How to Draw the Nose – Tutorial
Jul 26, 2009 Drawing, Tutorials
Here is my latest tutorial: how to draw the nose! I have already covered general tips on drawing the nose, now here is a step by step guide to my approach. Hope you enjoy!
1. Start with a good reference photo, as clear and detailed as you can find. Grid it, either digitally or by hand, and grid your paper to correspond. If possible, make a grayscale copy of your reference. This makes it much easier to see differences in tonal value.
2. With an ‘H’ pencil, Lightly draw in all the shapes and contours you can see. Include the outlines of major shadows and highlights. Carefully erase your grid lines with a kneaded eraser.
3. Use your ‘B’ pencil and start blocking in the darkest areas. Don’t think detail yet, just work on filling in some of the space. The shadows right underneath the edge of the nostrils will always be darkest, fading as they move away.
4. Now that you’ve done the shadows, start shading the midtones, working carefully towards the highlights. Try not to get any graphite inside the areas of the highlights, but get a nice smooth transition.
5. Now you can use your blending stick to blend together the different tones. Use short, regular strokes and work from light to dark so you don’t dirty your highlights. If your blending stick gets too dark, wipe it off on a sheet of scrap paper or roll it in your kneaded eraser.
6. Intensify some of the darkest shadows with your ’2B’ pencil and blend it in.
7. As a last step, use your kneaded eraser to clean up your highlights and lighten any areas that look too dark. Don’t forget about the highlights on the bottom edge of the nostrils!
How to Draw the Nose
Jul 6, 2009 Drawing
The nose gives many beginning portrait artists a hard time. I think this is because the nose is one facial feature that looks extremely different from what we expect it to. As kids we all drew noses as a backwards comma shape, or a backwards check mark. Or maybe just as a pair of nostrils! These kinds of preconceptions get in the way when trying to draw realistically. With noses, it is essential to look at your reference photo to see where the shadows fall. It is also important to understand the basic structure of the nose. Here are some tips:
UPDATE: View my step by step tutorial on how to draw the nose.
- At its most basic, the nose is a wedge sticking out from the face. The bottom and one edge are most often in shadow. Depending on the light, the nose may also cast a shadow.
- The tip of the nose and the nostrils can be shown by three circles.
- A more complex drawing of the nose includes the keystone-shaped
plane between the brows. This is usually in shadow. Below this shape, the nose is narrowest, widening at towards the bottom at the nostrils. - Hilights are usually found on the tip of the nose, the edge of one nostril, and down the bridge of the nose.
- Because we are seeing the nostrils at an angle, we don’t see the whole opening. Nostrils usually appear as just a curved line, or
sometimes as a bit of a triangular shape. - Don’t be worried if your nose only seems to be defined on one side. Depending on how the light hits the nose, the one side may be in shadow while the other side seems to blend right into the rest of the face.
- Don’t forget that underneath the tip of the nose and the bottom edge of the nostrils will be in shadow because they slant down towards the face.
Keep these guidelines in your head while you’re drawing and your noses will appear much more realistic. Most importantly, get rid of your ideas about what a nose should look like and really study your reference! All the information you need for a great portrait is there, you just need to look for it!
On the Web:
Stan Prokopenko’s blog has an excellent tutorial on how to draw a nose. He goes into great detail about the structure and anatomy of the nose.
Tags: better drawings, draw nose, drawing tips, getting started, portraits
Subscribe to RSS Feed
Subscribe by Email