Draw a Manga Head Template
Learning to draw a Manga head is really very simple and only takes a few steps. The head is round, and the face is expressive with wide eyes. You can use it as a template to draw more intricate expressions, or simply make it a basic manga exercise.
Steps
- Lightly draw a circle. Use a compass to draw your circle, or simply trace around the bottom of a round glass (or other object).
- Drawing manga is just a variety of shapes on another, so don't try making it harder than it is.
- Draw a spade-like shape along the two sides of the circle. The bottom of the spade will be your character's chin, so don't make it too pointy (especially if it's a male).
- Erase the bottom part of the circle. Do this so that the point of the spade-like shape will be your character's chin. This cleans up the area for easier drawing later.
- Sketch a light cross in the middle of the face. Do it so that the two lines intersect in the middle.
- This will help you center the eyes, and align the nose and mouth. You'll erase the cross once you're finished.
- Position the eyes, nose and mouth. The cross you sketched in the last step will serve as a guideline. Don't worry about filling in the features right now — you're just deciding on basic placement.
- Eyes: Draw two circles so that the bottom of each one hits the horizontal guideline. Space them evenly away from the vertical guideline. They should be apart by the space of one eye.
- Nose: Draw a small horizontal line just south of where the two guidelines intersect. This will be the bottom of your character's nose.
- Mouth: Draw a horizontal line between the nose and the chin, and center it on the vertical guideline.
- Refine the features. Once you have your features placed, you can begin to elaborate and fill them in.
- Eyes: Draw an egg-shaped circle in the middle. Decide where you want the eyelid to fall, and fill in the circle below the eyelid. You can add reflections, or clear circles that give the impression of light reflecting off the eyes. Just be sure to draw them on the same side of each eye (i.e., both on the right, or both on the left).
- Eyebrows: Sketch eyebrows over your eyes, and use the shape to convey emotion. Straight brows are neutral, downward brows are angry, upward brows express surprise or shock.
- Nose: Turn your nose guideline into two slight nostrils. Draw a small upside-down c for each nostril, and erase the nose guideline.
- Mouth: Using your mouth guideline, give your character a smile or a frown by curving the line upward or downward. Erase leftovers from the original guideline.
- Use the template to continue elaborating on your character design. You can add hair, refine the facial expression, or incorporate elements from other manga characters you like.
- When drawing hair, don't forget about head shape underneath.
- Remember, manga characters usually have shiny eyes (some with bigger eyes and more glare, some with less) and glossy hair. Eyes that are too realistic can ruin even the best manga artist's work.
- You might want to find some pictures of manga to inspire facial features for your character.
Tips
- Never get all mad when you mess up. Remember that failure is the way to success, just don't quit.
- If you have a scanner, you can also scan your drawing (make sure the lines are dark) then once scanned, touch it up a little bit, then add color using the "fill" tool in Microsoft Paint, or whatever other program you have.
- Be careful not to make erase marks.
- Always, ALWAYS, lightly sketch at first, in case you need to erase, it won't leave any marks. After your finished making corrections and adjusting your anime/manga head, you can hard line it with pencil, or use a fine point pen and go over your lines for a more defined look.
- Beginners should not draw anything more than basic features.
