Illustrator Tips from Nina Rycroft
Before and after
I’ve been teaching character design and children’s picture book illustration for a while now, and the thing that I see students struggle with the most is knowing how do you draw the same character from many different angles.
Below I’ll share some before and after character studies from some of my students. the before, I’ll share some common issues that anyone new to character design experiences, I then walk you through some of the techniques that the students applied to their characters. And then I’ll show you the after… the exciting results that these simple exercises produce.
Why do we need to be able to draw the head from every angle?
In a children’s picture book, the characters walk the reader through the story. As they move through the different scenes, you’ll need to be able to draw your character/s from every which way. The best way to understand what your character looks like from multiple angles is knowing what they look like from BOTH the front view and the side view.
Case study
Nichole Wade: took part in my 8-week Picture Book Illustration e-Course in 2017. Nichole then went on to showcase her illustration portfolio at the SCBWI winter conference in New York in 2019 and is currently working on her very first picture book for Little Pink Dogs Books.
Below is Nichole’s front and back cover sketch for (the PBIC course manuscript), ‘Florence Fox Goes to School’ written by Ben Whittaker-Cook. Nichole in a natural, but illustrating the same character from every-which-way was new to her. She had no issues drawing Florence Fox from the front view.
But when it came to drawing Florence Fox from the side view, she really struggled. You can see the issues Nichole had around the jaw, chin and ears. Another common issue is not drawing the back of the skull big enough.
Nichole, who was determined to nail this by taking my Skillshare class ‘How to Draw the Head from Every Angle’ – a three-part series. Nichole downloaded the worksheet from How to Draw the Head from Every Angle: Part Three.
Nichole drew the front-view of her Florence Fox’s head in the centre and then drew the side-view of her Florence Fox head in the space far-left and far-right. She then filled the gaps, drawing her Florence Fox’s head on the x-y and z-axis… and everything in between!
Nichole used this worksheet as a guide while she worked through her storyboards for ‘Florence Fox Goes To School’. Below, you can see by doing the process, Nichole was able to draw her Florence Fox character from every which way, bringing her Florence Fox character to life.
How do you draw your character’s profile using the front view as a guide?
Below, I’ll show you step-by-step how to draw the profile of a character using the front view sketch. Your character will obviously look very different from mine, so use these steps as a guide.
Step One: Draw a circle with the diameter reaching from the top of the skull to the position of the mouth. Divide the circle into quarters.
– Draw a soft-angled line from the frontal plane to the tip of the chin.
– Inside the main circle, draw a circle guide, half-the-size of the main circle.
Step Two: Draw guidelines marking…
– the top of the hair
– the eyebrows
– the top and bottom of the eyes
– the top and bottom of the ears
– the tip of the nose
– the mouth and
– the chin
Step Three: Draw an oval to mark the position of the nose (on the outer-frontal plane). The ear needs to sit on or behind the centre line (never in front). Draw the jaw, from the tip of the chin to the base of the ear.
Step Four: Use the guidelines to find the points for the forehead, nose, mouth and chin. Draw the facial features along the frontal plane. Note that the bridge of the nose slides in to touch the frontal plane, then pushes out at the point of the eyebrow.
– Draw an oval to define the chin area.
– Draw the neck as a soft curved line from the base of the ear at the back of the skull.
– Use the guidelines to find the top and the bottom of the eye. The eye may even sit back enough to touch the inner circle.
– Draw the arch of the eyebrow.
Step Five: Draw the hair and other features.
Step Six: Once you have completed your working drawing, trace over the top in pencil.
And voilà! You now have a reference for what your character’s head looks like, not just from the front view, but also their profile.
Try drawing your character head on the x,y and z-axis
Once you have drawn the front view and the side views of your characters head. try drawing your characters head on the X, Y and Z-axis.
Nina Rycroft
Nina Rycroft has been illustrating picture books since her first picture book was awarded the CBCA (Children’s Book Council of Australia) Notable Book in 2000. Since then, she’s had more than a dozen picture books published worldwide, including award-winning picture book and stage production ‘Boom Bah!’ (Phil Cummings), ‘No More Kisses’ (Margaret Wild), ‘Good Dog Hank’ (Jackie French) and ‘Pooka’ (Carol Chattaway, YABBA Award Winner, 2013). Nina has taught more than 50,000 students worldwide in her character design series on Skillshare and her 8-week Picture Book Illustration e-Course. To stay connected, you can sign up for Nina’s news or follow her on Instagram
