JebsArt

• Full face - proportion and measurement
• Placement of the hairline, length of face and the base of the bottom lip
• Feature placement
• The Eye

When I first started in portraiture I had no idea how to go about it.  As time went on and after reading several books that touched on the subject, I was still rather confused.  How on earth do you get the proportions and the correct placement of the face and features?

I set about studying faces in magazines and photo's to see if there was a similarity in sizing and placing.  Using what I learned from this, plus what I had gleaned from books, I found that there are guidelines for an "average" adult face.  Not all heads and faces are "average", but if you have the basics then you should be able to adapt from there.

First of all we need to find the size of the head using the outer eye width as a guide. 

I'm assuming here an outer eye meaurement of 1inch.

An average head measures 5 eye widths wide at it's widest point (which is approximately at the eyebrow level) and 7 to 8 eye widths in length, not counting the depth of hair on top of the head.

Therefore, to draw an average head I draw a 5 inch x 8 inch grid.

Mr/Mrs Average's head should fit in this grid.   Note that the head is about 5 eye widths wide at the widest point (top half of the head) and 8 eye widths in length from the top of the head to the base of the chin. 

The eyes normally have one eye space between them and the nose is about one eye width wide.   Note as well that the inner edge of the eyebrows line up vertically with the inner edge of the eye. 

The centre horizontal line is approximately where the eyes line up, (Yes, the eyes normally belong at the centre point of the length of the head!!!)

Divide the length of the head you[ve drawn into sevenths this time (a calculator comes in very handy at this point).  This gives the approximate placing of the hairline, which is about 1/7 from the top of the head.  This also gives us the length of the face as 6/7 of the head lenth.

The base of the bottom lip is about 1/7 of the head length up from the base of the chin. 

 Divide the length of the face  (between the hairline and the chin base) into thirds. 

The eyebrows and top of ears are usually placed 1/3 down the face from the hairline.

The approximate base of the nose level and lower ear level are 2/3 down the face from the hairline.

The outer corners of the mouth line up  approximately with the inner side of the iris's.

The inner end of the eyebrow lines up with the inner corner of the eye.  To find the outer end of the eyebrow, draw a diagonal line that touches the outer edge of the nose and the outer edge of the eye.

 Another average measurement I have noticed is that the base of the nose is approximately  1 1/2 eye widths down from the inner corner of the eye.

We've established how to measure the face and features using the "Outer Eye Width", but how do you calculate the size of the iris?

In an adult, the iris diameter (width) is approximately half the width of the visable "white" of the eye.

Children's iris's are about the same size as an adult, so less white shows.  This gives the impression of big eyes.  Drawing an adult with iris's that are too large will make them look younger than they should.

Normally the iris will be partially covered by the eye lids.  If the whole iris is showing the person will look surprised or possibly alarmed, lol.

A mistake a lot of new portrait artists (including myself) make is the placement of the pupil in the iris.  In a full face portrait the pupil is exactly centred within the iris.

(Note: If the head is turned sideways from the full frontal position, the iris AND the pupil become spheres.)