1-With a 2H pencil, lightly sketch the spider’s body and drop shadow to look like it’s crawling.
KEY-DETAIL PRACTICE
Try to add a drop shadow roughly to a spider sketch first; experiment with where the shadow transitions in value.
2-Lightly sketch the shape of the shadow and the highlights. The spider is mostly dark with long streaks of highlights on the legs and round highlights with some mid-tone on the body.
3-In your mid-tone and shadow area, add some value with an H or classic B pencil, and blend smoothly with a smudging tool.
A cotton swab might be too thick for this, try using a wad of tissue rolled up into a point.
4-Darken the mid-tone using a B or 2B, and blend out the harsh contrasting value of the body.
5-Finish the body and switch back to an H. Blend smooth from mid-tone to light, leaving the white highlights alone.
6-The pieces of the drop shadow touching the ground will have the darkest value, and will curve inward toward the body. Very lightly render the drop shadow shape and blend out.
7-Go in a bit darker now with the drop shadow, such as where the legs touch the paper. Smudge or blend out.
8-The spider’s body is pretty close to the ground, so just slightly darken the shadow beneath him.
