Capturing Likeness and Drawing Celebrities
Being able to capture someone’s likeness in a drawing is a skill I like to practise regularly, whether it’s a caricature, life drawing or a realistic portrait. But it’s not something that comes easy to me.
Recently, I heard someone say that the easiest person to draw is Pedro Pascal, while Zendaya was one of the hardest. Intrigued, I ran to my iPad to see for myself. To my surprise, they were absolutely right.
I wanted to restrict myself to using dot eyes. Keeping the eyes simple forced me to focus on the proportions of the whole face, rather than individual features. I also found that men were easier to draw this way, maybe because women often accentuate our eyes with makeup.
It was at this point I realized that I had been extremely lucky with that Pedro sketch. I decided to refine my line work a bit and start drawing regular eyeballs.
It may look like a lot of sketches here, but I probably have double the amount of completely unsharable drawings. But that’s how you get to the good stuff!
I’m no expert, but I do see a lot of improvement from when I started this challenge, so here are the steps I found helpful in capturing someone’s likeness:
In early stages, I found it helpful to restrict myself to straight lines. (I’m sensing a pattern with restriction here).
Next, I’d draw the features as basic shapes and think carefully about where they are placed in relation to each other, and then refine the details while studying reference.
After refining details, the resemblance should start to show. If not, you may want to shift some features around. Sometimes the slightest shift is all you need to catch a glimpse of the person you’re drawing.
I may not be great at complimenting myself but I can’t deny that this is a MUCH better Zendaya that my first attempt.
If you want to improve your portrait drawing skills, I highly recommend sketching while watching your favourite shows! A large cast of diverse faces will give you a great range to work with.
I’m currently working on two overlapping freelance projects (wish me luck!) so I’m going into work-hibernation and not sure when I’ll see you again, but I always look forward to our next date!