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Portrait Drawing Cheat Sheet v2

Portrait drawing cheat sheet

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fedhatom16
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135 views

Portrait Drawing Cheat Sheet v2

Portrait drawing cheat sheet

Uploaded by

fedhatom16
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
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PORTRAIT

DRAWING
Cheat Sheet
2.0

BY REBECCA TILLMAN-YOUNG
How to draw the head...
THE SAME...BUT “Drawing the Head and Hands.” This
method will teach you to visualize
DIFFERENT. the head as a 3D object, and begin
drawing more proportional and
There is an infinite variety of unique realistic heads in no time!
faces in the world; each of us is
different in a thousand ways from
every one else! But even with all that THINKING IN 3D
wonderful variety, we are also very
similar. The key to mastering this method is
to learn to think about the head and
That’s because, underneath it all, your drawing in 3D.
we’re all made of the same stuff. We
all have a skull that’s more or less the It also helps to get a good look at
same shape; we all have features like the skull and get familiar with its
eyes, noses, and mouths... And we all structure.
share the same basic blueprint for
approximately where those things
are supposed to go.

Lucky for us, that gives us a perfect


place to start when drawing a head.
If we can learn to find the average
locations of the features reliably, we
have an easy, reliable way to start any
BACK TO BASICS
portrait.
Next, we want to simplify. We need
to break the head into its simplest
In this cheat sheet, I’m going to
forms. We can start by picturing the
introduce you to the Loomis method
cranium (top portion of your head)
for drawing heads, originally taught
as a sphere, and the jaw/cheekbones
by Andrew Loomis in his book,
as a tapering box.

2 | rtyart.com
Step 1
SHAPE OF THE HEAD
Imagining the these simple forms, we can
start our head by drawing a simple circle
(and imagining it as a sphere).

Draw a line through the vertical center and


horizontal center of your sphere. When
looking straight ahead, these lines will be
straight and uncurved.

Next, we slice the sides off the sphere at a


slight angle: narrower in front and a little
wider in back.

Draw lines to connect the tops and bottoms


of the “sliced” sides, creating 4 boxes of
equal(ish) size.

Now measure the height of your boxes. Use


that measurement to make a mark that
same distance down from the bottom line
to mark the bottom of the chin.

Sketch in the jaw shape like an angular,


upside down egg: first down from the side
of the cranium, then in toward the center,
and flat again at the bottom of the chin.

NOTE: The location of the slices, jaw length and nose height
are variable, you can adjust them slightly depending on the
type of face you are drawing.

Portrait Drawing Cheat Sheet v 2.0 | 3


Step 2
ADD THE FEATURES
Next we mark the location of the features, using
the marks we’ve made as anchor points.

1. The top line marks the hairline.

2. The middle line marks the eyebrows (or tops


of the eye sockets).

3. The bottom line marks where the nose


meets the face (note: the tip of the nose may
be higher or lower)

4. The mouth is about 1/3 down from the nose,


and 2/3 up from the chin.

5. The ear sits behind the vertical center line


between eyebrows and bottom of the nose.

Once we have these vertical placements, we


can measure the width of the features:

1. The head is 5 eyes wide, with one eye space


between the eyes and one on either side.

2. The nose is usually about the width of one


eye.

3. The mouth extends to the halfway point of


each eye.

4 | rtyart.com
Step 3
CLEAN UP YOUR SKETCH
Lastly, we need to polish up the drawing, adding in the features
and making it unique!

Tips for Success


COMPLEX ANGLES
This formula can be used to more easily work out tricky angles: visualize your
sphere with it’s vertical and horizontal center lines as a tennis ball with rubber
bands wrapped it. (Better yet, get a tennis ball and draw lines or wrap rubber
bands around it.)

When you tilt and turn the ball, notice how the lines become curves. Use this to
set up your portraits for tricky angles. The rest of your lines will follow the same
angles and curves.

Portrait Drawing Cheat Sheet v 2.0 | 5


Examples
SUBTLE CHANGES,
BIG IMPACT
Using small tweaks to the
proportions, we can create a
wide variety of faces!

Subtle changes to the length of


the jaw, height of the nose, or
even width of the head result in
big differences to your finished
portrait.

Experiment and see how many


unique faces you can create!

6 | rtyart.com
Portrait Drawing Cheat Sheet v 2.0 | 7

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