Drawing Self Portraits

“Get yourself a mirror and paint your own portrait, over and over. It's a great chance to experiment, you'll discover things about yourself, and you don't have to pay the model!” –Susan Avishai

Self portraits are a splendid way to practice drawing faces. You know the model will always be there whenever you decide to work, after all, and, as Susan Avishai said, you don’t have to pay the model. One of my first projects in my ninth grade art class was to do my self-portrait. It's a very manageable goal. So, shall we begin?

            The first step is to gather your tools. We can’t begin drawing until we have everything together. You will need a decently sized mirror so that you can see your face from the position you will be drawing from without needing to tweak it about all the time. You will also need a pencil, an eraser, a sketchpad, and probably also an ebony. (An ebony is a darker pencil, essentially. It marks blacker and is great for shadows; it can save lives if you draw lightly, as I do. One beloved teacher of mine got into the habit of throwing them at me.) I might also suggest a pencil sharpener.

Now, on to the drawing. Ish. Settle in for the long haul, kids, because once you start drawing yourself, you won’t want to be moving much. Make certain you’re in a comfortable position. Now, what we do next is called sighting. Here, you hold a pencil or other straightedge up to figure angles (such as down the bridge of the nose to figure how the head is tilted) and transfer them to the paper. I suggest doing this on the nose, mouth, and eyes.

Draw a large circle through the centre of the paper. Don’t start drawing off on some corner of the paper; centre your work. If you have, draw the circle, erase the sighted lines in the corners, and redraw them through the circle. (Be sure to keep the right angles! Having the wrong angles will make trying to draw the portrait absolute murder later. You need those angles accurate, at least mostly so; they are the very foundations of your drawing.) From the circle, you will bring down the basic jaw shape. You can sight these lines as well. Also take a moment to sketch in the shoulders and basics, such as the collar of your shirt.

Here, you can see that on my sighted lines, I have roughly placed the basic features. I have rough, light circles for the eyes and slashes for the end of the nose and the mouth. I have also roughed out my hair.

Here we will draw the eyes. Look at your particular eyes for eye shape, but most tend to be vaguely almond shaped. Within this shape, you will draw smaller circles showing the iris, and pupils within those. Also notice the little pink pearls at the inner corners of the eyes. Eyelids are also important.

Next, we draw in the eyebrows. Just follow the shapes of your own. Make certain not to fill them in completely; eyebrows are made of hair and, therefore, not solid. Also mark on eyelashes. Eyelashes are somewhat like messy crescents. Don’t forget the lower lashes. (And, yes! Men have eyelashes too; just look at yours in that mirror.) These should be darker than the rest of the lines on the eye so far, save the pupil. We also get the fun of drawing the nose. Noses tend to come in various shapes and sizes. Some are long and straight, some rounded, some crooked, some big, some small. And everything in between. Pay close attention to the mirror here. You want to draw what you see, not what you think. When it comes to the nostrils, you can fill them in with the pencil, rather than leaving open circles. Unless you’re being lit for below, they will probably be shadowed. I generally only draw up the bridge on the side with the shadows, following it up to the eyebrows.

And now the mouth. This one can be a bit tricky for me, personally. On the line that I marked for mouth level earlier, I draw a thin bow-type shape (hunting, not hair). This points down, the corners curling up. Next, I lightly shade out the upper lip. I then mark a curve for the bottom lip. I darken the bow I drew originally to give a sense of depth. Also add the dip between the upper lip and nose.

Now, a while ago I marked out some of the shadows on my neck. Here, I also mark some of the more pronounced ones in my hair. It would also be a good chance to stop and remove guidelines. The features are on, you don’t need the sighting lines anymore.

I wear glasses. Many of you won’t, but some of you will. Glasses can be tricky to draw. You can start at the bridge of the nose and draw the part that covers it. Add on the nose pads and follow the arch of one then the other of the lenses, drawing in the frame. Be sure to draw what you see and not what you think. Follow the legs up and behind the ears. Also, mark where any glare shines very lightly for later, if you like.

Here the shading begins. I drew in the details of the ear and finished shading my neck. Don’t be afraid to use really dark values; you’ll like the contrast later. Follow your eyes and draw what you see; that’s the only real key to shading.  Also, note the shadows the clothing, hair, and jaw cast. It’s important to create interaction between the different parts of the drawing, otherwise there is no unity to the piece.

I added more here to the eyelashes, darkening and allowing them to be a little less organized.

Here’s some fun: eyes. I love drawing eyes. Here we start with putting down a general shade. (If your eyes are very pale, you might not have to do this.) Make certain to leave highlights! After this, you can start putting down shadows. These are generally around the edge of the iris opposite your light source in particular.

Though there are also shadows around the rims of the iris and near the pupil. There is a separate shadow at the top of the eye, iris and not, from the eyelid. There also tends to be a small on across the bottom of the eye simply because it’s round.

You can see the difference the shading made, yeah?

Yeah?

Now you do the same to the other eye. And don’t worry about making them match perfectly. Nothing in nature is perfectly symetrical.

Here we do some more shading, the shading around the eye to be particular. If you’ve ever put on makeup, you’ll have some idea how this works; if not, let me enlighten you. Do some medium shading over the eyelid and out to just under the arch of the eyebrow. Leave a highlight under the arch of the brow. Over at the crease of eyelid, create a shadow to imply depth. If you have circles under your eyes as I do, you should also add these in now.

Here you can see the outcome of this a little better. (I couldn’t see the exact quality of my pictures as I was taking them, and I couldn’t precisely go to check each one otherwise I would break my rhythm of drawing. My apologies.) I also added in the shadow cast by my glasses.

Repeat the process on the other eye. Though, note how this side is darker? This side of my face is more in shadow than the other. Not everything is going to be symmetrical. Little is, really. You’re used to this in everyday life, but it may take some people to get more used to this in your art. You’ll catch the hang of it, though.

Shadow over the nose. Be careful with your shadow and highlight here. Make the transition smooth so to give the rounded shapes on the nose and face. The jawline tends to be dark because of shadows on the underside. Under the nose and the temples are also places to take notice.

Shade over the cheeks and watch the face for wrinkles from smiling or such. I notice my own lips tend to have shadows by the corner of my mouth.

Shade in the lips and finish off the shading on the face. Note that the inside of the lips tend to be darker. Leave highlights on the bottom lip and shade underneath it. The chin needs to be watched for shadows as well. Often it will be darker on one side in a somewhat round shadow. The top generally has a highlight due to being higher up and catching more light.

And there’s your face!

Here we start on the hair. I usually start with kind of outlining the part.

Next I determine the shadows on one area. I also marked in the medium tones lightly. Draw sketchily here. No smudging, no smoothness. Hair is tons of tiny lines. That’s what your drawing should be implying.

Here you finish off the medium tones. Also note that my hair is a bit darker at the roots, near the part. If you have highlights or dye your hair, yours may be the same.

Integrate the part in to the rest of the hair. Keep drawing back over and adding value until you have definite highlights and shadows.

See what I mean?

Now mark out your shadows on the other side.

Add in medium tones. If you have no really bright highlights, you can shade over the entire area in your lightest tone.

Now add in those medium tones and leave your highlights. You may need to add in deeper tones. Strive for really good value and don’t be afraid to use that ebony whenever you need it. Otherwise, press firmly with that pencil. It’s not made of china; it can take the pressure.

And that’s the top area of my hair. See what the darker values do to offset the value through my face? It all comes together in unity.

You know how I said that you were blocking in things roughly? Here I found that on second glace, the hair ties were too far down my hair. I had to go back and correct. Don’t be afraid of your mistakes or to make changes as you go along.

Here I rough in some of the shadows on my braid. Hair doing something other than lying flat can be a bit different to draw. Hair is definitely all about directional lines. Draw the lines in the direction that the hair in moving. If it’s curling, you’d best be bringing that pencil around and around with it.

Here I continued this shadow and highlight bit with the braid.

And continued it. I also darkened in the hair ties so you could really see them.

I finished off the hair shading. Notice that the ends of my hair are shaggy. It’s unlikely that your hair is going to end in a perfectly straight line either. You’ll need to break it up with your pencil. Vertical (and nearly vertical) lines can be your friends here. If that doesn’t look like what your hair is doing, though, don’t. We are drawing what we see, after all. (Bet you’re sick of that line by now, aren’tcha?)

I finished off by just marking in my shirt with the ebony. Cloth and clothing value is definitely a lesson all it’s own.

And here’s the end product. You should now know how to draw a self-portrait. Any questions or comments? Leave them in the comments. Followed this through and have your end product posted somewhere? Leave the link. I’ll be glad to hear from all of you.

Avishai, Susan. "Art Quotes by Susan Avishai." Painter's Keys (2012): n.pag. Web. 20 Sep 2012. <http://quote.robertgenn.com/auth_search.php?authid=2219>.