Introduction
Hello! I’m Skyribbonsteph, and in this tutorial, you will learn the the ins and outs of drawing eyes for your character illustrations.
To watch the video tutorial, click the link below!
Part 1: The Basics of Drawing Eyes and Stylization
Parts of the Eye
Before you begin with drawing eyes, it’s important to go over the important parts of the eye. Here is a diagram showing the key components.
The white part of the eye is called the sclera (1). The colored circle inside of the eye is called the iris (2), and the black hole inside the iris is the pupil (3). The pink line at the bottom is the tear duct (4).
Types of Eyes
Some people in the the world have mono-lid eyes instead of hooded eyelids. This is especially important to know if you want to draw eyes in a more realistic style and incorporate characters from different parts of the world.
Drawing an Eye
It’s also important to remember that beneath the skin, the eye is the shape of a ball, or sphere. This will come in later in the coloring and highlighting step of this tutorial.
To draw an eye, start with an arch shape for the top lash line, and one for the bottom lash line. Then draw a circle inside the arch shapes for the iris, and a dot for the pupil.
Stylizing Eyes
Now drawing eyes like this is serviceable, but a little basic. So let’s get into how you can stylize eyes to make them more interesting.
One way to stylize eyes is by drawing them as either closed or open shapes.
You can draw arch shapes that fully connect all the way around into an oval, oval shapes that have an opening along one end, or drawing two separate arches that don’t connect at all.
Style Tip 1: Open vs. Closed Eye Lines
The next way to stylize is with eye size and shape. The general rule is that big and round eyes tend to look more youthful and innocent, while narrow and angular eyes are more serious and mature.
Style Tip 2: Eye Size and Shape
Small Pupils Versus Big Pupils
You can also play around with the size of the pupils inside the eyes as well. The smaller the pupils, the more beady and intense the eyes look--the bigger the pupils, the more soulful the eyes look.
Adding Shines
Adding shines to the pupils and irises gives the eyes more of an “anime” style to them.
Style Tip 3: Lashes
Don’t forget to also play around with eyelashes to give your eyes more flair. Here are some examples.
Style Tip 4: Eyebrows
You can play around with eyebrow shapes and sizes as well to add more personality to your eyes.
Part 2: Drawing Eyes on a Face From Different Angles
Let’s break down how to draw stylized eyes on a face from different angles.
To learn to draw eyes on a face from different angles, let’s quickly visit realism to understand the fundamentals.
Realistic Face Proportions
Generally speaking, the eyes land at about ⅓ of the way down the face, right at the divot between the forehead and the top of the nose bridge. The corners of the eyes land on the same line of the tops of the ears, and the distance between two eyes is about one eye in width. These rules are important to keep in mind even if you bend them depending on your art style.
Intro to Face Angles for Drawing Eyes
There are three main angles that are used for drawing faces: The front view, the side view, and the ¾ view.
Let’s start with the front view, where the face is shown to the viewer head-on. From this angle, the face will appear more flat and all facial features will appear to be the same size.
Drawing Eyes from the Front Angle
Start with drawing the head as an oval shape, then make a straight dividing line down the middle of the oval, and two straight horizontal guidelines for the top and bottom lids of the eyes, placed around a third of the way down the face.
Now draw your eyes along the top and bottom lid guidelines, making sure that they appear symmetrical. You can add additional vertical guidelines to make sure they're the same distance in width, and also flip the canvas to check for symmetry, if you’re working digitally.
Drawing An Eye from the Side Angle
Next is the side view, or profile view, where one half of the face is visible to the viewer.
Starting with the head, draw an oval shape. I like to draw the oval at an angle to visualize the shape of the protruding chin and jawline more easily.
The Eye from the Side Angle
From the side view, the eye looks like a cone shape, so draw two straight lines meeting at a central point. The iris and pupil will also look like a semicircle from this angle, and place the eye on the face according to the placement rules.
Drawing Eyes from the 3/4 Angle
Now let’s get to drawing the ¾ view of the head, or the viewpoint between the front and side view. Drawing eyes from this angle requires a bit of understanding of perspective, since one eye will look closer to the viewer than the other.
To start, draw an oval for the head shape, but draw a curved line from top to bottom this time. Draw the guidelines down the face for the eyes, curving in the same direction as your vertical curve.
For the eye that is closer to the viewers, draw the arch shapes along the guidelines similar to how you would a standard front-facing eye.
Illusion of Depth with Wide Eye Shape vs. Narrow Eye Shape
For the eye that is farther away, draw top and bottom arches along the guidelines that are much narrower than the first eye--this will make this eye look farther away and create that illusion of depth.
To add in the irises and pupils, draw the iris in the closer eye bigger than in the farther away eye, and the same goes for the pupils as well.
Part 3: Digitally Coloring and Rendering Eyes
Now let’s go over how to color and render eyes to make them shiny and appealing.
Here’s an illustration I made of an anime girl with the flat colors already laid down. I’m going to show you how I color eyes with three important steps--colors, shadows, and highlights.
Flat Colors
Start with coloring the white of the eyes. Don’t use pure white in the picture because it will be too bright and will make the eyes look unnatural. Instead, use a very light gray or faded color that appears white.
The next step is to color in the irises with a color that fits the mood of your piece. I’m using a bright brown.
The next step is to add shadows to the eyes. Let’s say the light source for this illustration is the standard, from above.
From this angle, the upper eyelid casts a curved shadow over the top of the eyeball, and the light will hit the center area of the eye.
Shadows
To color in the curved shadow over the top of the eyes, use a gray color for the whites of the eyes and a darker color than your iris color. I used a brown color with a bit of red in it to make the shadow pop out a bit more.
Primary Highlights
Next, you add the highlights across the middle of the eye. One way to do it that looks very nice is to make a new layer on top of the lineart for the eyes and draw white circles over the curve of the irises that cut into the pupils.
Secondary Highlights
Then, you can add a secondary highlight inside the irises that is a slightly less bright than the main highlight--use a color that is brighter than your iris color--I’m using a light yellow/brown color here. You can play around with the shape of the highlight until you’re satisfied.
Clipping Layers
Now the next step is optional--but it’s useful in making the eyes look softer--add in a clipping layer. Add in a clipping layer above the lineart layer of your eyes to make the eyes pop. I’m using a brown to match the mood of my picture.
And here is the completed illustration with added background and shading.
Conclusion
These are all my tips and tricks for how to draw eyes I have to share! I hope this tutorial helps you out, and thanks for reading!
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