How to Draw Face: Mastering Portrait Art Through Understanding Human Structure
Portrait drawing sits at this peculiar intersection of science and soul. Every face tells a story through its unique arrangement of features, yet beneath the surface variations lies a remarkably consistent architecture. Artists have wrestled with capturing human likeness since someone first dragged charcoal across a cave wall, and the challenge remains as compelling today as it was thirty thousand years ago.
I've spent countless hours staring at faces—my own reflection, strangers in coffee shops, masterworks in museums—trying to decode what makes a drawing leap from mere marks on paper to something that breathes with life. The secret, I've discovered, isn't in perfecting individual features but in understanding the underlying structure that holds everything together.
The Architecture Beneath the Skin
Before you even think about picking up a pencil, you need to internalize something fundamental: the human skull is essentially an egg-shaped form with a box attached to the front. This might sound reductive, but this simple concept will save you from the most common pitfall in portrait drawing—treating the face as a flat mask rather than a three-dimensional form.
The cranium (that egg shape) houses the brain and creates the upper portion of the head. The facial mass (the box) projects forward from the cranium and contains all those features we're so eager to draw. Understanding this relationship is crucial because it affects how features wrap around the form, how shadows fall, and why a three-quarter view looks so different from a frontal view.
I remember the exact moment this clicked for me. I was struggling with a self-portrait, erasing and redrawing for the hundredth time, when my instructor placed a skull on the table next to my easel. "Draw this first," she said. It seemed like a detour, but that afternoon spent studying bone structure transformed my approach entirely.
Proportional Relationships That Actually Matter
Now, you've probably seen those diagrams showing the face divided into perfect thirds or the eyes positioned exactly halfway down the head. These classical proportions are useful starting points, but here's what they don't tell you: real faces rarely conform to these ideals, and that's precisely what makes them interesting.
The general framework goes like this: if you divide the head vertically from crown to chin, the eyes typically fall near the midpoint. The bottom half can be roughly divided into thirds—hairline to brow, brow to nose base, nose base to chin. The width of an eye generally equals the space between the eyes. The corners of the mouth often align with the pupils when looking straight ahead.
But—and this is crucial—these are approximations, not laws. I've drawn faces where the eyes sat higher, creating an almost childlike quality, and others where they rested lower, lending an air of world-weariness. The magic happens when you learn to see these variations as opportunities rather than mistakes.
Start by establishing the basic egg shape of the head. Then add a vertical line down the center (this helps with symmetry) and a horizontal line where the eyes will sit. From there, you're not filling in features so much as carving out spaces. The eye sockets are depressions in the skull. The nose projects outward. The mouth wraps around the curved surface of the dental arch.
Eyes: Windows That Actually Function
Drawing eyes is where most beginners get seduced by detail too early. They'll spend an hour perfecting eyelashes while ignoring the fact that the eye itself is a wet sphere sitting in a socket, partially covered by skin flaps we call eyelids.
Think about it this way: the eyeball is constant, but everything else moves around it. The upper lid slides down like a garage door. The lower lid is more like a hammock that can tighten or relax. When someone smiles genuinely, the lower lid pushes up, creating those crow's feet we're all so self-conscious about but which actually make a face look alive in a drawing.
The iris—that colored part everyone focuses on—is actually a perfect circle. It only looks elliptical because we usually see it at an angle or partially covered by the lids. The pupil sits in the center of the iris, not the center of the eye opening. This distinction is subtle but crucial for creating eyes that look like they're actually seeing rather than just staring.
Here's something most tutorials skip: the eye isn't white. The "white" of the eye (the sclera) is usually a warm gray, often with visible blood vessels, and it's in shadow where the upper lid casts its shadow. The brightest point in the eye is typically the highlight on the cornea—that wet surface over the iris that catches light.
The Nose: A Study in Planes
Noses terrify beginning artists, probably because they seem to defy logical structure. Unlike eyes or mouths, which have clear boundaries, the nose emerges from the face in a way that can seem almost sculptural in its subtlety.
Stop thinking of the nose as a thing and start seeing it as a series of planes. There's the bridge (two planes meeting at an angle), the ball (which isn't really a ball but more like a trapezoid when viewed from below), and the wings (the flared portions containing the nostrils). Each of these catches light differently.
The key insight that revolutionized my nose-drawing was this: you're not drawing the nose itself so much as you're drawing the shadows it casts and the highlights it catches. The bridge might catch light while the sides fall into shadow. The nostrils aren't holes but rather shadowed spaces with specific shapes that change dramatically with the viewing angle.
From the front, resist the urge to outline the entire nose. Often, just indicating the shadow on one side and the nostril shapes is enough. From the side, pay attention to the angle where the nose meets the face—it's rarely the smooth ski-slope that beginners tend to draw.
Mouths and the Complexity of Expression
The mouth is arguably the most expressive feature on the face, capable of conveying everything from joy to contempt with the slightest adjustment. It's also structurally complex, built around the curved dental arch and controlled by more muscles than any other facial feature.
First, abandon the idea that lips are just outlined shapes to be filled in with pink. The upper lip is actually composed of three forms—a central tubercle and two wings. It's typically in shadow because it angles inward. The lower lip, conversely, often catches light because it projects outward.
The line where the lips meet (the oral commissure) is usually the darkest value in the mouth area. This line isn't straight—it follows the curve of the dental arch, dipping down in the center and rising at the corners. The corners themselves are crucial for expression. They might tuck into small shadows, creating dimples, or pull back to reveal teeth.
Speaking of teeth, here's a pro tip: never draw every individual tooth unless you're going for a very specific effect (usually an unsettling one). Teeth read as a mass, often just suggested by a few value changes or strategic highlights.
The Forgotten Features
Ears, I'll admit, used to be my nemesis. I'd either hide them behind conveniently placed hair or reduce them to question-mark shapes tacked onto the side of the head. But ears, when understood, add tremendous credibility to a portrait.
The ear is basically a funnel designed to catch sound waves. It has an outer rim (helix), an inner ridge (antihelix), and that little flap in front of the ear canal (tragus). The whole structure attaches to the head at an angle, not flat against it. From the side, the top of the ear typically aligns with the eyebrow, and the bottom with the base of the nose—though this varies significantly among individuals.
The neck, too, deserves more attention than it usually gets. It's not a cylinder but rather a complex form that tapers and tilts. The sternocleidomastoid muscles create those distinctive cords that run from behind the ears to the collarbones. The throat has its own architecture, with the Adam's apple creating a prominent landmark in many individuals.
Light, Shadow, and the Illusion of Form
All the proportional knowledge in the world won't help if you can't make your drawing look three-dimensional. This is where understanding light becomes crucial. Every form on the face either faces the light source (and appears lighter) or turns away from it (and falls into shadow).
But it's not just about light and dark. There are subtle gradations—the core shadow where the form turns away from light, the reflected light bouncing back into shadow areas, the cast shadows thrown by one form onto another. The nose casts a shadow on the upper lip. The brow ridge shadows the eye socket. The lower lip throws a shadow onto the chin.
I learned to see these patterns by setting up a single light source and drawing the same face from multiple angles. It's almost meditative, watching how the shadows shift and reshape the apparent structure of the features. What seems like a prominent cheekbone in one light might disappear entirely in another.
The Intangibles of Likeness
Here's where things get philosophical. You can nail every proportion, render every shadow perfectly, and still end up with a drawing that doesn't quite capture the person. Likeness lives in the subtle relationships between features, in the particular way someone's mouth pulls when they're thinking, in the cant of their head or the asymmetry of their smile.
I once spent weeks drawing my grandmother, producing technically proficient portraits that somehow missed her entirely. Then one day, working quickly with charcoal, I caught something—maybe it was the way her eyes crinkled when she was about to make a joke, or how she held her mouth when she was concentrating on her knitting. That loose, imperfect sketch captured her better than all my careful studies.
This is why I encourage students to draw from life whenever possible. Photographs flatten forms and freeze expressions. A living face is constantly shifting, revealing different aspects of its structure and character. Even if you can only convince a friend to sit for ten minutes, those ten minutes of direct observation are worth hours of photo reference.
Materials and Mark-Making
The tools you use profoundly affect the drawings you create. Graphite allows for precise, controlled marks but can feel cold. Charcoal offers rich darks and expressive strokes but demands a looser approach. Conte crayon bridges the gap, providing both precision and warmth.
I've found that changing materials can unlock new ways of seeing. When I'm stuck on a drawing, I'll switch from pencil to brush and ink, forcing myself to commit to marks I can't erase. Or I'll work with white chalk on toned paper, building form through light rather than shadow.
The paper matters too. Smooth paper reveals every hesitation in your line but allows for subtle gradations. Textured paper breaks up your marks, creating a more painterly effect but making fine detail challenging. I keep a variety on hand, choosing based on what I want to emphasize in each portrait.
Practice Strategies That Actually Work
The standard advice is to "practice every day," but that's about as helpful as telling someone to "be better." What matters is how you practice. Here's what's worked for me:
Start with skulls and basic forms. I know it seems like a detour when you want to draw faces, but understanding the underlying structure will accelerate your progress dramatically. Spend a week just drawing eggs and boxes from different angles, then add basic feature placements.
Do rapid gesture drawings of faces. Set a timer for two minutes and try to capture the essential character of a face. These won't be pretty, but they'll train your eye to see the big relationships before getting lost in details.
Copy master drawings. Find portrait drawings by artists you admire—Ingres, Kollwitz, Freud—and copy them line for line. You'll absorb their problem-solving strategies almost osmotically.
Draw yourself. You're always available as a model, and self-portraits force you to really look rather than drawing what you think you know.
Most importantly, draw people you care about. There's something about emotional investment that sharpens observation. When you're drawing someone you love, you naturally pay attention to those subtle qualities that make them unique.
Common Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
After years of teaching, I've seen the same mistakes crop up repeatedly. The eyes are usually too big and too high on the head—we tend to emphasize what we think is important. The nose is often too small, and the mouth too close to the nose. The entire face gets crammed into the lower portion of the head, leaving a vast expanse of forehead.
Another common issue is what I call "feature fixation"—drawing each feature in isolation without considering how they relate to each other and to the whole. This creates portraits that look like Mr. Potato Head assemblages rather than cohesive faces.
The solution is to work general to specific, constantly checking relationships. Block in the big shapes first. Establish the overall proportions before adding any features. When you do add features, develop them all together rather than finishing one before moving to the next.
The Journey Forward
Mastering portrait drawing is not a destination but a journey of continuous discovery. Every face you draw teaches you something new about seeing, about mark-making, about the endless variety of human features and expressions.
I still struggle with portraits. After decades of drawing, I still have days where nothing seems to work, where every face I draw looks like a police sketch done by someone with questionable eyesight. But I've learned to see these struggles as part of the process rather than failures.
The real joy comes not from achieving perfection but from those moments of connection—when your marks on paper suddenly coalesce into something that feels alive, that captures not just the appearance but the essence of a human face. These moments are rare and precious, and they're what keep us coming back to the drawing board.
Remember, every artist you admire struggled with the same challenges you're facing. They just kept drawing through the frustration until seeing became second nature and their hands could translate that seeing into marks that sing. You can do the same. Pick up your pencil, find a willing face (even if it's your own in the mirror), and begin. The journey of a thousand portraits starts with a single line.
Authoritative Sources:
Loomis, Andrew. Drawing the Head and Hands. Titan Books, 2011.
Bridgman, George B. Bridgman's Complete Guide to Drawing from Life. Sterling Publishing, 2009.
Hogarth, Burne. Drawing the Human Head. Watson-Guptill Publications, 1989.
Speed, Harold. The Practice and Science of Drawing. Dover Publications, 1972.
Vanderpoel, John H. The Human Figure. Dover Publications, 1958.