How to draw portraits from photography. How to draw a person's face. Highlight and darken - the final stages of working on a portrait from a photograph

Drawings of a person's face, a portrait is the most difficult type of fine art. Learning to draw a portrait of a person correctly, even with a simple pencil, requires not only training time, but also talent. The complexity of drawing a portrait of a person lies in the ability to convey the emotional state of a person, his facial expressions, the depth of his gaze, etc. To do this, you need to correctly draw the eyes, accurately repeat the shape of a person's lips and other features of his face.
How to draw a portrait of a person if you have no experience? It is quite possible to learn a simple technique for drawing a human face on your own, but first you can try draw a man's face step by step, with a simple pencil. Perhaps not the first time, but with a strong desire, you will certainly be able to draw a real portrait of a person.

1. The general contour of a person's face is the most important

To draw correctly portrait of a man it is important to accurately make the first contour, the contour of the face. Without pressing hard on the pencil, repeat this oval of the person's face in your drawing. You may need to draw it several times by repeating this step again. Do not spare paper, draw until this outline is correct and symmetrical. If you want to paint the same portrait as in my drawing, please be patient and diligent.

2. Marking the main parts of a person's face

Draw a horizontal line exactly in the center dividing the portrait in two, and just below another parallel line. From the center of the bottom line, draw a perpendicular line, and mark where the tip of the nose will be located on the face. When drawing these lines, do not press hard on the pencil. Don't forget to draw the ears.

3. Eyes are the main part of the portrait

Drawing a person's face in stages is simple and fun. The main thing is to take the first steps exactly. At this stage, drawing will be much easier, but you need to be extremely careful and accurate. Probably, we need to sharpen the pencil sharper, we will need to make thin lines now.
The eyes on a person's face are the most important part of a portrait. So let's start with them and start drawing this step of the portrait. Draw the eyes with smooth, oval lines, but first put marks (dots) for the side, upper and lower borders of each eye. Draw the pupils, mouth line and initial hair outlines.

4. Draw the outlines of the eyebrows, mouth and lips

This step will be the most difficult, but after it the portrait of the person will be almost finished. Draw something that is easy to draw first. Draw the eyebrows and finish drawing the outline of the hair. Now let's draw a slightly more complex element of the person's face - the lips. The lower lip is easier to draw, so we'll start with it, and the upper lip will be a mirror image of the lower one, only it is divided in half in the center. Don't paint too wide a mouth and thick lips.
Start drawing the nose from its tip, in the form of a "checkmark", and two arcs around the edges. Now draw a line from the right eyebrow, with a slight deviation to the right.
Gently remove from your drawing of a person's face extra contour lines and look, it turned out to be a real portrait of a person.

5. The drawing of the person's face is almost complete.

If you have reached this stage and are quite happy with your drawing of a person, then you are a real artist and apparently you can draw a lot of things beautifully. Starting from this step, you deserve a rest, and therefore you will not have to draw any more difficult things in a portrait of a person. You only need to draw the eyebrows, eyelids, hair and more details to draw the ears.

6. Portrait of a man. Creating shadows in the drawing

So we got a real drawing of a person's face, it remains only to make a portrait, as real artists do. That is, add a soft simple pencil to the shadow drawing, make the face picture three-dimensional. This effect can only be achieved by creating shadows and contrasts.
On the face and hair, many areas need to be shaded with darker and thicker light. This effect will give the face more realism and depth.
Now you know how draw a portrait person and you can try to draw a portrait from a photograph. Do not try to draw a portrait of a person "from life", only artists can do it. If you manage to convey the main similarities and express the main trait of a person in your drawing, this is already good. And if the portrait bears a resemblance to the person in the photo, then you can be sure that you have real talent.

The lesson on how to draw a portrait of a person is in addition to the lesson on how to draw a person in full growth. First draw a standing person, and then, using this lesson, you can draw in detail the person's face.

A drawing of a person's face is, first of all, eyes. It is this element of the portrait that needs to be paid the most attention. In this lesson, you can learn how to draw eyes in detail.

Each person's nose has unique characteristics, so it is impossible to give precise advice on how to draw the nose of a girl, child or man. You can only make an abstract or, as they say, "academic" drawing of the nose.

If you decide to draw a person's face, it is important to achieve similarities in the portrait of the person and accurately draw any facial features. But the eyes and lips are the most important elements of a facial drawing.

It is difficult to draw a ballerina, because you need to convey the grace and grace of the dancer's movements. To make it easier for you to draw a ballerina, this lesson is completed step by step.

Let's try to draw a hockey player in motion in stages, with a stick and a puck. You may even be able to draw your favorite hockey player or goalkeeper.

In this lesson, we will learn how to correctly draw anime comics in the manga style with a pencil. Every anime fan wants to be able to draw manga, but it's not easy for everyone, since drawing a person is difficult, especially anime in motion.

The eyes of the anime style drawing of a person's face are the basis of this style. Eyes always have a distorted enlarged size, and a person's facial features have only an approximate resemblance to a real person's face.

PHOTO SAMPLE

When I am tasked to paint a picture from a portrait photograph, I choose a self-portrait. It is always best to draw from life, as and when you can, in photographs the picture can sometimes be distorted. However, it is not always possible or convenient to get people to pose, and photographs definitely help here. I tried to choose the most interesting photo, I don't look like myself here, but I really like bright sunlight here, so I choose this photo! (fig. 1)

SKETCH

I don't always start with a sketch, but when I have to draw from a photograph (and, in fact, a self-portrait), it helps to be a little more accurate. Sometimes I start by just sketching general shapes and lines, but in this case, I just started with a very simple sketch.

It is needed in order to correctly measure the main features of the face: eyes, nose, mouth, etc. And one more layer just with lines on top of all parts of the face, then duplicated. (fig. 2-3)

(Straight lines can be drawn by holding down the Shift key while drawing a line with a brush) After that I roughly finish the rest by eye. You can use special grids if that's more convenient for you, but personally I try not to bother trying to achieve perfection on the basic sketch. At this stage, the drawing looks, of course, lousy, but the base is already ready, so you can move on to coloring!

BRUSHES

There are a huge number of different brushes on the Internet, and although some of them are very good in my opinion, there is nothing better than a regular round brush. This is what I'll be using, the basic hard round brush that comes with all versions of Photoshop. (fig. 4)

BASE COLORS

When it comes to choosing colors when painting from a photo, I think it's best to leave the thought of using the Color picker. Photos can be very mosaic and colors can be distorted, random selection of colors will not give you a real idea of ​​the tones, especially when it comes to skin, for example! Therefore, use only your abilities and experiment, trying to achieve the most approximate result, and here getting to the point is not the most important thing.

I will add so many different colors throughout the process that it won't matter in the end. The next step is to add some base tones on the normal layer below the sketch (the sketch layer itself is switched to Multiply, which makes it almost transparent). (fig. 5)

From now on, everything will be drawn on top of the sketch and the already applied base colors. In my work, I always merge layers as needed, so I don't have to get confused in a large number of layers. Most of the time, though, I will be adding new elements on separate layers. I'm not a purist! If something goes wrong, it won't be a disaster for me.

As for whether or not to use many layers in your work, this is entirely up to you, do what is convenient for you personally. At this point, I start to add base light spots to better shape the lines of the face. (fig. 6)

Don't worry if at this stage your drawing doesn't look like the original yet; it’s too early and it’s going to look much better along the way. In the meantime, everything looks rather sloppy, the strokes are very noticeable and uneven, but it's all about finding the right colors and shapes. Try not to get hung up on softening the lines of the picture yet.

COLORS

One of the most common questions that I have to receive in my address is how I "know" what colors to pick. To be honest, I don't know, I just try to pick them up and pay attention to the environment, and only then I choose a certain color. Photography is a great help and is much easier to work with than relying on your intuition. However, in 90% of cases I am not completely happy with the result of the chosen colors and as a result I have to change them. The color palette chosen at the very beginning of the work and the one that turns out at the very end are two completely different things. So if you don't like the color you choose, don't worry. Photoshop is your friend, and it definitely has its upsides. (fig. 7-8)

One of the invaluable tools for me is Color balance. I usually duplicate the entire image and then adjust the colors if I don't like them, which is absolutely always the case. This tool is very useful when you want to slightly or significantly change the colors of a painting. It can also be very helpful in balancing colors if they don't quite blend in with each other. (fig. 9)

You will surely notice how the tones in my drawing change throughout the work. Sometimes I change and undo changes in search of the desired effect. Yes, I'm so fickle!

PROCESSING

With the base colors and lights in place, I spend the rest of the time working on the details. In this process, I rarely get stuck in one area, I jump between different parts of the drawing so that I don't get bored of working on the same for too long. It also helps, when returning to previous sites, to notice small flaws and correct them. It is also obvious that the picture has become softer. It was a little too rough in the beginning, but we softened it up as we worked it out. (fig. 10-12)

LAYER MODES

In the course of my work, I used several different types of layers. These are mainly Normal and Overlay modes. I probably don't need to say anything about Normal mode, but Overlay is very useful. This is a very good way to enhance contrast. My sample photo has a very bright light source. Therefore, in the process of drawing, I overlaid a couple of layers in the Overlay mode. I make the right side of the face a lot brighter by applying the same skin tone, but in Blend mode. It helps a lot to add contrast and glow caused by bright sunlight. This mode also helps to add to this a very bright red / orange, which is visible when the skin contrasts with light.

Opacity (Opacity) of layers always varies, it all depends on which level suits best. Experiment constantly with layers and choose what works! (fig. 13-14)

The dark side of the face still looks flat compared to the lighted side. To fix this, I will add a brighter tone to the layer in Overlay mode to slightly emphasize the structure of the face, cheeks, eyebrow area, etc. I chose light green because the Overlay colors are very saturated. If I had chosen a skin tone, the result would have been a bright orange. Green, on the other hand, will not have the same effect, and will blend perfectly with the overall skin tone. (fig. 15)

TURN!

Another way to control some minor errors is to flip the image. Working with photography, I know what the result will be, but still it will not be superfluous to unfold the drawing about once an hour.

Errors are always detected, so it's much easier to fix them on the fly ... instead of finding out when you're done that everything looks awful if you take and rotate the image! (Image - Image rotation - Flip canvas horizontally) (Fig. 16)

MIXING

I'm pretty sure the most frequently asked question is about how I mix paints, creating smooth transitions from one color to another. I always find it difficult to answer this question, because I never mix two colors "actively". My method is to overlay the color on top, stroke by stroke, in different tones until they are almost invisible. (fig. 17) I would not recommend blurring the colors; in my opinion, this completely deprives the picture of life, in the end it looks "dirty", so do not be afraid if the image is a little rough, just keep working on it! Pick a tone that matches the two colors you want to combine, apply brush strokes and they will blend naturally. If you have any difficulty, try using a brush with softer edges. While I don't recommend using Airbrushes (again, everyone's choice!), Soft-edged brushes can help in blending colors. They can also be useful when you need to slightly lower the opacity of your brush. Sometimes 100% opacity can be overkill. While I almost always change my opacity from 100%, it's all about finding my method that will produce the best results.

HAIR

Using the same standard round brush, create the basic shape of the hair. Then, in the same manner, we begin to apply lighter tones. I do not paint hair as a group of hairs, instead I create curls and try to convey their natural position and the formation of strands as accurately as possible. Then I add individual hairs just to give the hair a lush effect. (fig. 18-20)

I added another layer in Blend mode and filled it with a light brown color, which will give the hair a beautiful shine from the side where the sunlight hits it. This is followed by the process of coloring and repeating. Just keep adding strands, highlights, and a few individual hairs that are knocking out of the hair until you get the finished image.

FINAL STROKES / DETAILS

Adding finishing touches always takes up most of the whole drawing process for me. It is also a process that should not be left to the "last" stages. I work on the details throughout the entire work on the picture, this is a very smooth process for me and very pleasant, I really love the details! This is where everything superfluous is cut off.

For me, the detailing process is the process of bringing order to lines, such as, for example, the jawline against a dark background of hair. At this stage, I can also pay more attention to the details of the eyes, eyebrows, nose and lips, etc. I use the same brush, only smaller. And I usually zoom in a lot when I'm working on details like this. After these procedures, the image becomes noticeably cleaner and it is much easier to work with it further. (fig. 21-22)

CHANGES

You may have noticed that there are some differences in my work from the original. The first change concerns the hair. In fact, they looked just awful! I wasn't particularly into drawing hair like this, so use your artist rights. If you think something needs to be changed, change it! At the end of the day, this is just a sample, not an instruction that must be followed urgently. You will see other changes made here as well. (fig. 23-24)

Below are the cuttings on an enlarged scale. (fig. 25-26) At this stage, the work is almost complete. I cropped the image a bit and tried to add some brighter colors, pinks and blues, to bring out the blue eyes and a subtle pink on the skin. Probably no need to say that this is not on the sample photo, but I just do it the way I like it.

Depicting a person on a piece of paper will help you easily draw friends and acquaintances. Learning this art is not as difficult as it seems at first glance, because everyone made their first sketches in childhood, the main thing is to hone their skills. Before the invention of photography, many people painted portraits, so the main thing to learn is to remember these skills.

How to learn to draw portraits with a pencil? This question is asked by many novice artists, it is very simple, you do not need to graduate from art institutes, but simply become a student of our drawing studio.

With us you can quickly learn the skills of drawing a portrait. Our specialists work according to the author's program, which allows you to hone your skills in practice, because this is the main thing in learning to draw with a pencil. We accept people of all ages and it is not necessary to have professional skills, the main desire is to learn how to draw, and we will help you make your dream come true.

How to draw portraits in pencil correctly?

To start learning to draw a portrait correctly, you first need to choose a special paper that is suitable for sketching with a pencil. It has a porous structure and strokes fit better on it. And a pencil should be picked up soft, if it is hard, then traces will remain on the paper after removing an unnecessary stroke. In our studio you can learn the art of drawing at a professional level, and you will be provided with all the necessary tools and equipment for work.

To begin with, you should familiarize yourself with the proportions of a person's head. If you look at the face right away, it seems that the eyes are located at the top of the head, but this is not at all the case, they are located in the middle, and the feeling of incorrect position creates a congestion with other details. In order to correctly depict all the elements, it is necessary to draw several vertical and horizontal lines on a blank sheet of paper. The eyes will be located along the horizontal line, and the nose along the vertical line.

Step-by-step training in drawing a portrait

To begin with, you need to pay special attention to the shapes of the parts of the face that you are depicting. After all, each person has his own individual characteristics, the eyes can be round or elongated, and the nose can be of different shapes. The main thing is to work out the details, because the portrait should look like a certain person. Then you need to work in stages and learn to draw the following elements:

• Eyes - to depict them you need to draw three lines. The pupils will be in the central part. You need to first sketch the eyeball and eye and not do the shading. After the image of the pupil, the eyelids and existing wrinkles are drawn. At the final stage, eyebrows are drawn;
• Lips - also drawn in three lines. To make it easier, you need to start with the lower lip, then proceed to the upper part. It is divided in half by a hollow. Using the addition of shadows, you can make folds and bulges;
• Nose - they begin to draw it over the upper lip. Artists depict it as a check mark. And from this check mark on both sides you draw several large arcs.

After drawing all these details and sketches, the main hard work is done. At the final stage, shadows are superimposed on the drawing. This is a fairly important stage, which should be given great attention, because it is they who revive the face. Particular attention is paid to the eyes, because it is worth freshening up the look, this will greatly decorate the portrait. The final stage will be drawing the oval of the face along with the shadows.

The main benefits of learning in the Matita drawing studio

If you have a desire, learn to draw portraits with a pencil, but there are no skills and experience at all, this is not a problem. We can quickly teach you all the subtleties and details, and soon your portraits will be admired by family and friends. Many people ask the question, why is it better to study in a drawing studio, and not on your own using a video lesson? Because by coming to our studio, you get a number of the following benefits:

After completing the courses, you will be issued a certificate that confirms the knowledge you have acquired. To try your hand, you can sign up for the first free lesson.

Usually people who do not have a special art education do not dare to portray human faces. It is understandable, for this you need to know the anatomy, the structure of the skull, types of facial muscles and much more. Such students are more interested in how to learn how to draw flowers, still lifes or landscapes, they seem more accessible ... However, in order for a drawing to look like a specific person, academic knowledge in the field of painting is not at all necessary. This sketch may not become a masterpiece, but it will preserve the memory of some meeting.

Artists who already know how to learn how to paint portraits recommend that all beginners pay more attention to the eyes: the similarity achieved depends to a large extent on them. With all the diversity of people living on earth, they are conventionally divided into a relatively small number of types. The most common type of eyes is almond-shaped, but there are others (it is important to understand what they are in the person portrayed). It is necessary to determine the inclination of the outer and inner edges of the eyes.

Now the nose. It is narrower at the top and wider at the bottom. The line of the bottom edge in the figure is already there, it remains only to convey the features of its shape. For beginners who are just learning how to learn how to paint portraits, it is better not to try to depict this facial feature in too much detail.

The mouth is depicted in three main lines. The top edge resembles the letter "M" stretched along the sides. The bottom line is an arc curved towards the bottom. Between them, the mouth itself is a small winding line. It is better not to draw teeth for novice artists unfamiliar with anatomy.

Eyebrow lines and hair tend to work best. Outlining the shape of the hairstyle is relatively easy.

The image of ears also usually does not cause difficulties, unless, of course, we dwell in detail on their structure, which requires certain knowledge.

Remains the neck and clothing (or rather, a collar or neckline). It's pretty straightforward, but details like this give the whole sketch a finishing touch.

After finishing the work, it is a good idea to take a break, and then (for example, the next day) to evaluate for yourself how much what happened, successfully conveys the external resemblance and, possibly, the character of the drawn person. Small details (such as moles, for example) can be important.

And finally, a few tips for those thinking about how to learn how to paint portraits:

• It is better to use a soft pencil.
• Don't be afraid to make a mistake, you can fix it with an eraser.
• You need to draw what you see, not what you want.
• If you have the ability, persist in learning.

And further! Any criticism should be treated with angelic patience, especially if the drawing is commented on by a professional artist.

This is the second lesson of the Spanish artist Luis Serrano, the first was in drawing a male portrait.

We will paint a portrait of actress Audrey Hepburn from the legendary film Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961). For the lesson, we need pencils B, 3B and 6B, an eraser, Canson Marfil paper.

To get a well-drawn portrait, you must first draw a good sketch. To do this, we must correctly display all the details of the face and proportions in order to achieve similarity with the photo. This is the only way to achieve the best result. If we make a bad sketch, there will be a high probability that our portrait will not work. Draw guide lines to make it easier to sketch.

We sketch with a pencil B, trying not to put too much pressure on the pencil. We start drawing from the left eye, if you are right-handed (if you are left-handed, then from the right).

We draw other facial features, constantly comparing with the original and trying to maintain proportions. Try to erase less with an eraser, as the paper gets dirty and damaged.

The similarity of the sketch is not very great, but we can see that the main features and proportions are reproduced correctly. After you finish sketching, take some rest and look at it with fresh eyes, if everything suits you, move on.

Step 1. Start drawing the eyes. We begin to draw the eye with a 3B pencil, namely the pupil and eyelashes. Draw the eye, which is on the left hand.

Step 2. Look closely at the top of the eye, the most upward pupil and eyeball are darkened, because the eyelid always casts a shadow, and because of this, the eye does not look flat. We draw eyelashes. First draw a thick line, then add small strokes with a pencil, simulating the eyelashes. Make shadows on top of the eye and also in the corner of the eye.

Step 3. Draw the second eye, as well as the eyebrows. Then we start drawing the nose. We draw everything with a 3B pencil, unless otherwise indicated. He begins to paint from the nostrils, trying not to make them too large and enlarged, so as not to look like a pig's nose. Apply soft shadows to the right and bottom of the nose to add volume to the nose. Shadows should be soft to convey the tone of the photo. Apply shadows to the face on the right side.

Step 4. Continue shading the face, apply shadow under the nose and slightly highlight the notch above the upper lip. Apply the shadow on the left side of the cheek very gently and softly. Then drawing the mouth is a tricky task, especially if it is open. Luckily, her teeth are barely visible, so it will be a little easier for us. First of all, draw the area inside the mouth, do not enlarge the teeth when drawing. When drawing the inside of the mouth, you can use a softer pencil to darken it. Then we begin to draw the upper lip, creating shadow transitions.

Step 5. Draw the lower lip. First, shade the top and bottom of the lower lip, so that the center is intact and remains white. Then, with separate strokes, repeating the shape of the lip, we apply shadows to the lower lip, creating an imitation of a highlight.

Step 6: Apply shadow to the chin.

Step 7. Now let's start drawing the hair, for some people this causes panic. But it is necessary to draw the hair in order to achieve the completeness of the portrait, tk. traced facial features and unpainted hair make a terrible impression, it doesn’t eat well. First we draw the ear, then look at the photo and define the dark areas of the hair, then draw them.

Step 8. Then darken the lighter area of ​​the hair with a softer tone, the strokes should be uneven. Then draw lines between the dark areas to simulate the shine of the hair.

If you look at the top of Audrey's head, you can see the result of these actions. Hair, like everything else, has a shadow, brightness. irregularities. A common mistake for beginners is to draw a lot of hairs without identifying the dark and light areas of the hair, it looks like a hair brush. we make this mistake because we know that hair consists of many hairs, but when we look at them, we do not see every hair, we see the big picture, they become as a whole, having curls, strands. Draw the rest of the hair based on the above.

Step 9. Draw the bangs, then draw the star-shaped glare earring.

Step 10. Draw the earring, its details are not clear, because the image is too contrasty and a lot of detail is lost.

Step 11. Draw a shadow on the neck, it should be dark enough to show that it is a shadow.

Step 12. Now let's move on to the hand. Many people hate drawing them because don't understand how. Audrey's hand details are barely noticeable, we will draw them this way too. We begin to hatch the back of the hand in a very light tone.

Add soft shadows to the fingers. Apply a darker shade to the joints, lightly mark the nails on the index and middle fingers, without going into details.

Step 13. Draw a cigarette. Apply shadows, focusing on the dark and light areas.

Step 14. Now we will draw a necklace, but it is hard to see it in the photo, so we will turn on imagination and vision, without going into details, using sharp shadows, we will draw something that looks like a necklace.

Step 15. Draw the dress, making the shading tone dark. In the lower part, we make a smooth transition so that it does not hurt the eyes. Then we apply shadows on the shoulder (the strip on the shoulder is the shadow from the nozzle on the cigarette). And we are finishing our work. We look at it, if you are more or less happy, we sign the work. We painted Audrey Herbern.