How to draw · Challenge · about 45 minutes

One-Point-Perspective Street

You need: Paper, Pencil, Eraser, Ruler. Optional: Colored pencils: brick red, tan, blue and gray.

Thick lines: draw these now. Thin gray: already drawn. Dashed: light guides you erase later.

Finished

1. Use a ruler to draw a light horizon line across your paper, a little below the middle. It shows your eye level: the height of your eyes in the picture.
2. Mark a dot on the horizon line near the middle. This is the vanishing point: every line that runs straight away from you meets here.
3. Draw the two edges of the road with a ruler, from the vanishing point out to the edges of your paper. Lines that aim at the vanishing point are called orthogonals.
4. Start with the nearest thing: a lamp post on the right sidewalk. Draw a tall vertical pole, an arm reaching over the road and a small lamp.
5. From the top and the bottom of the pole, draw two light guide lines to the vanishing point. Every lamp post of the same height fits between them.
6. Draw three more lamp posts between the guides, each one shorter and closer to the last. Then erase the two guides.
7. Draw the front corner of the nearest building on each side as a tall vertical line. Add flat lines from its top and bottom out to the paper edge.
8. From the bottom of each corner, draw a ruler line toward the vanishing point. This is where the buildings meet the sidewalk.
9. From the top of each corner, draw toward the vanishing point too, and stop where you want the first building to end.
10. Left side: draw a vertical line where the first building ends. Make the next one taller: its roof line also aims at the vanishing point. Add a third, lower one.
11. Right side: build the row the same way. A vertical line ends each building, and every roof line aims at the vanishing point.
12. Draw a building across the far end of the street. It faces you, so it is a plain rectangle with flat and vertical lines and no orthogonals.
13. Draw light floor guides across each building, aimed at the vanishing point. They split the walls into a ground floor and upper floors.
14. Draw windows between the floor guides. Sides are vertical, tops and bottoms aim at the vanishing point. Farther windows get thinner and closer together.
15. On each ground floor, draw a door and a wide shop window, using the same rules: vertical sides, tops and bottoms aimed at the vanishing point.
16. Erase the floor guides.
17. Draw the dashed line down the middle of the road. Each dash aims at the vanishing point, and the dashes get shorter and closer as they go back.
18. Erase the horizon line and the vanishing point. The orthogonals still show where they were.
19. The sun is on the left, so the building walls on the left side face away from it. Shade them with even vertical lines: a middle value.
20. Shade the windows and doors darkest with tight lines. Leave the sunny walls on the right white: light, middle and dark values make it look solid.

Practice here

Tip: Keep the vanishing point sharp and small: every orthogonal should pass exactly through it.

Tracing worksheet

One-Point-Perspective Street: trace it, then draw your own

Trace over the light lines.

Now draw it on your own.