How do YOU draw faceial features?

[Dakota]

How do YOU draw faces?
I thought it would be neat to swap tips to help each other
(Or just to help me )


If i'm drawing a person i know i'll either sletch them without them knowing or i'll use a picture

once you learn to draw faces it is easier to create new faces
(Wich is WAAAAAAAAAY easier cuz i doesn't have to look like anybody ;D LOL)



In my chior there are 3 different chiors Concert chior/Young Singers, Women's Chior, and Youth Chior.

I'm in the concert chior and youth chior and so i have to wait 40 mins durring womens chior cuz it is between the two i'm in.
And so anyway I drew this girl while we were waitin and her face looked nothing like her LOL
This little girl whose mom was late picking her up watched me draw her and laughed the whole time .
And the features looked beliveable (I spent 10 mins on her nose )

So when you are drawing a real person does it look like him/her?

And also do you draw ears?
That is somthing a almost always forget

Ok i'm done.
DaKoTa

[Vira Redclaw]

Hm...well, when I draw a face, I usually draw the outline of the face first. Then I add the facial features, including ears IF the ears would be visible in the pose I'm drawing the person in. Then I add the hair.

If it's going to be a full-body portrait, then I draw the face and neck, followed by the torso and then the legs. THEN I add the clothes and lastly the hair (unless it's a short-haired person). I could probably try to do a tutorial sometime to show how I draw a person step-by-step. I don't do it like most artist books show.

[Barry]

I don't know how to draw(human) faces.
I can never get them right.

[Christopher]

I don't know, I can't draw organic shapes!

Although I have been trying to learn! *Sits back and waits for more suggestions, so that maybe he could learn a thing or two*

[Vorchia]

I don't! I can NOT draw faces!

[Kiva]

A friend of mine used to draw in an anime style, and gave me a few tips; but I've got a mental block when it comes to seeing the picture in my head and actually getting it out on paper.

For me, I stick to writing. That and singing are my two artistic forte's.

[Vorchia]

There are all sorts of tutorials online thoughm just google! Or you can just go to your local library (or bookstore) and see if they have anything good. The local library has a HUGE section about art. They've got many times more books on art and related subjects then they have on all the sciences combined! But yes once you've managed to find the books that deal with normal drawings on the huge shelves filled with eleborate studies of everything from Da Vinci to Ancient Greek and Picasso you can find some really useful guides to drawing.

[Barry]

The only stuff that I'm very good at drawing is the stuff I
learned when I took drafting. I used to doodle around a lot
in class and draw dolphins and horses a lot on my spare time.
I tried a regular art class to try to draw faces and other stuff,
but I couldn't get the hang of it. I also try some of the drawing
books at the library with the same results. I'll guess I'll
stick to what I'm good at.

g2g I think I better get offa here before the library staff see me on on this board.

cya,

[tsatsayka]

Usually with a pencil.....

Well, I draw an egg-ish shape, then add a line with a hook-ish shape at the end down the middle of the face for a nose... Then I grab my handy pen eraser and get ready for lots of erasing while I draw in the various curves of the eyes and try to make it not look like eyes from two different people... Then I add a mouth, and if I'm drawing an elf, I add ears at this point, otherwise I start to draw the hair, get it about halfway done, and go "No! I forgot ears again!", add the ears, add the neck and possibly shoulders, continue on with the hair (unless it's the full body of a person, then I draw the basic person before adding all the hair) then I sit back to view the full effect of my masterpeice... and realise I've forgotten eyebrows yet again! So I add those and any other last finishing touches (like clothes, background, whatever) and then consider wheather to scan it and put it up on my devart account, or not.

Sometimes, though, I cheat entirely and draw the person from behind, thus not haveing to deal with the hassle of faces!

And no, when I try a real live person... the drawing is usually only recognisable has that person if there is some majorly distinguishing feature, like giant hoop earrings or something. If I work from a photo rather then real life it sometimes comes out closer to the person then otherwise, though.

Yay for choirs! I'm not in any now, sadly....

[Rosa]

Hmmm...when I think about it, I don't always go about the same steps every time when drawing people's faces. Sometimes I just start by drawing an eye then move on from there. Usually after the eyes, I draw the nose, then the mouth, and then start shaping the face and forming the hair and ears. Other times I quickly sketch an oval shape then lightly sketch a horizontal line across the circle and then a vertical line crossing through that, forming a plus (+) shape. This gives me a rough guidance on where I'm going to place the facial features. Later, when I get the rest of the features in, I erase the reference lines.

Here's a tip about ears. Usually, the top of the ears line up with the eyebrows and bottom of the ears line up with the end of the nose. Now it can vary a little from person to person, but it usually isn't too much different.

Often, it helps to draw the nose and mouth by thinking in shapes and shading, rather than lines. With practice, you can get a more realistic look.

It helps tremendously to look off of real people or pictures to draw your faces. Something my art teacher always said was, "Draw what you see, not what you know." When you want to draw eyes, your brain says, "circles." When you want to draw a nose, your brain says, " a dot." And when you want to draw lips, your brain says, "lines." That may not happen to everyone, but a lot of people encounter that. You have to learn to stop thinking and just draw what you see. Perfection doesn't come immediately, so don't get discouraged. Like most things, it takes tons of practice and the more you do, the better you get.

When you think you've got facial features down pretty good, then start trying to make the people look like the person in front of you or in the picture. Study their faces and think about just what it is that makes that person look that way. Perhaps her eyes tilt down slightly at the corners and the eyebrows are arched and very thin. Maybe the nose is long and slender, but tilts up slightly at the end. Perhaps its the wrinkles in her face that makes her smile so unique. Everyone has different wrinkles, creases, and dimples in their face and even different shapes of eyelids. Discover just what it is that makes your model different from everyone else. It's really fun to do portraits and even if you don't get all the features correct right away, don't give up. It's an accomplishment if you maybe just got the person's eyes looking right, or some other feature.

Well, I could talk for hours about this, but I'd better stop for now before this post gets much longer. Ya'll are probably gettin bored by now.

[Azonthus]

Whee!! Faces! I first draw an oval/round shape/egg sape or whatever shape I want the head to be. You have to remember that people have varying head shapes- I'm an oval, my sister is round, I've seen people with larger jaws and pointed heads or with larger forheads and smaller jaws/chins. Since I was working on drawing a character loosely based on myself, I worked out a page of expressions. I started out with the basic head shape, an oval. Then I added in a line from top to bottom, deviding the middle of the face in half from. Next came two lines that curved around the face where I wanted the eyes to go. The nose is a third of the way down from the bottom eye line and the mouth is the next third down. Ooh, the top line for the eyes is about half of the way down the head. You can really tell that in some of these sketches because I didn't bother erasing my guide lines. Yes, the eyes look too low down on the face until you add in the hair, but once the hairline has been added in, it looks much better. I didn't bother with ears on this picture because my hair typically covers my ears. What I do to help give my pictures a more completed or finished feel, even if it's just a head sketch, and to show how long the hair is, is to add in the shoulders and clavical bones. I rarely forget to add in the eyebrows because they're used so much for expressions.



For comparison, a picture of me. I don't think it really matters anymore with me 'hiding' these pictures because you guys have seen pics of me on Dinotopia.com!



My eyes are reaaaaaaaaally squinty in this pic.... Interesting.

And, for the heck of it... My boyfriend and a doodle of him.



Yes, I know the ears are off, but you can get a general idea of how I do ears.

[Aven Bluewing]

I personally don't know if i posess much knowledge on this subject, but heres what I learned from my art teacher:

Draw an oval. Then divide it equaly into four quadrents (a vertical and horizontal line to make a + in the middle). The + in the middle is where the bottom of the nose should be.

Draw another line that is midway between the bottom-nose line and the chin. This is where the mouth should be.

Draw a line that is midway between the bottom-nose line and the top of the head (oval). This is where the eyes should be.

The distance between the eyes should be the equivalent of one eye-width.

That's all that I can remember, ;D good luck, Dakota!

[Vorchia]

The world's finest tutorial for drawin human faces
Ok its not REALLY called that but you get the idea. Just click the link, I'm in love with this tutorial... If it doesn't work, copy paste the URL: www.sierravista.wuhsd.k12.ca.us/basicart/faces.htm#intro1

And if I post pictures of myself your screens will break from the sheer shock of it. My horse-dung colored hair is proof of the increasing entropy of the universe. I'm just that girl next door type-thingy but then with a science obsession.

[Aven Bluewing]

Aw man! The link doesn't work for me!