Drawing Faces and Heads
 |
| Kim Kardashian art copyright 2016 by H. Simpson |
Faces are based on shapes.You can get a lot of variety from combining different shapes in your drawing.
It’s always best to start with clearly defined shape for your head. globe, oval, cube, egg or pear shapes are you basic choices.
For a normal adult front view face, draw an oval divide the width in fifths. Why? The width of your head is 5 eyes wide. Now divide it equally down the middle horizontally and vertically. This is your starting point to locate the other features. The horizontal line gives you the location for your eyes. The eyebrows and top of ears start usually an eye height above the eye. The bottom of the ears end at bottom of nose line. For a normal child front view face, the head is divided into thirds. The eye line is two-thirds from the top. In all heads, the bottom of the nose is placed halfway between the eyes and chin. The distance from the bottom of the nose to the bottom of the chin, will be divided into thirds. The first two-thirds is where you draw the meeting place of the lips. The mouth extends no further than the mid-point of the eyes. This is where the dental cavity ends. If you are drawing an abnormal or exaggerated face, these beginning measurements will be different, as you may be drawing someone with a large forehead and you want to place the eyes lower the the middle of the oval. It’s best to concentrate on a normal head dimensions while you are learning.
 |
| Head Shapes |
It’s always best to start with clearly defined shape for your head. globe, oval, cube, egg or pear shapes are you basic choices.
 |
| Basic head measurements |
For a normal adult front view face, draw an oval divide the width in fifths. Why? The width of your head is 5 eyes wide. Now divide it equally down the middle horizontally and vertically. This is your starting point to locate the other features. The horizontal line gives you the location for your eyes. The eyebrows and top of ears start usually an eye height above the eye. The bottom of the ears end at bottom of nose line. For a normal child front view face, the head is divided into thirds. The eye line is two-thirds from the top. In all heads, the bottom of the nose is placed halfway between the eyes and chin. The distance from the bottom of the nose to the bottom of the chin, will be divided into thirds. The first two-thirds is where you draw the meeting place of the lips. The mouth extends no further than the mid-point of the eyes. This is where the dental cavity ends. If you are drawing an abnormal or exaggerated face, these beginning measurements will be different, as you may be drawing someone with a large forehead and you want to place the eyes lower the the middle of the oval. It’s best to concentrate on a normal head dimensions while you are learning.
Artist can develop what I call drawing glyphs. This is a shortcut method for drawing the same thing over and over to communicate to the audience. Your glyph for drawing a nose may be two lines or three lines. Using two or three lines don't make it a glyph. It's drawing those same style of lines for the nose on every face that makes it a glyph. This type of glyph doesn't fall into the stereotype or caricature category, it falls into the laziness category.
Sadly, it may not be a conscious decision to be lazy. It sneaks up on you. It becomes a muscle memory. It goes beyond just your stylistic choices. It becomes what you perceive as way to communicate what a nose looks like and you know your audience will accept it.
to be continued…
read next - Hands are Handy to Draw Dynamically
previous - Don't Maroon Your Animals: Learn to Draw Them Too
Follow and subscribe to me. If you have found this helpful, please let me know and share with other creators. Are the explanations clear and complete? Feel free to ask me questions.
Please support me making video tutorials on Patreon
Remember… Just Create!
If you are interested in further expanding your knowledge, then I recommend these books.
You can support this blog when you purchase a book by clicking the link below, I get a piece of the action and helps me to continue doing this blog. Support an artist today.
copyright 2016 H. Simpson
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please comment.
I always like to read your comments.