Face drawing - how to do draw a face

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get some tips on how to draw a face

This is an online resource about face drawing including links to lessons, tips about shading and other aspects of drawing a face. Learn about the basic proportions of the human face and head. Various ways of creating volumes and shades will be shown. Furthermore examples of face drawings will illustrate the endless possibilities how a face can be depicted. There is also another lens dedicated to the self portrait :The self portrait - somewhat of an adventure
Rather than teaching an academic approach or skill the intention is to give inspirations for readers for their own discoveries and experiments. But be aware, if your drawings get remarkable they might look a bit like a purple cow !

All of my drawing lenses:
How to draw a tree
Landscape drawing - Improve your skills
How to draw a pine tree
How to draw decidous trees (mostly apple trees:).)
How to draw coniferous trees (some spruce trees)
How to draw buildings and houses
Drawing the urban landscape
Draw people in a landscape
The self portrait - somewhat of an adventure
Artists sketchbooks - little nothings turn into big somethings
Sketching gear - a guide for beginners
Drawing the urban landscape
How to draw with a pen
How to draw a straight line

Hi , you can call me Vincent

Some basic facts about the proportions of a human face 

The basic proportions of the head are demonstrated in the "draw people in a landscape"-lens. Face drawing mostly is about the frontal view of the human face. There two general characteristics of the average human face which are remarkable:

1. The eyes of most human faces are on a line which splits the face more or less exactly in two parts of same size : From eyes to the top of tjhe head and downwards to the tip of the chin. These equal distances are marke with line a in the drawing below on the right side.

2. There are three parts in a face of almost equal proportion marked with line b in the drawing below on the right.
a. the forehead,which strechted from the hairline to the eye brows
b. from the eyebrows to the tip of the nose
c. from the tip of the nose to the tip of the chin

face drawing study
I have used a blue ball pen to trim the drawing on the left to more correct proportions. The forehead was stretched a bit to much and the distance between tip of the nose and the tip of the chin is a bit short. However individual faces can deviate quite a lot from these general rules,which are nevertheless helpful as they can make you aware of the individual look of a face.

Light and shade on a face 

A face stude in water color


In this face study from a photograph I have used brown for the drawing. Light ocre for the bright side and blue for the shadows.

Creating volume in a face drawing 

Face study in oil colors

On the left there is a quick sketch in oil colors on large sheet of kraftliner paper. In this example the volume of the head and face is created by drawing with a brush in different tonalities. I used only three values. The middle tone was given by the paper. The dark values are represented in black and the brightest value with white oil color. This is a fast 10-15 minute study, as reference I used a photograph that shows the sleeping Andy Warhol.
The example in the middle uses line drawing. With lines one can describe the volumes and create different tonalities at the same time with more or less dense lines or hatching in various directions. In the third face on the right I used bundles of lines some of them following the volumes of the face and some in independent direction.

A face drawing in the snow 


Mascarons at Avignon - monochrome monotype prints 

Faces to scare the evil away

A face drawing by Matisse - extremely simplyfied 

An almost children like reduction

Quick drawings of a face 

studies from black and white photographs

For some time I loved to do quick drawings with acrylic colors from black and white photographs. Here are some examples .. each drawing took about 10 minutes.
Black and white photographs are great because it is easy to study the darks and the lights on a face.

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Learning from David Hockney 

Face and head drawings by David Hockney

Peter, Hotel Regina, Venice (detail)


Hockney, David
Buy at AllPosters.com

David Hockney has studied the human face through his entire career in various mediums and styles. His very realistic portraits with a camera lucida are very famous, but he has also down great free hand drawings from life.

There is a great gallery of his drawings on the official David Hockney website

I took this link from a great Squidoo lens on Hockney: David Hockney resources for artlovers. There is a lot of great material for example also videos/interviews with Hockney on that lens. I find Hockney so very interesting as he masters very precise drawings and a free or lose style.

David Hockney answers your questions  

Ghee the guy is responding to Tateshots on Twitter

TateShots: David Hockney Answers Your Questions

Followers of TateShots on Twitter sent in their questions for artist David Hockney, who answers them here. www.twitter.com/tateshots

Runtime: 264
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curated content from YouTube

Learn how to draw faces 

This is a demonstration video for those who like to draw very realistic faces.
The instructor is Riven Phoenix, a very skilled draftsman who has runs a weblog about drawing the human figure called "The structure of Man". In this example he demonstrates how he develops the face from simple forms. His method include the use of an eraser to remove construction lines or preliminary lines.

Learn How To Draw Faces - Jessica Alba

Learn How To Draw Faces - Jessica Alba http://www.AlienThink.com http://learn-how-to-draw-faces.blogspot.com

Runtime: 416
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curated content from YouTube

Get your face drawing book on Amazon 

Secrets to Drawing Realistic Faces

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Drawing Faces: Internet-linked (Usborne Art Ideas)

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Face Drawings

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I Can Draw Faces

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A face study in water colors 


This study is a bit more expressive. Again there were mainly only three colors used, umber,blue,ocre and a bit of purple

Some more variations and examples of face drawings 

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In the face on the left I tried to depict the major "planes" in a face with lines, in the middle some quick head drawings and on the right side an ink drawing with combination with pencil

Sometimes I use also a blue ink roller pen in my sketchbooks. The doodles in the middle are some drawing records while watching a video film.

Interesting face drawings on the net 

Picasa Web Albums - Dhanan - Portrait_Drawings
A set of pencil and pen drawings made deep down south in India
Picasa Web Albums - Mr D Finn - Face drawings
A set of 4 pages with 6 different emotional expressions on a face ! Really interesting.
Urban Sketchers: Sketches on the bus in London 8
These is a great face drawings or quick portraits by urban Sketcher Adebanji,London, done in the SUbway or on the bus...yes that seems possible
Urban Sketchers: Theatre audience, St Albans
This is a nice study of theater visitors by Urban sketcher Julie Oakley
Making a Mark - Drawing a head
A series of head drawings from life by british artist and blogger Katherine Tyrell.
Katherine typically uses fine line hatching to achieve volume in her drawings. Her work a great examples for using hatches in general and especially for head, face or portrait drawings
Faces on Laurelines - weblog of Laura Murphy Frankstone
Artist Laura Murphy Frankstone has a great portfolio of face drawings and paintings on her weblog in various mediums and techniques.
More Tokyo Train Sketches by LOK Jansen
Lok Jansen has developed great skills in depicting faces with coherent lines, thus reducing the drawing to a minimum. It is amazing to see how little "amount" of lines is necessary to draw a face.... a must see

Face drawing online tutorials 

How to draw the face - Portrait Art Tutorials, lessons on portrait art basics.
How to draw the features of the face - tutorial for the portrait artist. Lessons on drawing and sketching the face.
How To Draw Anatomic Face In 2.5 Minutes - Video
You can learn to draw a face like this.. It's very easy... Watch Video about How,Draw,Faces by Metacafe.com
How To Draw Woman Face (girl, Female) 3/4 View Video Tutorial : - Video
How to draw woman face (girl, female) 3/4 view Video tutorial : learn step by step. Learn how to draw face girl woman or female facial figure front v. Watch Video about Anime,Art,Body by Metacafe.com
Learn How To Draw Faces
A weblog that specialises in the "structure of Man". There is an interesting video demonstration of a face drawing
How to Draw a Portrait of the Head - A lesson on Empty Easel Blog
The most important part of a drawing is the start, not the finish. This tutorial will focus on how to start a portrait drawing, using basic blocking-in techniques.

Good bye, hope to see you again on one of my other lenses ! 

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