How to draw eyelids: the lid line and the crease

In a drawn eye the upper lid carries three decisions: how much of the iris it covers, how heavy its line is next to the lower lid, and where the crease goes above it, where the lid folds back under the brow. This guide measures all three on ten drawn heads.

The heads come from the free head rotation reference. On the front plates we traced the upper lid line, the lower lid and the crease on both eyes with a script, drew every trace back on its plate to check it, and fitted a circle to each iris from its side edges. We call the lowest dark line over the iris the lid line; a line above it is the crease or the brow. From the front an iris is a little over two fifths of an eye's width, measured from the inner corner to the outer corner, where the upper and lower lids meet. Treat these as rough reads, especially where a figure combines two points. Where the crease sits too close to the lid line for the script to separate them, we sorted it by eye at five to seven times zoom. The numbers describe these drawings, not people's faces; use them as a starting point to check against your own reference.

The upper lid hides about a quarter of the iris

On 19 of the 20 eyes the circle runs up under the lid line and stops there; on the hard-plane head's eye at the right of the plate the lid only touches the top of the circle. Measured from the top of the fitted circle to the lower edge of the lid line:

Most eyes: on 17 of the 20 the lid covers about a fifth to three tenths of the iris's height. Across all twenty, a typical lid covers about a quarter.
Three cover less, all on the eye at the right of the plate: the hard-plane head hides almost nothing, and the minimal and soft-planes heads read a little under the rest, within the error. Overall the right-of-plate eyes cover a little less, a little under a quarter of the iris on a typical eye, against about a quarter on the left.
Error: allow about a tenth of the iris for reading error.

Our eyes guide lists an iris with no lid over it as a common mistake. On these plates the lid covers the top of the iris on 19 of 20 eyes, usually about a quarter of it.

The soft-planes head from the front. The lid line covers the top of each iris, a little more on the left of the plate than on the right; over the iris the crease is part of the lid line.

A heavy upper lid, a light lower lid

We compared the two lids column by column across the outer half of each eye, between the iris and the outer corner. The upper lid's middle tone is darker than the lower lid's on every eye, by a wide margin on most and only a little on a few. The upper lid is the darker line in 172 of the 182 columns, and on all twenty eyes by its middle tone.

It's also the thicker line. At the column halfway between the iris center and the outer corner, the upper line is the thicker one on 15 of the 19 eyes we could read there and the same on four. The difference is small, so treat it as a lean, not a ratio. The line under the lower lid is lighter again, so the eye steps from dark at the top to light at the bottom.

The crease: four ways the plates draw it

Every head but possibly the minimal one draws a crease above the upper lid, and not in the same way. Sorted by eye on the drawn-back traces:

A separate line, clear of the lid line over the iris: the gaunt-planes, square-jaw and full-lips heads, both eyes. At the iris center the crease sits about a fifth to three eighths of the iris's width above the lid line, measured from the middle of one line to the middle of the other. On all six eyes it reaches the inner corner and runs past the outer corner, by about a quarter to a little under half an eye width. The gaunt head and one square-jaw eye carry it furthest.
Close: the heavy-jaw and high-cheekbones heads, both eyes. The crease runs about a seventh of the iris above the lid line, nearly touching it. On the heavy-jaw head a heavier line also crosses a third to a little over two fifths of the iris up; we read it as the lower edge of the brow, which comes down close over this eye.
Faint: the deep-folds head. A thin, light line about a quarter of the iris up at the iris on the eye at the left of the plate; on the other eye only a short piece, about a quarter to three tenths up, toward the inner corner.
Fused: the hard-plane, minimal, soft-planes and heavy-brow heads, both eyes. Over the iris the crease and the lid line are one thick stroke. Toward the inner corner a second line leaves the top of it on several of these eyes, most clearly on the hard-plane and soft-planes heads.

Where the crease is a separate line, the widest gap at the iris is less than two fifths of the iris; on the other fourteen eyes it's closer or part of the lid line.

The square-jaw head from the front. A separate crease runs above each lid line, about a fifth and a quarter of the iris up at the iris, and carries on past the outer corner.

The gaunt-planes head from the front. The widest crease of the ten, about a third and two fifths of the iris above the lid line at the iris, running on past both outer corners.

What we couldn't measure

Where the upper lid peaks couldn't be measured here: near the inner corner the crease leaves the top of the lid line, and on six eyes the script followed the crease instead of the lid. Eyes from the front measures it from the white of the eye instead and finds the top over the middle of the eye. It covers the front view only; the turned views were not measured.

Order of work

Draw the iris as a full circle, lightly.
Draw the upper lid line across it about a quarter of the way down the iris, then erase the arc above the line.
Make the upper lid darker and thicker than the lower lid.
Choose a crease and place it by type. Fused: thicken the lid line over the iris and let a second line leave it toward the inner corner. Close: a line about a seventh of the iris above the lid line. Separate: a fifth to two-fifths of the iris above it at the iris center, running from the inner corner to past the outer corner.

Common mistakes

Drawing the whole iris. The lid covers the top of it on 19 of the 20 eyes here.
Matching the lower lid to the upper. The upper lid is darker on all twenty eyes.
Floating the crease high above the lid. Even the separate creases sit no more than two-fifths of the iris up.
Stopping a separate crease short of the corners. On all six eyes with a separate crease it reaches the inner corner and runs past the outer one.

Related guides

How to draw eyes at different angles turns the eye and its lids. The lid folds back into the socket under the brow, so how to draw eye sockets and how to draw a brow ridge show what sits above it, and how to draw eye bags measures the line under the lower lid the same way as this guide.

A short exercise

Draw the square-jaw head and the soft-planes head from the front, side by side and the same size. On the first, draw a separate crease about a quarter to a third of the iris above each lid line, from the inner corner to past the outer one. On the second, thicken the lid line over the iris and split the crease off only toward the inner corner. Cover the top quarter of every iris with the lid, then compare both drawings with the plates.

The square-jaw head is Study Pack 07 and the soft-planes head is Study Pack 06, both in Volume 2, sixteen angles in pencil and tone.

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