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Elegy (stage three)
I always start by shading the face first. It's the most important part of every drawing, and if I mess up now it's still not too late to start over. I like to use mechanical pencils in 0.5 mm and 0.9 mm for the details, and a variety of regular pencils for covering larger, less detailed areas. To find out more about the brands I like to work with visit the Materials page.
I define the shadows lightly with a 2B pencil, and then darken them to desired intensity by adding more layers and blending to a smooth finish (more on blending later). Here I've pretty much finished the face (I may come back to it later though) and started working on the neck and the hair. I don't use a gazillion different grades of pencil for my graphite drawings; I only use 2H, HB, 2B, 6B (for the darkest areas), and 4H (for those really subtle, barely there shadows). I also use 4H for softening the darkest parts.
I also use a variety of smudging tools when I shade: rolled-up paper stumps and tortillons, regular q-tips, or sometimes even my fingers. I don't recommend the last one, since your skin contains oils that can affect the drawing. Nevertheless, I still do it now and then because sometimes I get so into it I simply forget that it's a no-no. If any smudging gets into the areas that are supposed to be light, I just get out my good old friend kneaded eraser. It gets rid of the mess fairly easily.
I should also mention that to prevent unnecessary mess I always use a sheet of paper under my pencil hand when I draw. That graphite residue can get onto your skin and get dragged all over the surface, soiling the drawing in the process. The sheet doesn't prevent it from happening completely, but it does diminish the mess, since graphite doesn't cling to it as much as it does it skin.
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