How to Draw Lips

Step by step

1. Step 1

   Draw a light horizontal guide and a vertical centre line.

   Lips are close to symmetrical and the eye is unforgiving about it, so the centre line is not optional here. The horizontal marks where the two lips meet.

   Watch out Working without guides because the subject looks simple.

   Check The two lines should cross at the middle of your page.

2. Step 2

   Draw the line where the lips meet - a wave, not a line.

   This is the most important mark in the drawing. It dips slightly at the centre under the cupid's bow, rises on each side, then turns down into the corners. Draw it slowly and get it right; everything else is placed relative to it.

   Watch out Drawing it straight or as a single smooth curve.

   Check It should change direction at least three times.

3. Step 3

   Mark the corners of the mouth and how far apart they are.

   Mouth width is the proportion people get wrong most often on a face - it is wider than you think, roughly reaching the centre of each eye. Marking the corners now stops the lips creeping inward as you draw.

   Watch out Drawing the mouth too narrow.

   Check Both corners should be the same distance from your centre line.

4. Step 4

   Draw the cupid's bow: two shallow curves meeting at a dip.

   Not a sharp M. The two peaks are rounded and the dip between them is shallow, and on most faces the whole thing is subtler than the version in your head. Keep it inside the middle third of the mouth's width.

   Watch out Making it too pointed and too wide.

   Check The peaks should sit within the middle third of the mouth.

5. Step 5

   Run the upper lip edge from the bow out to each corner.

   It thins as it goes. The upper lip is thickest at the centre and almost vanishes at the corners, and drawing it at even thickness the whole way is what produces the drawn-on look.

   Watch out An upper lip of constant thickness.

   Check The upper lip should be visibly thinner at the corners.

6. Step 6

   Draw the lower lip as one full curve.

   The lower lip is fuller than the upper - commonly about half again as deep - and it is a single continuous curve rather than two halves. Sweep it in one motion from corner to corner.

   Watch out Making the two lips the same depth, which reads as a cartoon.

   Check The lower lip should be clearly deeper than the upper.

7. Step 7

   Darken the line between the lips until it is the darkest mark.

   Go over it and commit. That dividing line is in shadow at every point along its length, and it should be darker than anything else on the page. Timid here is the commonest reason drawn mouths look weak.

   Watch out Keeping it at the same weight as the outline.

   Check Squint. The dividing line should be the first thing you still see.

8. Step 8

   Deepen the corners into small dark pockets.

   The corners of a mouth are recessed, so they are darker and softer than the line between the lips. A small dark note at each corner, fading outward, is what makes the mouth sit inside the face rather than on top of it.

   Watch out Ending the mouth line in a hard point.

   Check Each corner should fade out rather than stop sharply.

9. Step 9

   Shade the whole upper lip a middle grey.

   It angles away from the light, so it is darker overall than the lower lip. Shade it evenly first and add the variation afterwards - trying to do both at once is how the upper lip ends up patchy.

   Watch out Leaving the upper lip as light as the lower.

   Check Upper lip clearly darker than lower, everywhere.

10. Step 10

    Shade under the lower lip, and leave a highlight on top of it.

    The lower lip catches light on its upper surface and drops into shadow underneath, where it also casts a shadow onto the chin. That light-on-top, dark-underneath pattern is what makes it read as a rounded form rather than a shape.

    Watch out Two symmetrical highlights, which look like plastic. One, slightly off-centre.

    Check There should be exactly one highlight, off the centre line.

11. Step 11

    Add vertical texture lines, in the shadowed parts only.

    Lips are lined vertically, and the lines follow the curve of each lip rather than running straight up and down. Put them where the lip is already darker and leave the lit areas alone - texture everywhere flattens the form you just built.

    Watch out Covering both lips evenly with lines.

    Check The highlight area should have no texture lines in it.

12. Step 12

    Soften the outer edges until they nearly disappear.

    This is the step that decides whether the mouth looks drawn on or grown there. Go round the outline and lighten it, especially at the corners and under the lower lip. Keep only the dividing line strong.

    Watch out Leaving a crisp outline all the way round.

    Check From arm's length the outline should be hard to find.

13. Step 13

    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.

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

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