Constructive drawing of a skull of a human head

The human head has a complex three-dimensional shape, consisting of many articulating volumes. Add to this the individual characteristics of people, the uniqueness of their characters, and then you will understand what a wide layer of knowledge you are facing.

• Sheet composition
• Constructive construction of a human skull
• Aerial perspective. Lighting. Partial tone introduction.

Preparation for drawing a skull

Observations of first-year students are interesting when they consider the shape of the skull of a person’s head, but they themselves still perform the task “Still Life Drawing”. There is a complete misunderstanding and, as a result, paralysis of perception. So, looking at the forest, we are trying to count the trunks of trees and can not. If we can’t, then it means infinity, which cannot be comprehended.

The transition from a drawing of a still life to a drawing of a person’s head is very complicated. Not all students succeed in preparing their consciousness for the perception of the volume of form in space during the previous assignment ("Still Life Drawing"). The main burden of these problems goes into the task "Drawing the skull of a human head." Moreover, all this is sometimes to the detriment of tone relations in the drawing, not to mention the transfer of materiality of the objects of the drawing. Therefore, in the first tasks of the course “Figure of a human head”, more attention is paid to the structural features of the structure of the human head.

Despite all the individual plastic features of the structure of the human head, a design common to all is due to the anatomical structure of the skull. Study of the construction of the human skull is necessary for every draftsman. The path to understanding the shape of the skull as a volume in space lies only through its construction.

It is impossible to draw that which you do not understand. This is not drawing, but pointless copying, even if you will perfectly know the names of all the bones and bumps. After completing this task, you should have a very simple and generalized image of the skull of a human head. The image is as simple as you can imagine such a geometric figure as a cube.

The human skull consists of two parts: cerebral and facial. The cerebral part of the skull is formed by six main bones: frontal, two parietal, two temporal and occipital. In places of their intersection, frontal and parietal tubercles form. The front part includes the upper and lower jaws, zygomatic, nasal bones and so on.

The most important thing is to understand what plastic role all these parts play in the shaping of the whole. To develop a simple and clear understanding of the design of the shape of the skull, so that, in the future drawing of the human head, you understand what exactly is the basis of this head.

The best material for this task is A2, A3 paper and graphite pencils.