How to Draw a Tree: Step by Step

Start with a short wide trunk near the base of the paper. From the top of the trunk, lift a few light lines for the main branches, then draw the overall outline of the canopy with a soft fluid stroke. Keep it loose. These are guideline marks, not the final tree.

The whole shape should sit comfortably on the page, with room above for the canopy and room below for the trunk and the ground shadow you will add later.

Press a little harder with the same pencil and go over the trunk edges and the start of the main branches with a more confident line. You are pinning the tree's frame to the page so everything else has something solid to hang off.

Where the branches leave the trunk, vary the line a bit so they don't look like stiff sticks. A few small bumps and bends along the way will read as natural bark structure later.

Turn the pencil onto its side and lay shading across the trunk. The light is coming from the left in this drawing, so keep the left side lighter and the right side darker. Build up to a mid-tone first, then come back and deepen the right side to a proper dark tone.

Add a few short marks for bark texture, mainly on the lighter side where they will read. The darkest part of the whole drawing should sit on the right side of the trunk and along the underside of the main branches.

Switch back to the side of the pencil and lay a mid-tone across most of the leaf area. Cover plenty of ground but leave little pockets of clean paper showing through. Those gaps will read as sunlight catching the top of the leaves.

Don't finish one section before moving on. Drift your hand around the whole canopy as you shade so the tree develops together, not in patches. Right side a bit denser than the left because of where the light is coming from.

Pick up the pencil tip and add the inner branches that peek through the gaps in the canopy. The trick is to break each branch into short segments rather than drawing it as one continuous dark line. Leaves will sit in front of parts of the branch, hiding it.

Vary the thickness too. Branches taper as they reach the edge of the tree, so the tips should be much thinner than where they leave the trunk. Look at the tree as a whole as you draw each one so they all relate.

Lay the pencil almost flat on its side and drag a soft tone over much of the canopy. This blends the patches you have already made and stops anything looking too cut out. Keep some areas untouched so the tree still has bright spots.

Once the surface is softened, switch to the tip and pick out small patches of deep dark in among the leaves, especially on the right side. Run a kneaded eraser around lightly to lift a few highlights back out. Light, dark, light, dark - that contrast is what makes the tree feel three-dimensional.

Sharpen your pencil and draw a low horizon line behind the trunk. Above it, sketch a thin row of distant trees with a light tone so they sit back in space. A sharp pencil tip gives them crisp dark edges without making them compete with the main tree.

Below the trunk, on the left and right where it meets the ground, lay a dark shadow that stretches a little to the right. The shadow grounds the tree so it stops floating on the page. Once the shadow is in, step back. If you can't see what else to do, you're done.