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Tips on Pencil Portrait Drawing - Positioning Head Landmarks

Published by Remi | January 3rd 2009 | Views:

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A pencil portrait sketch from life starts with the "striking" of the arabesque. Striking the arabesque means drawing the outer contour of the skull with the accurate proportions, shape, and theaccurate symmetry.

Once you have drawn a reasonably accurate arabesque it is time to situate the main landmarks of the skull. That means that we will correctly situate the most essential spots of the skull. These spots will then be used as references for mapping out the rest of the skull features.

Here is something that may help you with this task: work with your eyes a bit out-of-focus. This is called observing with a "soft eye". Somehow this makes it easier to correctly determine shapes and proportions. It also helps you with suppressing the predetermined notions we all have of certain entities.

Let us imagine that we are working from a three-quarter skull profile.

* The Brow Ridge - is the first important landmark. To place the brow ridge you must first take your best estimate at where you think it is and only then check it by sighting.

Note that to coach your eyes it is better to first estimate distances, angles, etc. and verify them later. There is nothing to gain from pre- sighting.

Sighting signifies to use your pencil with locked arm and checking distances along the pencil with your thumb and index finger and one eye closed.

So then, first sight from the bottom of the chin to a spot on this a choice, you should always size the shortest length because doing so tends to be more right.

Your spot on the brow ridge should, if it was placed correctly, be exactly halfway between the bottom of the chin and your check-point. If it is not – then correct the placement of your brow ridge.

* Jaw Hinge - Now you can tag the width of the head. In the three-quarter pose the hinge of the jaw is a critical landmark. Again, take your best estimate then check by sighting horizontally from the hinge of the jaw to the outer edge of the cheek bone and vertically relating that measure from the bottom of the chin.

* Top Nose Bone - Since we have already positioned the brow ridge we now only have to estimate a small distance to fix the top of the nasal bone. If you placed the hinge of the jaw correctly, it should equal the distance from the bottom of the chin to the nasal bone. If you are off a bit, then correct the placement of the hinge of the jaw. Again, imagine that the shortest length estimated is the right one.

Now that these prime landmarks are positioned you can continue drawing the arabesque. I find it best to further resolve only the back, least intricate, part of the skull at this early point.

* Facial Angle - Lastly, you have to situate the facial angle which is the center line of the face. Sketch a slightly bending line from the middle of the mental tubercle up through the center of the brow ridge.

The positioning of the facial angle is very important. You have to feel your way through this as there is no way to rightly measure it.

Once the facial angle is positioned proceed with resolving the arabesque carefully observing the shape of the mouth area, the forehead, and all the other features that are expressed in the shape of the arabesque.

With this, we have positioned all the basic landmarks that will help us with the mapping of the rest of the features such as the ears and nose.
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