How to Draw a Face

He hipanga ki te hipanga

1. Ka taea te whakahau 1

   Draw a circle for the cranium.

   The top two-thirds of a head is essentially a ball, and everything else attaches to it. Draw it big - the commonest structural error in beginner portraits is a skull that is too small for the face hanging off it.

   Whakawhanake Drawing an egg for the whole head, which leaves no room for the jaw.

   Whakamātautau The circle should occupy the top half of your page.

2. Ka taea te whakahau 2

   Cut the sides flat and drop the jaw to the chin.

   A head is narrower from the front than a sphere would be, so flatten both sides of the circle. Then run two lines down and inward to the chin, which sits about a quarter of a circle-width below the bottom of the ball.

   Whakawhanake A pointed chin, which reads as a cartoon. Chins are blunter than you think.

   Whakamātautau The head should be taller than it is wide, by about a third.

3. Ka taea te whakahau 3

   Draw the halfway line - top of skull to bottom of chin.

   Measure it, do not guess. This line is where the eyes go, and it is almost certainly lower than your instinct says. Every proportion after this is measured from it, so getting it wrong ruins everything downstream.

   Whakawhanake Placing this line by eye and putting it too high.

   Whakamātautau The distance above and below the line should be equal.

4. Ka taea te whakahau 4

   Divide the lower half into thirds: brow, nose, chin.

   Two more horizontal lines. Brow just above the eye line, the base of the nose a third of the way down from it, and the mouth a third of the way from the nose to the chin. These hold for most faces before you start adjusting them for a particular one.

   Whakawhanake Putting the nose halfway between eyes and chin, which lengthens the whole lower face.

   Whakamātautau Nose base should be closer to the eyes than to the chin.

5. Ka taea te whakahau 5

   Divide the eye line into fifths and place the eyes.

   The face is five eye-widths wide, and the eyes occupy the second and fourth fifths - which means there is exactly one eye-width of gap between them. That gap is a likeness cue and it is easy to check, so check it.

   Whakawhanake Eyes too close together, which is the default instinct.

   Whakamātautau You should be able to fit one more eye between the two.

6. Ka taea te whakahau 6

   Add the iris and pupil, partly covered by the upper lid.

   A relaxed eye always has its iris slightly cut off at the top by the lid. Drawing the whole circle exposed is what gives portraits their staring, alarmed look, and it is one of the most common errors on the internet.

   Whakawhanake A fully visible circular iris.

   Whakamātautau The top of each iris should be hidden by the lid.

7. Ka taea te whakahau 7

   Place the nose: width equals the gap between the eyes.

   The wings of the nose line up with the inner corners of the eyes on most faces. Draw the underside plane and the nostrils rather than an outline down each side - a nose has almost no outline on a real face.

   Whakawhanake Outlining the sides of the nose, which makes it look stuck on.

   Whakamātautau The nose should be as wide as the gap between the eyes.

8. Ka taea te whakahau 8

   Place the mouth: corners under the centres of the pupils.

   That is the check - mouth width against pupil centres. Draw the line between the lips first and make it the darkest mark in the lower face; the lip outlines come after and stay light.

   Whakawhanake Drawing the mouth too narrow, which shrinks the whole lower face.

   Whakamātautau A vertical from each pupil should land near a mouth corner.

9. Ka taea te whakahau 9

   Place the ears between the brow line and the base of the nose.

   That is the whole rule, and it is reliable. Ears set too low are one of those errors that makes a portrait feel wrong without the viewer being able to name why, which is exactly the kind of error worth measuring away.

   Whakawhanake Ears too low and too small.

   Whakamātautau The top of each ear should be level with the brow line.

10. Ka taea te whakahau 10

    Draw the hairline about a quarter of the way down the skull.

    The forehead is taller than instinct suggests - roughly the same height as the nose. Drawing the hairline too low is the other half of the eyes-too-high error, and the two together produce the alien look.

    Whakawhanake A hairline sitting just above the brows.

    Whakamātautau Forehead height should be about the same as nose length.

11. Ka taea te whakahau 11

    Draw the hair as masses, never as strands.

    Same method as the tree canopy: three or four big shapes with a light side and a dark side, and hair sits ON the skull with volume, so it should extend beyond the circle you drew. Individual strands come last, if at all.

    Whakawhanake Drawing hair as lines that follow the skull outline exactly, which looks painted on.

    Whakamātautau The hair should extend past the skull circle.

12. Ka taea te whakahau 12

    Now check the widths, not the heights.

    Turn your drawing and the reference upside down and compare three distances: eye to eye, mouth width, jaw width. Widths carry likeness far more than feature shape does, and they are the thing beginners never check.

    Whakawhanake Refining the features instead of correcting the proportions.

    Whakamātautau All three widths should match the reference.

13. Ka taea te whakahau 13

    Pick a light direction and shade the five recesses.

    The eye sockets, under the cheekbones, under the nose, under the lower lip, and under the jaw. Those five are in shadow on almost every lit face, and putting tone into them is what turns a diagram of a face into a head.

    Whakawhanake Shading the outline of the face rather than its recesses.

    Whakamātautau You should see the skull structure underneath.

14. Ka taea te whakahau 14

    Lose the outline along the lit side of the face.

    On the side facing the light, the edge of the face against a light background almost disappears. Softening it there while keeping the shadow-side edge firm is what stops a portrait looking cut out and pasted down.

    Whakawhanake A uniform hard outline all the way round the head.

    Whakamātautau Squint. Part of the outline should vanish.

15. Ka taea te whakahau 15

    Go over the lines you want to keep, and lose the guides.

    This is the step that turns a construction drawing into a finished one, and it is the one most people skip. Press harder on the outline and the features; leave the small stuff light. That difference in weight is what makes a drawing look deliberate rather than traced, and it costs thirty seconds.

    Whakawhanake Going over everything at the same weight, which flattens the drawing back out.

    Whakamātautau The outline should be clearly darker than the smallest details.