How to draw a nose from the side: bridge, tip and wing

From the side, the tip of the nose is the furthest-forward point of the face (here by an eighth to over a third of the nose's length), and almost all of the nose is outline. The bridge, the tip and the underside are one line you have to get right, and the wing sits inside that line, where it is easy to put in the wrong place. Three things are easy to get wrong: the tip doesn't stand out far enough, the wing slides forward under the bridge, or the underside runs level. This guide measures the nose in profile on ten drawn heads, so you have numbers to check against.

The heads come from the free head rotation reference. On each pencil plate at 90 degrees, a script traced the outline as the furthest stroke out on each row. The dip at the top of the bridge and the brow come from the same tracing used in how to draw a forehead. The tip is the furthest-forward point of the nose; its front runs straight down for up to a fifth of the nose's length, so we took the middle of that run. We picked the base of the nose by hand, where the steep drop under the tip ends, and took the back of the wing as the rearmost dark stroke of the curve around the nostril (by hand on the heavy-brow head, where the script caught the cheek line). Every point was drawn back on its plate and checked by eye. Four heads are drawn tipped a little chin-up, by about 5 to 6 degrees (hard-plane, heavy-jaw, minimal) and 2 (square-jaw); we turned them level before measuring angles and sideways distances. The wing and the base of the nose are a little harder to place precisely than the other points.

To make the numbers work at any size, we give distances as a share of the nose's own length: from the dip at the bridge to the tip; the longest nose here is about half again the shortest. All ten heads have straight bridges, none hooked or scooped, and every range below is the range of these ten drawings, not of people's faces.

The bridge is straight and leans about 30 degrees

Fit a straight line to the bridge between the dip and the ball of the tip. The outline stays close to that line on every head, never straying by more than 3 percent of the nose's length. The bends are at the two ends: the dip at the top, and the ball of the tip at the bottom, where the outline swings forward and then down.

Once the heads are level, the bridge leans 25 to 34 degrees from vertical, middle value 30. The gaunt-planes and heavy-jaw heads stand most upright, about 25 degrees. The hard-plane, deep-folds, soft-planes and full-lips heads lean the most, 33 to 34.

The heavy-jaw head in profile. The bridge is a straight line from the dip to the tip; the underside climbs about 29 degrees to the tip, one of the two flattest.

How far the tip stands out

Measured straight across, the tip stands in front of the back of the wing by just over half to nearly two thirds of the nose's length, about three fifths on a typical head; eight heads are within about a twentieth of that three-fifths mark.

Two other checks give the same picture. The tip is about a third of the nose's length in front of the base of the nose (from a little over a quarter to two fifths), and about four tenths in front of the brow (from about a third to nearly half). So in your own drawing, measure the dip-to-tip length and put the back of the wing about three fifths of it behind the tip.

The wing sits behind the bridge

On a level head, drop a line straight down from the dip at the top of the bridge. The back of the wing lands behind that line on every head, never under it or in front: about 7 to 19 percent of the nose's length, about a tenth on a typical head, once levelled. The tilt matters here: on the hard-plane and minimal plates, drawn chin-up, the wing sits about 3 percent ahead of the dip until the head is turned level.

The wing itself is a curve around the nostril, open toward the tip. Inside it, each head has a short dark slit or comma for the nostril under the tip; on the full-lips head it is closer to a smudge. If your wing sits under the bridge, move it back until the base of the nose is long enough.

The square-jaw head in profile. The tip stands about two thirds of the nose's length in front of the back of the wing.

The underside climbs to the tip

The base of the nose sits below the tip on every head, a sixth to a third of the nose's length lower. A line from the base of the nose to the tip climbs 37 to 49 degrees on eight heads, and about 29 on the gaunt-planes and heavy-jaw heads, whose undersides are flatter. None of the ten tips hangs below the base of the nose.

Where the underside meets the upper lip, the two make an angle wider than a right angle: 105 to 129 degrees, measured to the front of the upper lip. The gaunt-planes, hard-plane, heavy-jaw and full-lips heads are nearest a right angle, 105 to 109, the minimal head sits at 114, and the square-jaw, heavy-brow, high-cheekbones, deep-folds and soft-planes heads open to 119 to 129. These angles move with the tip point: taken at the top of the tip's straight front run instead of its middle, the underside reads about 4 to 6 degrees steeper on most heads, 9 on the heavy-brow head and none on the gaunt-planes head. How to draw lips from the side carries on below the nose.

The high-cheekbones head in profile. Its underside climbs about 49 degrees to the tip.

How to draw a nose from the side, step by step

The heavy-brow head, drawn level. The rest of the head and earlier lines grey, new lines and guides red, earlier guides blue-grey; 8 is the finished nose.

Mark the dip at the top of the bridge and the tip. The distance between them is your unit.
Draw the bridge as one straight line leaning about 30 degrees from vertical, bending only at the dip and at the ball of the tip.
Check the tip against the brow: about four tenths of the unit in front of it.
Place the base of the nose below the tip and about a third of the unit behind it, so the underside climbs to the tip at roughly 30 to 50 degrees (a few degrees more if you take the tip at the top of its front run).
Set the back of the wing about three fifths of the unit behind the tip, behind a line dropped from the dip.
Draw the wing as a curve open toward the tip, with a dark slit for the nostril inside it.
Run the upper lip down from the base of the nose at more than a right angle to the underside.

Common mistakes

A bridge that bends in the middle, on a straight nose like these. Every one stays close to a straight line.
A wing under the bridge. Each one sits behind the dip.
A short tip. The tip stands out about three fifths of the nose's length past the wing.
A level or drooping underside. It climbs to the tip on all ten drawings.
A tight corner under the nose. The underside and the upper lip open wider than a right angle.

Related guides

How to draw the nose from different angles turns the nose through every view, how to draw nostrils sizes the openings, and how to draw the head in profile builds the rest of the side view.

A short exercise

Draw the heavy-jaw head and the high-cheekbones head in profile, the same size. On each, mark the dip and the tip first and use that length for everything else. Give the heavy-jaw nose its gentle underside, about 29 degrees, and the high-cheekbones nose its steep one, about 49, keep both wings behind the dip, then compare each drawing with its plate.

The heavy-jaw head is Study Pack 03, in Volume 1, and the high-cheekbones head is Study Pack 09, 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.