Art-ology

The rendering of children demands freshness and directness of purpose. Unfortunately, there are not too many quick and ready rules. Let us just say that kids’ portraits demand a keen and patient eye.

For those who intend to do commercial portraiture the good news is that kids’ portraits can be lucrative. There are very few draftspersons who can capably render children.

Soft lighting works best for portraits of children. The kid could be looking towards a intense light source. This sort of light source will light up the kid’s face and create an introspective facial expression. The tone range goes from light to medium with the eyes very dark.

Addressing the facial proportions of children in a general sense is somewhat of a waste of time. Their facial proportions change dramatically within a six month time span.

Suffice it to say that the younger the kid is the smaller the face in relation to the head. The eyes also appear larger although this can be misleading. A kid’s nose can be very difficult to render – there is nothing really to hold onto. And the mouth is very subtle and sensitive not to mention its constant motion if you render from life.

If you do want to mention some broad proportions you can say that whereas an adult face is about 1/2 the size of the frontal head side, a kid’s face is about one-third of that size. Also, observe how little an infant’s neck is compared to the size of the head.

At its widest segment, a baby’s face is about five eye widths wide. The width between the eyes is a tiny bit more than the width of an eye. Both the mouth and the nose are approximately the width of an eye. Once more, we must emphasize that these proportions are only a broad rule and individual face proportions can vary. The above broad rules can be used for comparison purposes when you do your own careful observations of a particular face.

As always, start your sketch by striking the arabesque and then correcting the height/width proportions as necessary.

After establishing the primary facial proportions (i.e., the brow, nose, mouth, etc.) block-in the major light/dark patterns. Then, stump down the graphite using your fingers or a stump. To render and re-shape the lights make use of a clean putty eraser.

Now the features are carefully placed, sized and partially rendered. There are two points to take into account here:

1. Your pencils must be real sharp, and

2. At this point, you should never fully complete a feature. Sketch each feature no more than 50%.

As soon as the features are sized and established as best you can, you can now further develop them. Do not neglect the hair and sides of the face. Everything should be brought up together. As you proceed to render you should always be on the lookout for mistakes in proportions and tone.

In closing, the basic procedures used to render a kid’s portrait are of course always the same. Above, we listed most of the differences in proportion and shape between an adult head and that of a kid. Your frame of mind when rendering a kid should be one that reflects the innocence and the softness of a kid.

Do you want to learn the secrets of pencil portrait drawing? Download my brand new free pencil portrait drawing tutorial here: portrait drawing tutorial.

Remi Engels is a pencil portrait artist and oil painter and practiced drawing teacher. See his work at graphite pencil portraits by Remi.

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