How to Draw Spheres

Along with the cube, cylinder, cone, and pyramid, the sphere is a fundamental form that serves as a building block for rendering complex objects.

In this tutorial, I will share my step-by-step process for drawing spheres, including shading and techniques for capturing realistic textures.

Contour:

The outer contour of a sphere is a perfect circle.

If you struggle to freehand a clean circle, begin by drawing two intersecting, perpendicular lines of equal length to establish the center and outer bounds.

Alternatively, you can trace a circular object (like a coin or glass) or utilize a compass.

While tools offer precision, I personally prefer the feeling of freehand drawing; the minor imperfections add character and make the creative process far more rewarding.

Cross contour lines:

By itself, a circular outline looks completely flat - like a disc.

To create the illusion of volume and direction, you need to utilize cross-contour drawing.

By drawing lines that wrap around the sphere's curved surface, you instantly map out its three-dimensional structure before you even begin shading.

Values:

Defining the light source allows you to arrange your values effectively.

Establish the highlight at the sphere's closest point to the light, then gradually draw darker tones as you move outward.

Cast shadow:

To accurately draw the cast shadow, project two lines from your light source so that they run tangent to the outer edges of the sphere.

Keep in mind the rules of perspective:

Viewed directly from above, a sphere's cast shadow on a flat surface forms a perfect circle.

However, from a side view, the cast shadow becomes foreshortened, appearing as an ellipse.

For a deeper dive into how circular shapes distort in perspective, see my dedicated guide on how to draw round objects.

Edges:

Edges are how an area ends. It can end in a sharp (hard) way or in a blurry (soft) way.

Typically, a ball has hard (sharp) edges, while its cast shadow has soft edges.

Ambient occlusion:

Every object is built from pigments. It absorbs some wavelengths and reflects the others.

The reflected light is called ambient light.

Ambient occlusion is the area where the ambient light cannot reach (blocked). These are usually the darkest areas.

These areas are the cracks and holes between or within surfaces (for example, between the table and the floor or between the fingers), into which the scattered radiation fails to penetrate.

Core shadow:

When a ball is in the air, it has a light area and a dark area.

On the ground, or close to the ground, it may receive some reflected light from the ground.

Therefore, the darkest area of the ball is no longer the area farthest away from the light but a bit above it.

This darkest area on the ball is called a core shadow. Not to be confused with ambient occlusion, which is darker and located between the ball and the ground.

When rendering realistically, using textures, the same rules apply to the texture.

Meaning, look for light and shadow areas, ambient occlusion, core shadow, and pay attention to foreshortening of the cast shadow.

Different textures react differently to light. A texture can be shiny, reflective, matte, etc., and therefore reacts differently to light.

Remember that everything gets darker in the shadow area and lighter in the light area, including texture marks.

For more info on texturing, visit my realistic texture drawing guide.

Suggestion:

Try to draw various textures. Do not limit your textures to a ball.

Practice on other shapes, like a cylinder or a box. Make sure you draw it in perspective.

Linear perspective is arguably the most important drawing fundamental, especially for drawing from imagination.

Here is my perspective drawing guide.

All objects are subject to foreshortening!

A ball is a bit different. Its shape is always a circle; the foreshortening happens inside the ball.

Imagine a ball, which is built from planes. The center plane of the ball is in front of the observer and therefore not foreshortened.

As the other planes move to all sides, they start to be in the observer's direction of sight and become foreshortened.

In the next example, the circle for the number (8) is closer to the edge of the ball and therefore foreshortened (an ellipse).

Understanding foreshortening is crucial for drawing. You can learn that in my guide on drawing from imagination.

Another thing to pay attention to is a lost edge.

When two areas share the same brightness value, the edge between them is not visible. Hence, lost edge.

In the example below, the values of the ball and of the cast shadow are the same; therefore, the edge of the ball is NOT visible in that area.

For realistic drawing, these are my recommended drawing materials.

Different paper brands and types produce a different outcome. You can read about it in my review for drawing paper.

If you are new to realistic drawing, check out my tutorial on how to draw realism. It covers the 4 important factors.

Additionally, I highly recommend reading about these 15 methods to draw depth.

Lastly, in the next example, I drew an igloo (half a sphere) with colored pencils.

You can draw the structure as complex as you want.

Here is an example of a house on Mars, again with colored pencils.

Good to know:

Another shape, which is hard to draw, is a torus.

I created a guide on how to draw complex shapes that focuses on the torus shape.