The First Step: Shade and Shadow

What are shade and shadow?
What is the difference between them, and how are they similar?

Both shade and shadow are related to light and how it affects and is affected by the surroundings.

In this simple diagram, you can see the difference between them. Light shines on the vase, casting a shadow to one side, leaving the surface in varying degrees of shade in relation to the light, the furthest area from the light being the darkest, closest being lightest.
Shade and shadow are clearly related to each other, but still manage to be different.

Exercise:
To put this into practice, for starters, get used to shading. Try shading a rectangle for now. Just start at one side and shade to the other, using different gradations of shading.
Try and make the transitions as smooth as possible.


Just a simple exercise to try to get used to shading. Don't laugh at my examples! Just try it.

Shading is an important part of drawing. It helps to show the 3rd dimension when drawing in 2D. Shading is indispensable when trying to draw the illusion of a real shape on a flat piece of paper.
The things we see everyday are not just made up of lines. To portray what we see, we must be able to interpret both shade and shadow with a pencil and paper.