Art Tutorials

4. Guide To Drawing EYES (Part 1- Female Eyes)

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Being the 'windows to the soul', eyes are probably one of the most noticeable features of your character. 

So in this chapter, I'd like to start off with the basics of drawing a FEMALE eye, as well as different styles of drawing it. Hope you enjoy these tutorials!

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To start this tutorial, I'll introduce you to my style of drawing eyes, which is quite similar to the Disney style, and resembles a more 'cartoonish' look.

1. First, draw an almond shaped base, which will be the main shape of the eye. Wing it at the corner slightly as a guide for the eyelashes. The shape should be curved slightly upward, but not too much!

2. Next, you can start thickening the line for the eyelashes (This doesn't have to be perfect, as it will be covered up by the eyelashes), as well as the lower lash-line.

3. At this point, you should start building up the eyelashes with quick and thin strokes, beginning from the guide you just drew. In order to get the effect of the eyelash thinning out at the end, gently release pressure when you're about halfway through the stroke. Don't make them too long though!
Next, add in the circle.

4. After doing so, the next step is to color in the pupil (the black part of the eye), but leave a tiny white spot at the corner as a highlight. (The highlight of the eyes is quite important, as it displays the reflective surface of the eye, including giving a more 'alive' look to your character.)

For the pupil, the size of it will actually affect your character's appearance slightly. A rounder pupil is usually seen as a more innocent and 'cute' look, as the eyes seem bigger.

5. You can now color the iris (the remaining white part) with whatever color you like, as this is what controls the eyes' color. The part of the iris which is closer to the eyelash guideline should be colored a darker shade of color, and it should gradually get lighter as it reaches the bottom.

6. Finally, you can decide if you'd like to add extra highlights, as this will give a more 'shiny and sparkly' effect to the eyes. You could also add tiny eyelashes to the lower lash-line to thicken it. This is recommended if you're drawing a rather elegant and 'seductive' female character. 

Alright, so this is the first part of the basics of drawing eyes, and I'll introduce the other styles of drawing them in the next chapters. ^^
I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, and if you have any topic you'd like me to go into, including coloring and painting tips, kindly leave a comment on my INTRODUCTION chapter! :)