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Affordable Pencil Portraits in a Natural & Direct Style...

by UK pencil portraits artist Sally Holland, at affordable prices! Pencil portraits make unique & affordable gifts. Pencil portraits celebrate landmarks in life: Birthdays, Weddings, Anniversaries.

I tell the child that I do not need them to smile all the time; it would soon become painful. I only ask for a smile when I need it. I try and draw quickly, for the sake of the child. My drawings are basically linear and shape-conscious. I introduce areas of tone in these portraits only to suggest form quickly and to represent dark hair or eyes for instance, and texture in certain sections of the drawing.

I look at the general shape of the hair/head. Some children typically have their head  tipped & this could be a key to their character. An angled central line to indicate the tipped face might be a useful start with another line at right angles to this to indicate the line of the eyes.  As a note of interest, the shoulders often counterbalance the tipping of the head. Establishing the angles correctly lifts the drawing above the ordinary.

Lightly indicate the general shape of the head. The drawing has to have some flexibility in it at this stage so do not make marks that cannot be erased easily. They might have to be repositioned if the child moves. Make some comparisons between width and height. Establish the depth of the fringe, perhaps using this as a unit of measure to determine other proportions.

It is always surprising how large a child’s skull is, and, surprisingly, the eyes will appear lower than halfway down the total length of the head. (Drawing adults is a different matter.)
This is the case when viewing the child at their own level. See photos below:-

 

While still at the roughing out stage, try and position the ears thinking in terms of the angle they are set at. Not only is the angle of the ears key to achieving something of the character of the child it also helps describe the widening part of the head. This is satisfying to get right as the head starts to appear solid.

                       

Having established some general proportions I change my approach, sharpen my pencil and home in tightly on the eye area. The eye area is the focus of the portrait and warrants the closest treatment. Locate the eyebrows precisely by relating them to the eye line and the hair shape. Look at the shape of the eyebrows and ask:  ‘where, exactly, is the high-point of the curve?’ This is always a good question to ask when drawing any curved line.  Some eyebrows are dark and individual tiny hairs can be seen. With a sharp pencil concentrate of the direction and the flow of these tiny hairs. Be precise and quick. Do not labour over it. Many children have very fair eyebrows, often so feint that only the merest indication is needed. Be true to what you see and consider how the two eyebrows relate to each other.

Now, to the eyes. This is the approach that works for me in this kind of portrait. I often ask the child to look at me, or at a fixed point for a few minutes. Again, it is all about seeing shape precisely. Each persons’ eyes have their own distinct shape, so it is crucial to see and draw these shapes precisely. Drawing the eyes is all about seeing the character of the shape. Use a good, sharp pencil for precision, and also to describe the fine creases that flow round the eyes and define the shape of the lids.

           

                                           

 Again, this is my approach to this type of portrait. Locate and draw the iris. Make sure it is a distinct circle, albeit the upper and lower parts are hidden under the lids. Some pale eyed children have a dark ring around the outer edge of the iris. This is particularly satisfying to draw as it reinforces the circle of the iris.

Draw the second eye relating it to the first in every respect, obviously. Consider how the two eyes relate to each other in terms of overall shape. We have all heard it said that the eyes are one eye’s width apart – but beyond this we must ask:  ‘is it a big gap or is it a small gap?’ This is a question I frequently ask myself throughout the course of a drawing.

                                           

 

The catch-light is a chip of pure white light, or paper, left showing in the eye. I locate it close to the black of the pupil so that the contrast is intensified. Draw the catch-light in the same position in both irises. When shading the iris use marks appropriate to the eye as it appears. Sometimes radiating lines are appropriate; sometimes the merest smudge is enough for particularly pale eyes; or heavy shading for liquid brown eyes, but I would never shade in solidly, because some light and life needs to come from the eye. I rarely shade anything in flatly.

There is a muscle under the eye that tightens when the child smiles, so I will always ask the child for a brief smile. To indicate this muscle I place a brief curve, a mere mark, just below the eye. Be careful, because if drawn too clumsily it can simply make the child look tired. Locate it carefully and make sure it is always the product of observation, because, of course, every child is different even in the the seemingly insignificant details.

Now, working downwards... I have, in my experience, noticed that noses are often longer than one imagines. Even little button noses. Assess the length by comparison with a known unit of measure and plot the position of the end of the nose. Believe your measurements. Once you are happy with the positioning, make a mark that can be developed into a carefully observed nose-shape. Think in terms of its shape as you observe it, and its three dimensional form. Draw round the shapes. Sense the form.

                                          

Freckles can be a wonderful opportunity. When drawn sensitively they help describe the form of the face. Work across the face, up and over the hill of the nose, across and round the far cheek. They might be very feint or they might be distinct. A problem can arise when the child has a face full of freckles and trying to reproduce them exactly as they appear will look like measles. Therefore I concentrate the freckles in the familiar freckle passage; the ‘mask’ across the nose and cheeks and only suggest them very sparsely on the rest of the face.

Working downwards... between the nose and the top lip is the shallow furrow of the filtrim, a seemingly unimportant part of the face. Sometimes long, sometimes short, the length of it is of real importance in the face. Many caricaturists have taken it to extremes, exploiting its expressive properties for comical effect. The length of the filtrim also influences the overall length of the face significantly, so it is important to judge it precisely. “Is it a big gap, is it a small gap?”

The parents will of course want the child to be smiling. Most, but not all, children smile with their top teeth showing. Others will smile keeping their mouth stubbornly shut. I request they smile only for the time I need it and then work quickly. I draw the curve of the smile based upon observation and looking for any peculiarities. I then concentrate on the overall shape of the teeth. I use only the lightest indication where the teeth divide - getting the overall shape of the teeth is far more important than drawing every tooth. Usually only the softest line is needed to outline the lips.

                                                   

It is preferable to understate the smile lines. So often they are overstated. Not only does this age the child - more importantly - it breaks down the form. Similarly, dimples need to be positioned carefully and indicated only lightly.

Working downwards, the chin forms part of the face shape.  At the same I would run my eyes around the general face shape and establish it as narrow, broad, round, triangular, square, or permutations of these. The face shape is such an important part of the portrait and perhaps the hardest and most satisfying aspect to get right.

I look again at the overall shape of the head and develop the drawing  of the hair. Whether the hair is long and lustrous or short and tatty, the same applies - the key consideration is to make sure that the lines describing the hair help describe the form of the head itself. It is easy to follow a piece of curling hair and find that it appears to break down the form beneath. So be selective. That way the head looks good and solid.

                                     

Working downwards, the neck is so small on a very young child that it hardly shows at  all. So look carefully at where the line of the shoulders appears to meet the head. I find that children often have to be asked to relax their shoulders after sitting for a while and possibly feeling a little self-conscious and tense. Babies’ and toddlers’ shoulders are quiet narrow. Sometimes when drawing older children the shoulders are too big for the sheet of paper and the artist must be wary of the temptation to reduce the width of the shoulders to fit the paper. So compare widths with vertical measurements.

When drawing the clothes follow the folds, creases and patterns that help describe the form beneath. This part of the drawing is not a focal part so keep the drawing fairly loose, avoiding detail, so that the eye does not settle there.

I can cope with the child moving, to a certain extent. If distracted, they tend to return to the same pose before too long. There are some people, however,  who I just know are going to present a problem - head tippers. They appear to have a weak neck and habitually tip their head to one side. The artist needs to draw them as they appear, of course - which is great, interesting. But I know from experience that after five minutes or so, they will shift their weight a little, and suddenly their head has settled, tipped to the other side! It s a major change and yet the sitter seems to be unaware.  My process of drawing involves ‘pulling’ the shapes I see down onto the paper in front of me which is lined up straight in front of the subject - pure observation. So this dramatic shift in position can be a major obstacle. If I am five or ten minutes into a 25-minute drawing then there really is not enough time to totally change the drawing. And anyway, who knows whether they will tip their head back to the original position again in five minutes’ time? In this case I have to ask them to return to their original pose.

More to follow shortly …