How to draw eyes from the front, step by step

From the front, an eye comes down to two corners and two curves: an upper lid that arches high and a lower lid that dips only a little. This guide places them in order and gives each one a number read off ten drawn heads.

The heads are the ten bald heads in the free head rotation reference, read on their front pencil plates. We read the inner corner of each eye by hand on crops enlarged ten times. The outer corner is where the two lid lines come together and the white of the eye ends; on these drawings the upper lid line runs on past that point as a short tail, which we leave out. Eye width here means inner corner to outer corner. A script then followed the white of the eye column by column: its top edge is the upper lid and its bottom edge the lower lid. We drew every pick and trace back on its plate and looked at it. The iris and the lid at the iris come from our measurements for the iris and eyelids. The corners are hard to place exactly, so we count only differences large enough to read clearly. The numbers describe ten bald drawings in one style, each with a neutral face, not people's faces, so use them to check your own drawing rather than as rules.

Panels 1 to 6 follow the steps below on the full-lips head, whose outer corners lift most of the ten, about twice a typical eye. The plate's own lines appear as the steps reach them. In 1 the gap between the inner corners is solid for one eye width, the bar under the left eye, and dashed for the extra third. In 2 the dashed lines are level. In 3 the red past each outer dot is the lid line's tail, not counted in the width. In 5 the dashed bar is a third of the eye's width. In 6 the dashed arc is the iris under the upper lid. New lines and marks red, marks kept from earlier steps blue-grey.

1. Space the eyes

Mark the inner corners first. On these heads the gap between them is about one and a sixth to one and a half eye widths, about one and a third on a typical head; face width proportions has the numbers. Set the gap at one eye width, then add about a third of one.

2. Lift the outer corner a little

None of the twenty eyes drops its outer corner below the inner one, and most lift it a little: at most about a tenth of the eye's width, a slope of about 6 degrees, and about half that on a typical eye.

Eye by eye, twelve clearly lift the outer corner. The other eight sit too close to level to read.
Taking both eyes of a head together, the full-lips head lifts its outer corners most. The deep-folds, soft-planes and high-cheekbones heads come next, about alike, and the gaunt-planes, heavy-jaw and heavy-brow heads sit almost level. The other three fall in between.

The inner corners of each pair sit almost exactly level with each other on nine heads and a touch off on the soft-planes head, so the heads aren't tipped; the lift is in the eyes. Start with a line through the inner corners, then raise each outer end a little, more if your reference shows it.

3. Arch the upper lid

The upper lid makes most of the eye's shape. At its highest, the lower edge of the upper lid line is about a fifth of the eye's width above the line between the corners, up to a quarter on the minimal head. Its top is a flat stretch rather than a point, and on 18 of the 20 eyes that stretch takes in the middle of the eye. It sits inward of the center of the iris on every eye, just inward on most and further on a few.

The lid shows no steady lean toward either corner. Very close to the corners it is a little more often higher on the outer side, six eyes against two of the twelve we could trace there, but a quarter of the way in it is mixed. So arch the lid over the middle, not toward either corner.

4. Keep the lower lid shallow

Under the iris the lower lid sits only a little below the line between the corners, about a tenth of the eye's width, at or near its lowest point. Toward the inner corner it comes back up to the line, or just past it, quickly; toward the outer corner it stays lower for longer, on all twelve eyes we could trace near both ends. Of the opening at the iris, about three fifths to five sixths lies above the corner line, about two thirds on a typical head. Draw the lower lid as a shallow curve, lighter than the upper; the eyelids guide measures how much lighter.

The minimal head from the front. Its upper lids arch highest of the ten above the line between the corners, while the lower lids dip only a little below it.

5. Check the opening

At the iris, from the lower edge of the upper lid line to the lower lid line, the opening is from a little over a quarter to a little over a third of the eye's width on our reads, close to a third on a typical head; one eye of the minimal head opens to about two fifths. So the eye is about three times as wide as it is open, a little less or a little more. If yours comes out rounder, bring the upper lid down. If it comes out too narrow, check that the lower lid isn't climbing toward the middle.

6. Place the iris

Last, the iris: two fifths of the eye's width or a little more, its center a little toward the outer corner, its top hidden under the upper lid by about a quarter, and its bottom on the lower lid. How to draw the iris and the eyelids guide have those numbers.

Common mistakes

Drawing an almond with both curves the same depth, instead of a high upper arch over a shallow lower lid.
Tilting the eyes steeply, or dropping the outer corners below the inner ones.
Pushing the top of the upper lid toward either corner.
Counting the tail of the upper lid line in the eye's width.
Opening the eye wider than a little over a third of its width.
Setting the eyes only one eye width apart, or less.

A short exercise

Open the soft-planes head from the front. Mark the four corners, with the inner pair about one and a third eye widths apart and each outer corner a touch higher than its inner one, and join each pair with a light line. Arch the upper lid about a fifth of the eye's width above that line, highest over the middle, then add a lower lid that dips only a little under the iris, and compare your drawing with the plate.

Then try the minimal head, whose upper lids arch highest, and the heavy-brow head, whose corners sit almost level.

What these numbers don't cover

The heads were read only from the front, and the hard-plane front is seen slightly from below. The inner corners are hand reads, and a narrow strip beside each edge of the iris wasn't traced. Each head gives two eyes, so the counts come from ten heads, not twenty separate eyes. None of the heads has eyebrows, and none is smiling or squinting, which changes the lids.

The turned views are in how to draw eyes at different angles, the profile in how to draw an eye from the side, and the bone around the eye in eye sockets and the brow ridge. The soft-planes, full-lips, minimal and hard-plane heads are Study Packs 06, 08, 04 and 01; packs 01 to 04 are in Volume 1 and 05 to 10 in Volume 2.

This guide is one step in how to draw the head at any angle, which puts all the head guides in order.