest highlights on the ornament’s top. Then I used my battery powered eraser to lift out the brightest highlights. Because erasers aren’t exact, I used a sharp pencil to reshape the highlights.

Using my kneaded eraser, I gently lifted out a soft highlight in the middle section of the ornament on the left side, just past center.

I used my battery powered eraser to tap out the little highlight reflections in the cap and added a thin loop of wire at the top of the cap, too. I reshaped all those details with a sharp pencil and added a little value to them if they were too light.