Drawing the face from above, at an angle


In this series, we’re looking at some tricky angles that are much more challenging to draw than simple front-facing or profile faces. Today we’ll be studying a low angle – more specifically, a high, diagonal angle. We’ll be showing you some great tips for drawing the face at this difficult angle!

Two of the key reasons artists make mistakes when drawing a face is that they don’t have a strong enough grasp of the 3D shape of the face, or they haven’t drawn their guidelines correctly. So let’s look at some techniques to iron out those problems, and help expand your repertoire of poses and angles!



First of all, we draw a circle with crossed lines in it as our first guidelines. Have the vertical lines slope gently to the side, and add in in some oval/balloon shaped guidelines inside the circle. This will help us think about the depth and dimension of the head when drawing.

The pink arrow shows the depth of the head – as seen on the side view too!


Now we can start with our linework. The first line we draw is this one, from the forehead down to the mid line of the eyes.


Then we continue the line down to the chin, remembering to add a dent to show the eye socket, and a swell to show the cheek.


We can extend the centre line of the eyes, and position the ears underneath that line. Then add a line to connect the bottom of the ear up with the chin.


Here’s how we can place the eyes, eyebrows and mouth. Remember to place the mouth and nose on the centre line of the face.


Let’s simplify it a little. So when drawing from an angle like this, we have these two parallel lines connecting the left and right ears. The blue line passes through both of the pupils of the eyes, and the green line marks the top of the eyes. The pink line is the centre line of the face.


Then we draw in the hair to complete our character!


We hope this has helped you better understand how to accurately draw a face from this high angle. Make sure to practice these guidelines lots of times, so you can get the 3D shape clear in your mind. After enough practice, it will get much easier to draw faces from all different angles!


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