Howdy, Para! I have always loved the range of emotion you can draw and was wondering if you had any tips or tricks or your process on drawing intense emotions/facial expressions that you’d like to share? If not, no worries! Just know that you’re exceptionally talented and I ALWAYS look forward to the next Monster Boy update!!! Cheers! ❤️
Thank you Vero for my life. ;v; You’re a sweetpea. <3
I’d say the first thing you need to do is learn how to draw loosely. If you’re someone who has a tendency to draw “tightly”, concerned with every line and focusing on the details, you’re going to struggle with drawing big expressions. Take some time to practice drawing quickly; do some 30/20/10 second drawing exercises, challenge yourself to draw in strokes instead of sketching each line, draw with a pen so you can’t erase. These are brilliant confidence building exercises, and will help you draw big, bold facial expressions.
As for actual instruction, honestly the first place I would direct you to is Tracy JB’s awesome tutorial on drawing facial expressions. Her advice is golden. I appreciate that she not only touches on the Do’s, but the Don’ts too. Stock anime expressions can be fun, and good for a punchline in a comic maybe, but I would discourage artists from becoming too reliant on them. When your characters are all using the same expressions, they’re stripped of their individuality. This tutorial also includes some imperative studies for anyone interested in cartooning: squash and stretch, people-watching, using your own reflection as reference. Making faces in a mirror is a good laugh too!
The second image of this post includes a page from Scott McCloud’s book How To Draw Comics. It’s a chart of expressions, ranging from subtle to extreme. Further on down the post is another page showing how to combine expressions to get different results. It’s a really nice breakdown of how to draw complicated emotions. (This post includes a ton of facial expression reference too. Bonus!)
I’d recommend spending time looking at the work of your favourite artists, especially those who have a mastery of facial expressions. Look at the emotions on the characters’ faces, see how they differ. What parts of the face have to be emphasized in order to carry the expression? Check the little details: the angle of the character’s head, the wrinkles in the skin around the eyebrows, eyes and mouth. How do the expressions differ from character to character? Maybe one has a tendency to chew their lip, another keeps their teeth gritted, another squints a lot. Look at characters with different types of faces: how does a young girl’s facial expressions look compared to an old man’s? Consider individuality in your characters’ expressions.
You mentioned you’re interested in learning how to extreme facial expressions - which is cool, they’re super fun! But I’d say learning how to draw subtle facial expressions is just as important, because it’s more difficult. Try drawing a character who is trying to hide their emotion, trying not to let it show on their face. What would happen? Are they sweating, are their eyes wide, are they trying to smile? What happens when they break? I find it really fun exploring ideas like this, it’s challenging and you can learn a lot.
Finally, one little tidbit: the most expressive part of the face is the eyebrows. Sounds weird but it’s true. The eyebrows are your best tool when it comes to drawing facial expressions.
I hope that helps a little!! Thanks again Vero! qwq/ <33
