Creating my own Steemit logo in Graffiti letters - step by step drawing

I like drawing this kind of stuff, I've done it since I was 10 years old. For my Steemit introduceyourself I drew a Steemit logo of my own and I wanted to share with you how I did it.

Disclaimer

Okay first off, it takes countless of hours and hours of practice to get to a certain acceptable level. Not only do you need the talent and creativity to be able to build legible, but creative letters. Also it takes a lot of practice to being able to draw straight or round lines without failing. This is hard, don't think it's not for one second. Many people think of graffiti as a form of vandalism, and it could be just that. But it heavily depends on what you do with it. Random scribbled words on the streets or trains are vandalism, but there are also countless people who see and treat it like an artform. As do I. I'd much rather take my time to come up with something nice at a place where it's allowed, then to go out and destroy or deface property.

First, the final result

Now that we've got that little disclaimer out of the way, let's see the end result before I will show you how to construct it.

How to begin

Like I said before, it is hard to build a unique letter that fits your style. The truth is, every letter can be bent, stretched or maybe even altered a little bit. Still it has to be legibile and the basic construction of the letter has to remain intact. There are many different styles and everyone has their own preference. To be able to form your own style, takes years of practice and lots of skill.

So obviously you start off with the first letter. This will be the foundation of the total design and every other letter has to fit in with the rest. The first one was the S...(yeah thanks captain obvious)

I colored this one in already to get a basic idea of how the rest should be. After this, the rest will all be just sketch lines until the entire design is finished. That way I can easily see how it's going to turn out and easily change wherever I want to. 

Used materials

I almost always use colored pencils to sketch and fill it in. This way I have full control over my lines as they are soft. I much rather use these over ink because with these pencils I can easily determine how thick or thin the lines have to be. For the outlines I usually use thin felt tip markers. 

Now for the rest

Here comes the hardest part...it's make or break time

This is by far the hardest part. Whether it's on paper or on a wall with a spraycan, the outlines are supposed to make, but can easily break the entire design. Now I know I always want it to be absolutely perfect and I'm hardly ever satisfied, but this is truly the point of no return. With paint, you can paint over, although not always easy. With felt markers or ink, it's final and can't be undone. 

I start off with the basic outlines and after that's done, I start adding the drop shadow. It's also possible to do a 3d effect, or nothing at all...but I prefer doing drop shadow. Knowing where to place these exact lines is very important and if done correctly, will give an instant boost to the overall design.

Now to wrap things up

After that's all done, I can add a lot more stuff like backgrounds, highlights, second outlines...you name it. For sketching, I usually keep it very basic.

Thanks for reading! Give me some feedback or ask me anything about this in the comments. Be sure to follow if you want more :)