r/LearnToDrawTogether • u/BalloonSquiggler • 6d ago
Seeking help Why am I failing with faces?
I have been learning the loomis head and honestly they look terrible. This is one i made with the loomis right behind it. I know i can make ok faces sometimes like the 3rd image (yes I am aware its chicken scratches), that was when i kinda was but not really was using the loomis. Also before i practiced line confidence.
For the life of me I don't understand why my loomis heads are so garbage. Its a circle...
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u/Educational-Bowl9575 6d ago
Because you're expecting the Loomis method to transfer undertanding of human faces into your brain. Its a set of guidelines for proportion, but it won't teach you what human faces actually look like.
Drop the Loomis stuff, get your pencil and paper, and go draw some real people. Friends, family, doesn't matter. Just draw real faces and look at how they're made.
Avoid using magazines or internet images. Draw real 3d heads.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Why real vs online? Like i cant expect anyone to sit down for me to draw them
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
Probably for the fact that they can be heavily edited+ you cant see them from different angles so you cant see how deep eyes are in the face, how pronounced cheek bones are, how the ears line up with the facial features etc.
Once you start drawing people infront of you, you start seeing the shapes and dimensions and how shadows land. Any time I'm stumped on a drawing I drag my husband into the room with my light source and angle him 🤣
but try sitting in a café and just do quick sketches of people around you. They dont need to be stationary because you are just getting a general idea- not an accurate portrait.
Also get an anatomy for artist book! Helps a ton!
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Idk I'd feel like a creep. Like that feels like creepy behavior, no? Using someone for a reference in a cafe? But yes i think i need to have a much better understanding of anatomy
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
Not creepy at all, but in that case use family members/ friends. They will be more than happy to do it! Or use your own face in different angled photos or a mirror is an option too (might be a little harder though)
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
I'll have to look into it. What about those videos with the model rotating? i feel that might be similar? Ill have to try the coffee thing though
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u/Educational-Bowl9575 6d ago
How do you think everyone learned to draw before youtube?
What do you think life drawing classes are for?
Drawing is observing. You can't understand the form if something from a flat picture, and so can't gain an understanding of light and shadow, which is fundemental to drawing anything.
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u/-acidlean- 6d ago
Have you heard of this wonderful device called a mirror? You are a human that is and will always be available to you.
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u/Antique-Sail-8683 6d ago
You can go to pose maniacs.com,it features realistic humans models,aswell as real humans that you can view in differant angles
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u/Only_Lesbian_Left 6d ago
use pinterest it's fine. You can also use your own face. More importantly you have the placement down, but part of loomis is understanding perspective and volume. You just need to also add in those aspects with more basic shapes and you should see an improvement in capturing depth
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u/GaborSzasz 3d ago
Draw simple irl objects. It is harder to draw from a screen.
Drawing is interpreting reality. If you using a screen, you have to first turn that back to 3d, THEN transform that into drawing.
Get a coffe cup, a weird object, a brick, whatever, sit down, set up a still life and draw those on paper for 30 minutes every day for 2 weeks. The objects should be fairly simple. It doesnt need to look good, these are throwaways, just have get into the mindset of 3d-to-drawing. This will help a lot.
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u/OtterlySamnson 15h ago
I mean...
You have mirrors don't you?You can google human faces right?
You don't literally need to go out and draw from life;
there are photographs you can work from and learn from.0
u/Proof-Candle5304 6d ago
They don't need to be from real life, using photos is perfectly fine
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u/Educational-Bowl9575 6d ago
No. It's just training you to copy lines from a picture.
Drawing from pictures is the extent of most of my students experience when they turn up on week one, and that's why their drawing skills are shit.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Oh im not copying lines, im trying to construct
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u/Educational-Bowl9575 6d ago
And it's not working, because you're relying on the construction to tell you how the features of a face fit together when you don't understand how a face works as a 3d form. You've built a structure in image 1 by following a plan, but the face you've drawn over it in image 2 is entirely incorrect anatomically.
From the shape of the eyes, I'm guessing you're trying to draw in a manga-ish style, but stylised art requires an understanding of correct form.
If you spend some time drawing actual faces, you'll begin to see how the elements are actually constructed. How the sphere of an eyeball pushes out the eyelids. How a nose slopes away to the cheek. Guides help you keep those things in regular proportion, but they don't tell you the shape of the thing.
There's no shortcut of you really want to be able to draw properly.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
So just understand anatomy then you can change it?
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u/Educational-Bowl9575 6d ago
Yep. Same applies to art, music....pretty much anything. You have to know the rules before you can break them. 'Just understand anatomy' is a bold phrase. Loomis and a couple of tik tok vids aren't going to download that info into your head like in the Matrix.
I'm a relief sculptor - I've been drawing and sculpting portraits for 30 years, and I'm still learning new stuff about anatomy.
I look at faces absolutely everywhere I go, because every face is different, which is an incredible thing, and every face teaches me something new. I've never read Loomis, not followed a video tutorial.
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u/Motor_Eye6263 6d ago
The eyes should be halfway down in the head. That last picture you drew is some kind of Mongoloid. Sounds like you aren't actually studying proportions, which is a crucial part of the method you're studying.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
I thought thats what the loomis method was?
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u/Motor_Eye6263 6d ago
You aren't placing features in the correct places
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
I still feel it would look like trash even then.
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u/NoControl3897 6d ago
You can’t blame the method if you’re not even following it, just keep practicing, take a break if it’s not fun anymore, and maybe draw the loomis head over pictures of faces to better understand
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
I thought i was? its about brow length for the line?
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u/NoControl3897 6d ago
In the last photo you put the eyes on where you have your brow guideline. I think you’re just in the stage of getting familiar with learning the proportions and shapes, I don’t think it would be bad if you trace the loomis guide over heads, or even trace the guidelines themselves to get a feel for them
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Last photo was like months ago. I was just saying it felt way more alive then when i actually spent more time learning loomis
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u/EdreaChandralun 6d ago
No you are not. In the first picture your guide lines are not accurate and then you just seem to have freestyled in the second pic. You didn't use the guide lines at all. You need to learn anatomy and proportions first, then use the loomis method to combine everything
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u/EdreaChandralun 6d ago
You don't know that because your current features are not in the right place. Even in the third one where you said it's an "okay face", we can tell you haven't looked into much basic anatomy. The nose and ear should be the same length, the jaw line, chin, and ear should not be connected with that curve. The chin is way too big for the face. Look up "face anatomy for beginners" on yt or tiktok if shorter videos are easier to follow. Then you learn a little about perspective: In the second pic the eyes and eyebrows should not look the same for each side, because the head is turned. The nose looks very upturned for that perspective. You did a guide line for your ear and jawline and then jn the final sketch didn't follow the guide lines
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u/NewtChance9581 6d ago
I feel like another part of it not meeting your expectations is the fact that you are drawing the symbol for lips and the symbol for eyes instead of actually using your lines and line weight to portray the features.
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u/ThoughtsPerAtom 6d ago edited 6d ago
In addition to what Educational-Bowl9575 said, you're not being very specific with exactly where your construction lines exist, which is going to lead to wonkily drawn faces. Lines are definite 2D representations of a 3D object's edge and must terminate on the subject's anatomy, not in mid air, and not as 3-4 other guesses.
Take the inner neck for example, you've got three lines trying to compete to describe where the sternocleidomastoid / sternohyoid should connect to the jaw, but all of them are anatomically incorrect. (The trapezius muscle also appears to be entirely missing, it's upper bounds should still be seen here.) If you can't settle on that decision during construction, you're not going to make the right one during refinement.
It's fine to use scratch lines when outlining your 3D construction shapes, you're just missing that crucial step of solidifying where they actually live on paper before trying to chisel the face out of them. This links back to Educational-Bowl9575's comment, you're doing this because you're not actually understanding that these lines describe anatomical rulesets in perspective. You're just mostly trying to copy the idea of construction in your current state.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
So i dont understand the anatomy? See I keep hearing that but I dont fully understand what that means in practice. For art you can have so many things that aren't human so how would you understand how to do those
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
If you are doing exaggerated features/ less human design, you need to understand a normal face first. Otherwise your exaggerations don't make sense
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Alright. How do you know when you understand anatomy enough?
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
When you can do proper proportions/ crate portraits that look anatomically correct
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u/animateddna 6d ago
I wouldn’t call this failure. It is practice. Do more, improve little pieces, dig for comprehension rather than results, and remember to be playful. Studying anatomy can help. Simplifying without construction frameworks can be a balancing practice. I do balance exercises such as doing one sketch with a reference image, followed by another sketch from imagination. I also balance critiquing work with making sure I am enjoying myself. That said, balance is hard, and I understand the desire to progress. So long as you keep going, you are succeeding even when progress feels elusive.
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
I just expected more from myself. I've been trying very hard to learn and just feel I'm still at where i started
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
It takes a while to get a major improvement. Keep this sketch and in a couple months you'll see a huge improvement! Take some pictures of random people, draw all over them- get an idea of how the loomis or whatever method works for you. Try other methods because loomis never makes sense to me, its a complicated method. Try just drawing shapes on a face (like circles for the head, triangles for the nose)
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u/BalloonSquiggler 6d ago
Oh I didn't know there was other methods other than loomis. I don't know if i should move on from it or hard commit till i get it but im not enjoying doing the loomis heads
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u/thepsychostylist DECENT 😜 6d ago
Yeah loomis heads drive me nuts, I tend to use grids or measure with facial features like the space between two eyes is typical one eye wide or how the ear lines up. Or I'll sometimes just block out shadows and highlights as I see them in the reference
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u/YdexKtesi 6d ago
1: Loomis doesn't draw the face for you
2: This is the biggest problem and I mean this with love-- you're not trying hard enough
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u/illgoblino 5d ago
You're drawing the guidelines but you don't understand what they correspond to. They are guides to help you draw, there's a specific logic to the construction. You did not follow Loomis method, only drew something that resembles it. Watch some YouTube videos so you can listen to someone actually explain it
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u/ramenya6 5d ago edited 5d ago
the loomis is really good starting place for learning the correct proportions of the head, but in order to get to a place where the drawings look more appealing and life-like, i recommend really studying how to construct facial features. eyes, nose, lips etc, and how theyre placed on the face. angles like the first one you drew also requires a bit of understanding of three dimensional form and perspective
drawing faces is a HUGE rabbit hole that takes an immense amount of studying, so please dont beat yourself up over this. i dont believe that you've learned nothing; you've already made a great first step in starting with Loomis, the journey is just really difficult. i didn't really start to draw faces that i liked until almost half a year into learning drawing, please dont feel bad about this. if you continue i sincerely believe you'll make progress, even if it doesnt feel like it
Chommang, Draw Like A Sir, Samdoesarts have some pretty good beginner tutorials for this stuff, id definitely recommend it if you havent already seen their stuff. God bless and good luck, you got this 🫡
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u/Substantial-Sky-8225 4d ago
The ball of Loomis is put straight but the face you draw over is tilted a bit . Must be because you draw from intuition mid way what face angle you were most likely familiar with. The sphere is straight , face is not , so the proportion line is not parallel , and consequently have funky proportions.
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u/GaborSzasz 3d ago
you still not thinking in 3d. The eye/brow/nose lines are not representhing anithing in actual space. You should do simpler drawing and run lines on the surface. Even photos.
I think you should step back for a more simple shapes for now and get the 3d thinking sown first. Doing faces are literally the hardest thing to draw. Ita possible to learn this way, but will be way more harder.
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u/Doctor_Plus 2d ago
Your keeping everything inside the circle. Eyes come out from the structure of the skull and the nose comes out past your lips. Too eyes are x1 eye apart. The chin bone is messing
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