How to draw the Astronaut | Alexei Leonov

Hi everybody, and welcome to a new tutorial. NIL-Tech has prepared a new awesome Drawing Tutorial for you: "Alexei Leonov, the first man in outer space". In 1965, astronaut Alexei Leonov ended up being the first man to step into deep space. Alexei Leonov, a Soviet cosmonaut who, as part of the mission of Voskhod-2 spaceship, conducted the very first spacewalk in the history of humanity, died on October 11, 2019. 

Here are some exciting things to know about Alexei Leonov's incredible life:

1. 85-year-old Leonov had a long career behind him. In 1970-1991, he worked as the Deputy Head of the Cosmonaut Training Center. Meanwhile, in 1975, he took part in the Apollo-Soyuz Test Project, the first-ever area flight carried out by the 2 superpowers together, with the American command and service module and the Soviet capsule docking with one another. That time, commander Leonov headed the Soviet team.

2. After retiring in 1991, Leonov worked with commercial structures and devoted time to art, painting - primarily space. However, he will always be remembered mostly as the very first human to go to deep space and return. And this journey, which later on formed the basis for the 2017 drama Spacewalk was no walk in the park (pun intended).

3. His path to space was rather common for the Soviet Union. He was born in the Siberian borders near the city of Kemerovo (3,600 km east of Moscow). Through hard work, he became a pilot, experienced and brave enough to join the first-ever Soviet cosmonaut corps in 1960 - a year before Yuri Gagarin became the first man in orbit.

4. They did it! As it was impossible to fully imitate the conditions of deep space on Earth, during the 12 minutes Leonov spent drifting near the spaceship, connected to it with a 5.3-meter tether, his spacesuit started to swell up, making his motions slower. With an inflated spacesuit, Leonov hardly made it back to Voskhod-2, moving slowly and suffering extreme overload. The possibilities of being suspended in space were very real. 

5. Due to the communication systems being out of order, for 2 days the cosmonauts had to survive in the woods. "We were sitting there in our spacesuits for 2 days, and we had no other clothes with us," Leonov said. Finally, they were saved and transferred to Moscow.

In this tutorial, we used the following supplies:

• 2B pencil 
• 3B pencil 
• 5B pencil
• 8B pencil 
• 5H pencil 
• Mechanical Pencil
• Blending Stump
• Kneaded Eraser
• White Vinyl Eraser

You may find all the tools for drawing in our Drawing pencil set!

Let's Start Drawing the Astronaut Alexei Leonov Step by Step!

Step 1. We draw two ovals (head and body), the upper edge of the larger one is hiding behind the smaller one (pencil 5H).

Step 2. Draw the ovals for the arms and legs (pencil 5H).

Step 3. Draw the contours of the hands and the left foot, the glass of the helmet, and hoses (pencil 5H).

Step 4. Draw the details and contours of the fingers and body (pencil 2B).

Step 5. Eraser the excess lines with the eraser and correct the contours (pencil 3B, eraser).

Step 6. Draw the details of the spacesuit (mechanical pencil).

Step 7.Draw shadows around the spacesuit's contours, add folds (pencil 3B), darken the glass of a helmet (pencil 5B). Blend the graphite with a blending tool for smoother transitions (blending stump).

Step 8. Shade the background without stepping over the edges of the spacesuit (pencil 8B).

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