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The drawing of children demands freshness and directness of purpose. Regrettably, there are not too many quick and ready rules. Let us just say that kids’ portraits demand a keen and patient eye.

For those who intend to do commercial portraiture the good news is that kids’ portraits can be profitable. There are very few artists who can competently render children.

Soft lighting works best for portraits of children. The child could be looking towards a intense light source. This sort of light source will light up the child’s face and produce an introspective facial expression. The tone range goes from light to medium with the eyes very dark.

Addressing the facial sizes of children in a general sense is somewhat of a waste of time. Their facial sizes change dramatically within a time span of six month.

Suffice it to say that the younger the child is the smaller the face in relation to the head. The eyes also appear larger although this can be deceiving. A child’s nose can be very difficult to render – there is nothing really to hold onto. And the mouth is very subtle and sensitive not to mention its constant motion if you render from life.

If you do want to mention some general sizes you can say that whereas an adult face is about 1/2 the size of the frontal head side, a child’s face is about 1/3 of that size. Also, note how small an infant’s neck is compared to the size of the skull.

At its widest section, a baby’s face is about 5 eye widths wide. The width between the eyes is a little bit more than the width of an eye. Both the mouth and the nose are about the width of an eye. Once more, we must stress that these sizes are only a general rule and individual face sizes can vary. The above general rules can be used for comparison purposes when you do your own careful observations of a particular face.

As always, start your rendering by striking the arabesque and then correcting the height/width proportions as necessary.

After establishing the primary facial proportions (i.e., the brow, nose, mouth, etc.) block-in the major light/dark patterns. Then, stump down the graphite using your fingers or a stump. To render and re-shape the lights use a clean putty eraser.

Now the features are carefully placed, measured and partially drawn. There are two things to take into account here:

1. Your pencils must be real sharp, and

2. At this point, you should never fully complete a feature. Draw each feature no more than 50%.

Once the features are sized and situated as best you can, you can now further develop them. Do not neglect the hair and sides of the face. Everything should be advanced together. As you continue to render you should always be on the lookout for mistakes in sizes and tone.

In conclusion, the basic processes used to render a child’s portrait are of course always the same. Above, we listed most of the differences in size and form between an adult skull and that of a child. Your mood when drawing a child should be one that reflects the innocence and the softness of a child.

Do you want to learn the secrets of pencil portrait drawing? Download my brand new free pencil portrait drawing course here: portrait drawing tutorial.

Remi Engels is a pencil portrait artist and oil painter and skilled drawing teacher. See his work at pencil portraits.

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