Portrait Tutorial

•The first thing I do is roughly sketch the features with an "H" pencil. This is a very light tone pencil and it prevents me from getting too dark, too early.
•The bottom picture shows how it looks after I smooth out those rough lines using a "tortillion" (paper stump).
• I can already see many refinements I need to make before preceding (please don't criticize yet)...it is still in the very early stages of development.
• Next I will start to define the darker areas with a "2B" pencil. I will post these stages also .

Please check back if you find this interesting! I will post all the stages leading up to the final piece.

EYES

•This is when I use my "2B" mechanical pencil to define detailed areas and add some contrast.
• You can see that I basically outlined her eyes and shaded all around, inside and out, completing everything except her LASHES...I ALWAYS save them for the last step.
NOTE: Dont be affraid to shade in the whites of the eyes...It adds to the realism after you make the highlights....This was a mistake I made for several years, leaving the eyes pure white makes them look unnatural.
• The bottom frame shows the addition of her lashes and eyebrows. Even after I draw these fine lines of hair, I still go over them 1 more time with a tortillion to soften them up.
• NEXT ....onto her nose....one of my favorite areas to draw.

I brought my scan into Adobe Illustrator to place text on it, and dotted lines for reference. Not much to say about the nose except that if the nostrils are aligned with the eyes, it will look goofy! I can see this needs a little adjustment.

The Mouth Area...In my opinion, one of the hardest things to draw. The mouth is the one thing on every face that is always moving and constantly changing shape and size!!! How do we ever really know what it should look like?