When creating a drawing, I usually work on it in stages. I start by drawing a basic sketch, and then flesh it out by adding details and polish. Adding detail often requires careful observation, problem solving, and iteration.
Stage 1 is fairly basic. I focused on creating a drawToppings subroutine to scatter the toppings on my pizza. It’s random in the sense that it places the toppings in different locations every time, but the distribution is always fairly even. My second challenge was getting the shape of the mushroom right.
In stage 2, I brown the crust a little bit, draw the pepperoni and mushrooms with a little more detail, and graduate from diced green peppers to strips of green peppers. While I vary the pepperoni and green peppers, the mushrooms are all identical.
In stage 3, I caramelize and puff up the crust, sprinkle some herbs in the tomato sauce, go from a uniform layer of cheese to slices of cheese, put a dark green skin on the green pepper strips, and vary the mushrooms.
For me, a drawing is never completely finished—there are always little things I would improve on. For example, I really wish that I could caramelize the cheese in spots and get some of the cheese to ooze over the toppings; and I’d probably add some tomato chunks to the sauce, and give my green peppers and mushrooms a bit more variety. But that’s not to say that I’m never satisfied—just look at the caramelization on that crust!