Here’s how to draw a Face that follows the general rules of proportion. Turns out we are all more similar than we are different, a good thing to remember these days.
Learning how to draw a face may seem like a daunting task to some, but there’s actually some good news about them. Unlike other subject matter, there are actually some very general rules of proportion that students can follow to help them get off to a good start.
Even though we of course, all look different, everyone tends to have their eyes roughly in the middle of their head, noses end about halfway to our chin, and mouths sit in the middle space left over.
Learning how to have face drawings come out the way you want takes time and practice, of course. But if I had to choose one thing that I wanted any of my elementary students to remember about them, it’s simply that rule about where to place the eyes. Most tend to draw them too high, not in the middle, and that gets the spacing of everything else off too. Eyes need to be placed in the middle, before any hair is drawn, which might affect their judgement.
Speaking of hair, I added a page to my tutorial that gives some examples of how different styles of hair can look. And some glasses too, just for good measure.
Preview of step by step Face tutorials
RECOMMENDED MATERIALS
- Pencil. The Ticonderoga brand are the most reliable, make nice dark lines when you need them, and are the easiest to erase. Buying the pre-sharpened ones will save busy teachers a lot of time.
- Eraser. Large ones you can hold in your hand do a much better job than just the pencil tip erasers, especially when erasing leftover pencil lines after tracing.
- Black Sharpie Marker. These fine point permanent marker pens make nice black outlines, have a good tip for coloring, and never bleed when they get wet. Use them with good ventilation and add extra paper underneath to protect your tables.
- Prang Crayons. These are a bit softer than other crayons so they sometimes look like oil pastels. They also have a some nice brown shades that Crayola does not have unless you buy their larger boxes.
- Crayola Crayons. The reliable brand that always works well. The 24 pack has some of my favorite golden orange and yellow colors that seem a bit richer and warmer than the ones Prang has.
DIRECTIONS
Time needed: 30 minutes.
How to Draw a Face
- Draw a large half circle.
- Continue sides with straight lines.
- Finish with the curved chin.
- Draw two eyes and brows.
- Add a nose half way down.
- Draw mouth half way to chin.
- Add the ears and neck.
- Add hair lines and erase inside.
- Trace with marker and color.
More Portrait Projects
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.