Sketchbook 008 - How To Draw Any Face (Self Portrait Creepiness)

Time for more drawing stuff!

I am finding myself having to draw faces from reference images more often lately. It can be quite intimidating at times, so I thought it might be useful to come up with my own method for drawing any face quickly and easily. There are other ways and tutorials online, but I usually prefer to come up with my own way to do a thing, feels more natural than forcing my brain to learn more things. Maybe someday when I figure out the sleep thing.

For some reason, I wanted to torture myself by attempting to do a self portrait type of thing, which honestly, I didn't enjoy much. I don't like looking at my face, (It is a perfectly fine face but it freaks me out to have to see it, guess we all have our weird little eccentricities.)

Here is the process I used, this is the second one I did using the same method (I used it for last week's post, but was too stressed over it to remember to take process photos)

Step 1 - Vertical line to indicate where the center of the face will be, horizontal lines marking the following features: hairline, eyebrows, eye, bottom of nose, mouth, chin

Step 2 - Two circles, overlapping in the third section of your facial features grid.

Step 3 - using the grids and circles as guides, draw an outline of the head.

Step 4 - Draw two 'boxes' for the eyes on the third line, then using those as guide, add a triangle shape for the nose, extend lines at the bottom of the triangle to create guide box for the mouth.

Step 5 - I find it easiest to use little circles to figure out exactly where the eyes should go and how big they should be. Also added circles as guide for the nostrils and a rough mouth shape. Once those are in place, things will be much easier.

Step 6 - Now for the fun part! Add in the rest of the basic features and details for the face.

Step 7 - Optional extras and some hair. (I love drawing hair!)

Step 8 - Line it all in ink! I like this part too.

Step 9 - Destroy another pen by adding lots of black. (So much fun, I really go through a lot of pens.)

Step 10 - Paint from light to dark...(process should work for shading in more natural colours too)

...and....Done!!

Hope this was useful and not too confusing.

Till next time!

Credit - All photos and work belongs to me

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