How to draw eyes step by step

Comic Eyes

Everyone who has ever painted a face before has probably started by putting two dots or strokes for the eyes. After a few attempts, it probably turned into two circles with dots in the middle. This abstract representation actually sums up pretty precisely what eyes are all about: They are two spheres and each sphere has a pupil indicating the direction of vision. As a next step, we intrepid illustrators felt like we needed to express emotions through the eyes. So, we added an upper eyelid in the eye circle shape. We soon realized that downward pointing eyelids tend to look angry or evil, and upward pointing eyelids tend to look sad or meek.

There’s good reason that this basic type of eye representation is a cartoon, comics, and animation classic: These cartoon eyes can portray a pretty wide range of emotions. And if we look closer, it becomes obvious that cartoonists have given a lot of thought to the shape of the eyes - even if they choose what at first appears to be a simple form of representation. Let's keep that in mind as we explore the next steps.

Almond Shape: Advanced

Next, we will look at the shape of what we artists actually mean by the "eye". What we are referring to is actually the opening through which a part of the eyeball peaks out - or the space between the edges of two eyelids. In principle, the edges of our eyelids are shaped like two flattened U’s turned inward toward each other. Let's look a bit more closely at the two U’s.

Even experienced drafters often take a moment to mentally plan before drawing the line of the upper eyelid in an expert sweep. This is because even a very slight deviation of this line can completely transform the expressions of the face. This trick will help: divide the upper eyelid into 3 sections. (By the way: this trick of dividing difficult lines into several sections doesn’t only apply to eyelids - any line can be pre-sketched in this way.) The lower eyelid can also be divided.

However, it is best to use only two strokes here instead of three. For some mysterious reason, the eye ends up looking more dynamic if we divide the top eyelid into three and the bottom only twice. Some artists do it the other way around, with two strokes at the top and three at the bottom. Try it out.

At the middle section of the eye - here on the right – you’ll see what is known as the tear duct.

It varies from face to face, and sometimes isn’t even there at all.

Now that we have pre-sketched the eye shape, we can either round off the corners of the subdivision lines a bit, or try drawing the two eyelid lines in two clean sweeps.

Variations

This 5-line concept offers a wealth of possible variations. Depending on the length ratio and angle of the lines, you can create very different types of eyes expressing a wide range of moods. Of course, these lines are primarily for pre-construction, and it is up to you in which style you want to continue with on your eyes. However, implementing the 5-lines concept can be a really interesting stylistic device..

Brows

Eyebrows can go quite easily from being shapes that look painted-on to looking like actual eyebrows. And you can do this with the “Smudge” tool. In order to do this, always wipe in the same direction as the hair growth so the hard edges of your shapes deform into a light, zigzagged line. Be careful not to make the zigzags either too even or too messy. When you're satisfied with the result, lighten your zigzags a bit, and finish off the brows with some hair. The same fine line between order and chaos applies to hair. Draw the individual hairs with as quick strokes as possible. It’s best to use slightly curved lines that taper off and change direction often, while still paying attention to the direction of hair growth in the eyebrows.

Lashes

Last but not least, here’s a little challenge. Lashes will usually take a couple tries and a bit of practice. A few little tips might make this task a little easier: Eyelashes grow on the second (or outer) eyelid line. They tend to be longer towards the outer edge of the eye. The lower lashes are shorter than the upper ones and towards the middle they usually become quite fine, almost invisible. In addition, eyelashes are always curved. The direction of this curve is based on your perspective of the curvature of the eye. This means that the curve decreases towards the center of the eye, and that the eyelashes curve in opposite directions on both sides of the eye. That may sound really complicated, but it’s actually quite easy to understand from the picture.

When drawing eyelashes, it can be helpful to use a 2-step process: First, draw in only about ten lashes per eyelid. Take special care that all the eyelashes bend at the correct angle. And, pay attention to the lengths and allow them to taper just like the eyebrow hairs. In the second step, use the spaces between the initial lashes to insert the "chaos lashes" (shown here in grey). Vary the length and direction of curves slightly, and occasionally let several lashes come together to make little clumps.

Depending on how you turn your head, the direction of the lashes will change too. This may require a brief moment of spatial reflection. Take your time. Think carefully about where the eyelashes need to point.

Finished

This brings us to the end of a challenging tutorial. You needn’t internalize and apply everything we have done here immediately. But, you will find pretty much every tip that you need to draw eyes in this tutorial. You'll no doubt pick up one or two!

Have fun drawing, and see you soon!

Spoiler alert: Some of the eyes we so painstakingly just constructed will simply disappear behind the nose in the next tutorial.