Point Perspective Drawing Lesson 2 - How to Draw a Circle doc

1 Point Perspective Drawing -
Lesson 2 - How to Draw a Circle



In 1 point perspective drawing lesson one, construction of a cube was the
first step that you took. What you will learn in this lesson is how to draw a
circle in perspective. This will come in handy if you ever want to draw car
tires, fountains, cylindrical buildings or anything else that uses the circle as
its base shape.
Step by step drawing of a circle in 1 point perspective.
Start off by drawing a rectangle or square in perspective just like you learned
in the first perspective drawing lesson. Establish your horizon line first, and
then add your vanishing point.

Step 2 - Start to define your box
Next draw a vertical line somewhere on the page - for the purposes of this
tutorial it will work best if the vertical line you draw and your vanishing
point are not too close. Now, draw lines from the top and bottom of this
vertical line back towards your vanishing point.

Finish off by drawing one more vertical inbetween the two lines that you just
drew. The next thing you'll do is learn how to great a helper grid in 1 point
perspective. Perspective grids are extremely helpful when you want to draw
any kind of curved or irregular shape in perspective.
Step 3 - Find the mid point of your shape
In 1 point perspective drawing it's really important that you know how to
find the mid point. Draw a diagonal line from each corner to make an "X"
inside your box. Where the lines meet will always be the middle point of the
shape.

From this point onward in the tutorial you will see a second square on the
left side of the image that shows how your drawing would look if it were not
in perspective. Use this image to help you understand what is happening in
your 1 point perspective drawing, as the images are identical in construction
- the only difference being is that one has perspective applied to it to add
depth, and the other doesn't.
Step 4 - Divide your box into four parts
Now that you've found the mid point of your box draw a vertical line that
passes through the mid point. Next, draw a line that passes horizontally
through your midpoint and goes back to the vanishing point on the 1 point
perspective horizon line. What you will be left with is a box that has been
divided into 4 equal parts.

Step 5 - Find the mid-point again
Use the same diagonal line technique to find your mid points of the four
smaller boxes. You may be asking yourself what you're doing right now -
this was supposed to be a circle drawing tutorial right? I hear you! The
reason that it's important to first construct a 1 point perspective grid is that
you will use it later as a guide for drawing your circle. The grid will set you
up to get the best result possible, especially if you are new to drawing in
perspective.

Step 6 - Add in additional horizontal and vertical lines
Repeat what you did in step 4 by adding in the lines that will leave you with
16 little boxes. In the next step you will draw the circle.

Step 7 - Draw a circle in perspective
Here's where all of your hard work in constructing a 1 point perspective grid
is going to pay off. Look at the square in the bottom left of the step 7 image.
You can see the construction grid that you created and it now has a circle

drawn on top of it. You can also see the circle drawn in perspective.
Pay careful attention to look at where the circle is passing through the guide
lines in your perspective grid on the left. Your ability to match what you see
in the two images will determine how well your circle looks.
Look closely at the top left area of the circle on the left. Take note of the
exact points where the lines of the circle cross the lines of that perspective
grid. Once you have a clear idea of where your circle should cross which
lines, go to your perspective grid, and before you draw anything, put a
small point on each of the lines that the circle crosses over exactly at the
point where the circle meets the line. I'll say thing again because it's very
important. How accurately you are able to match what you see in the
drawing on the left to the drawing on the right will determine the success of
your drawing.
Remember too that if it doesn't look good the first time, try it again and
again until it does look good. The first time I tried this technique I didn't
have a lot of success, but after repeating the process a few times I was able
to draw a circle without a problem.

If you are having a lot of problems you could find the midpoint one more
time and create an even smaller and more exact grid. This may be a good
idea in the beginning. Drawing more grid lines requires a little extra time,
but if that's what it takes for you to master the concept don't sell yourself
short. Put in the work today and by tomorrow drawing circles should feel
completely natural.
Step 8 - Cleaning up
Erase the lines that you made to create your perspective grid. And you're left
with a great looking circle that's drawn in one point perspective.