How To Draw An Oak Tree

Let’s learn how to draw an Oak Tree. I was looking for the ideal shape that would represent a very old oak tree.

I found this spectacular Angel Oak Tree.

They say it is 400 - 500 years old…well, I believe it may be even older. 800 years old.

Wow!

If this Oak Tree could speak…

Have you seen the movie “The Man Who Planted Trees”?

I don’t know why, but this movie came to my mind while I was drawing this Oak Tree.

If you love trees, especially oak trees go to youtube and watch that 30min movie.

It’s worth every minute of your time.

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I hope you’ll like the bizarre shape of this Angel Oak Tree as much as I do.

You can hardly find better shape than this one.

It is a perfect drawing subject if you want to learn how to draw an Oak tree.

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Draw An Oak Tree Step By Step

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Decide first the entire size of the oak tree you are going to draw.

Notice that both (right and left) sides of the tree aren’t equal. It might be because of age but it looks very natural a great as a drawing theme.

Roughly sketch the coordinates and a half circle as you see on the picture.

These will be the guidelines you’ll be using to draw an Oak tree of the best possible natural shape and balance.

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Observe the ready-made picture, or any other photo and outline the main trunk and the limbs of the Oak Tree.

Use an HB pencil.

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Outline the branches only by a single pencil line. You can use side of the pencil in order to get better control over the initial sketch.

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Outline the contours of the limbs. It looks instantly better now.

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Using the initial half circle as a guideline, outline the rough contours of the foliage.

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Although I wanted to draw an oak tree as realistic as possible, it is sometimes difficult to draw exactly every detail if the plant is so enormously huge like this one.

This especially applies for leaves. So I simply outlined them but did not draw too many details.

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I would suggest concentrating on details on the trunk. That would be the best place to suggest the details.

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You can start to play with the bark pattern on the trunk and the limbs.

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To draw an oak tree as realistic as possible, take your time and work out the patterns on the bark as precisely as possible.

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Here I used the pen-shaped-eraser and partially erased the pattern on the bark.

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Continue to shade the pattern on the bark.

Notice that the lines on the bark pattern are parallel with the direction of growth.

This is important.

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Begin to work out the foliage. There isn’t any special recipe to do this, since you cannot do many details on this drawing.

Rugged and curved lines can outline leaves and the entire foliage as you see on the picture. If you have a better idea go ahead and use it.

Each time you draw an oak tree, make your drawing better than mine. That is the purpose of this website.

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Now, take a 2B or 4B pencil (if you don’t have one, use your HB pencil) and add darker tone into the foliage.

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As you see by now, the foliage looks too complex to draw every detail.

So again, I used a pen shaped eraser to erase the sharp pencil strokes and to soften the entire image.

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There are still many spots in the foliage that tend to remain white (blank) so you can use gentle pencil strokes and fill them up.

Finally, I used the side of 4B pencil to shade the foliage and add some final touch to the bark pattern on the trunk.

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