How to Use Tracing Paper for Drawing (It's Not Cheating!)

By Carol Leather

Have you ever wondered if learning to use tracing paper is cheating or just another artistic technique?

The question comes up all the time in online art groups, and people tend to fall into two camps: tracing is cheating, or tracing is a tool. Whatever your feelings, tracing paper is useful whatever stage you've reached. A traced outline gets the shapes in the right place, so your time and energy go into the part that makes the drawing yours.

When someone asks me, "Did you trace it or draw it freehand?", I normally answer "Yes." That usually earns me a blank look, so this page explains what I mean. Then it walks you through four ways to transfer an outline, and how to clean up the smudges afterwards.

1. Trace the outline. Lay the tracing paper over your reference and draw the main outlines with a soft pencil (a 2B works well).
2. Shade the back. Turn the paper over and scribble graphite over the backs of those lines.
3. Transfer onto your paper. Lay it graphite-side down and go over the outlines again with a sharp pencil to print them onto your drawing paper.

The Benefits of Tracing

Tracing is useful at every stage of learning coloured pencil, but it does a different job depending on where you are.

For Beginners:

Practising the basic skills will help you far more in the long run than worrying about whether tracing counts. A traced outline lets you spend your drawing time on layering, pressure and value, which is where the learning happens. It also makes you look closely at how the shapes fit together, and that's good practice for your eye.

For Intermediate Artists:

If you can already draw but want to learn coloured pencil techniques, tracing the basic shapes from a tutorial or your own photo saves a lot of time. You can also lay tracings over one another to try out a composition, check proportions, and move elements around until the layout works.

For Experienced Artists:

If you work on commission, time is money, and anything that saves time without costing quality is worth using. A tracing keeps a complex composition accurate, and turning it over gives you a mirror image for a symmetrical design.

Tracing vs freehand drawing: why not both?

Tracing and freehand drawing aren't opposites. I use both, and always in the same order.

When I work from a photo reference, I don't trace the photo itself. I start with a freehand sketch in my sketchbook or on cheap paper, trying out different compositions. Shall I include that? Is this necessary? When I'm happy with it, I go over the lines I want to keep with a darker line. Only then does the tracing paper come out, and I trace my own sketch.

My sketches and tracings aren't accurate records of where every hair goes on a dog, or every leaf on a tree. The lines are there to fix the size and position of the important elements. I might mark:

• the edges of a patch of coloured fur
• the angle of the nose
• where the twinkle is in an eye

Once the outline is transferred, I put the tracing to one side. When the drawing is nearly finished, I lay it back over the top to check the important elements are still in the right places and haven't migrated while I worked. If something has drifted, I can correct it.

A tracing of the finished piece is useful in another way too. When I write a tutorial, it becomes the template, so your starting outline matches where my drawing ended up, not the mistakes in my first sketch.

How to use tracing paper

There are four ways to transfer an outline with tracing paper. They all do the same job, so choose the one that suits your drawing and the paper you're working on.

If you'd rather not trace at all, the grid system is the other reliable way to get an accurate outline.

Method 1: The Classic Three-Step Process

You probably used this method at school, so think of this as a recap. Start with thick, good-quality tracing paper. Thin paper creases and tears, which is frustrating halfway through.

1. Prepare: Lay the tracing paper over the image you want to reproduce. Hold the two together with tape or paper clips so they don't slide around.
2. Trace and Reinforce: Trace the image with a medium graphite pencil, or a watercolour pencil that contrasts with your drawing paper. Turn the tracing paper over, lay it on scrap paper, and go over the lines again on the back.
3. Transfer: Fix the tracing over your drawing paper with a hinge of low-tack tape. Without resting your hand on the tracing, draw back over the lines with a coloured pencil. Using a different colour shows you which lines you've already done. Keep the pressure light, or you'll end up with dents in the paper.

Instead of a pencil, you can transfer the lines with a crafter's bone folder or the back of a teaspoon handle. The wider, flatter edge is less likely to dent the paper.

Method 2: The Scribble Technique

This is a quicker way to work.

1. Trace the outlines, as in Method 1.
2. Turn the tracing paper over, and this time don't retrace the lines accurately. Scribble roughly over them instead. Where lines are close together, the scribble can cover the whole area. Leave large open spaces uncovered.
3. Fix the tracing over your drawing paper and go over the outline carefully to transfer it.

This method smudges more easily, so take extra care.

Method 3: DIY Graphite Transfer Paper

You can make your own transfer paper and reuse it.

• Cover a sheet of tracing paper with graphite from a pencil or a solid graphite block. When it wears thin, add more graphite where the lines have transferred.
• Fix your tracing to the drawing paper as usual, then slip the DIY sheet in between, graphite side towards your drawing. Trace carefully over your lines.
• Smudges are very likely with this method, so work lightly.

Method 4: Ready-Prepared Graphite Paper

To save even more time, you can buy ready-made graphite transfer paper from an art shop. Make sure it's the graphite version: carbon paper made for other purposes can't be worked over or erased.

It also comes in colours such as white and red, designed for dark papers. I haven't had a lot of success with these. If a transferred line ends up outside your drawing, it's hard to erase, and I've found my white pencils don't work well over the transferred white lines. Your experience may be different.

If you're working on black paper, I prefer a white pastel pencil on the back of the tracing paper. After transferring, I go over the pastel lines with a white coloured pencil, then dust off any loose pastel powder.

How to remove smudges from the drawing paper

The best way I've found to remove graphite smudges is to tap lightly with a kneaded eraser. Tapping rather than rubbing lifts the loose graphite without smearing it further.

If you don't have one, the mounting putty used to stick posters to the wall works too. Here in the UK a popular brand is BluTac. Work it in your hand for a while until it feels slightly sticky, and it will pick up the graphite easily.

I keep my kneaded eraser and BluTac in separate little tubs so they don't dry out or collect dust.

Summing up

Tracing paper gets the shapes in the right place, so you can put your time into the rendering: the layers, the light and the colour. It's a tool, not a shortcut past the skill.

Try each method on scrap paper first, and you'll soon find the one that suits the way you work. And if anyone asks whether you traced it or drew it freehand, you know my answer.

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