How to draw lips

All right. In this lecture, we're going to learn how to draw the lips. So let's go ahead and get started. So the first thing I like to do when I'm drawing the lips is I like to draw a little bit of a curved but almost straight line, just like so that's going to be the crease or the crack between our upper lip and our bottom lip. The next thing I like to do is I like to mark where the top of my lip is going to be. So I'll put a mark like so and then I'll do the same thing down here. And then I like to put a middle line right through the middle of this line. So I want to make sure it's as close to the middle as possible. And now right here on this first Mark, I'm going to go ahead and make the top shape of my lip. So it's basically going to be sort of a squashed letter V like. So then I can go ahead and continue this line with a curve, kind of like so and then it's going to turn into an inverted curve down to that point. So almost like a very stretched SX curve, we'll do the same thing on the other side, so it's going to curve upwards first and then start to swoop downwards all the way back to this corner. And we want to try to get this shape on the side to be symmetrical to that shape on that side. So we'll continue to work with that till we get it looking correct. Once we have that shape established next, what I want to do is I want to go ahead and create my bottom lip. So the bottom lip is basically going to start right here and it's basically going to be an oval like so. So this oval is going to come a little bit past these two points of the upper lip, and then that's going to morph into that corner right there. And same with this side. So we'll go ahead and curve that end to that corner right there. All right. Perfect. Now we can go ahead and start adding in our shading. So first, the crease of our mouth or the crack between the two lips is going to come a little bit further than the actual shape of the lips. And in some cases, it might even come up a little bit like. So I'll add some shading underneath that. And next what we want to do is we want to add in that shape between our two lips. So it's not going to be a straight line. The first shape we have to incorporate in there is this part right here that's right underneath this sort of v shape of our lips. And basically it's just going to be another V shape right underneath here. And we want to try to create that a little soft so that it's not such a hard line, especially towards the ends of it. And then we're going to go ahead and create this shape right here, which is basically going to be a curved shape that comes back into the corner of our mouth. We do the same thing on the other side like so. And now we have that shape for the middle of our lips. Now we can go ahead and start shading it in. Now the light source is going to be coming down from the top and this lip right here, if we look at it from the side, it's going to be at a down angle like so then this bottom lip is going to be a rounded shape like so. And so that means that this surface right here, which will be this surface right here, is going to be our shadow. So we're going to go ahead and fill in this top area of our lips with a mid tone shadow just like. So then we're going to go ahead and further detail this in. So the first thing we want to really shade in is we want to darken this area right here on this side of our V shape right here. So that gets darkened in just a little bit. Next, we want to go ahead and darken in this bottom area. So as the lips come down and into the mouth, we're going to get a little bit of shadow in that area. So let's go ahead and add that shadow in. And we want to try to avoid adding too much to this area right here. So we'll just add it on both sides of that. And we want that to blend in to our other value or lighter value. And we can still add a little bit of value on this part. We just don't want it to be as dark. And then I'm going to go ahead and darken that line in a little bit more with a very dark, hard line seen with this part right here. And then we can go ahead and darken in these corner areas like so. Same with this side. All right, great. Now we can go ahead and add a little bit more detail in there by adding some lines and some cracks into the lips. This will make it look more realistic. And as we get to this middle area, the lines are going to become more straight. And then as you get further out, they're going to become more curved once again. Great. Now let's go ahead and move on to this bottom part of the mouth or the bottom lip. So first off, because we have this shape right here for the bottom lip, that means the light is going to be hitting this surface right here, which is this main area of the lip. And as it curves underneath, we're going to be getting some shadow underneath here. So let's start by adding in that shadow. So basically, we're just going to add in a dark shadow underneath this edge and it's slowly going to soften into our highlight. We can also soften that into the skin of our face down here. Which also you'll notice that I'm starting to sort of form that chin shape with the shadow. Then I'm going to go ahead and add some shadow down this side of my lip. And same with this side. Then I'm going to start to round the shape out by using some more value just like so. And I can darken the shadow in just a little bit more. Then we also want to add a little bit of shadow on this edge, because these lips, the top lips, would be creating a little bit of a shadow on that area. And then I'll add a little bit of shadow right down the middle, because the lips kind of get split up into two parts, this side and this side. They're usually divided by a little crease in the lips. Then we can go ahead and add in some line detail in there to create some cracks on the lips. Or not necessarily cracks, but more wrinkles. Just like so. And I'm going to soften that dark edge on the upper lip a little bit more and bring that out into the skin part of my face. Just like. So that's a little bit too dark. So I'm going to go ahead and lighten that up a bit. All right, perfect. We might also want to darken in that line just a bit more and darken it on this bottom lip a little bit more also. And then we can also soften that dark value into the light part of the skin. And go ahead and add a little bit of a darker edge to these lips up there. Then overall, I'm going to darken these lips just a little bit more on the top side, just because I want them to appear like they're more in shadow. All right, great. So now we just created the lips from the front view. Now I want to show you how to create the lips from a three quarters view. So it's very similar to drawing the lips this way. So first we start off with our middle line of our mouth, and it's going to be a little bit curved because the face is curved. Then we're going to go ahead and create the middle line or the crease in the mouth, and it's going to be a little curved and it's going to be a lot straighter on this side. And then over on the other side of this line is going to get a little bit more curved because we're looking at it in perspective. Next, we're going to mark where the top of our lip is and the bottom of our lip. Then we're going to go ahead and create our V shape on that line like so. And in this case, the V shape, rather than being so spread out like so we're going to make it a lot more squashed like we have already drawn here. Then we're going to go ahead and continue that line all the way back to the corner of our mouth, and then this side can come over all the way to the corner of our mouth like so. And because we're looking at this at an angle, this side is a lot more squashed than this side. Then we'll go ahead and draw the bottom lip. So we're going to draw that in just like so. And we'll bring that all the way back to this corner. Now we can go ahead and shade that in. So I'm going to go ahead and start by adding this other V shape on the bottom, and then I'll go ahead and continue this middle line back to the corner of my mouth and then we can go ahead and shade that in. So we're going to start with this bottom edge and make it pretty dart. And we can also darken this edge a little bit more because maybe it's being hit by the light less. Maybe the light is coming more from this angle. So this site is going to be a little bit more in shadow. Go ahead and add some shadow to this bottom edge of the lip, the top edge. Now we're going to go ahead and shade in this whole shape so it becomes the shadow side of our lips. Now we can go ahead and move on to the bottom part of our lip. So we'll go ahead and add in a dark shadow on the underside of our lip. So I'll add a little bit more of a shadow under this part of the lips. So we have a little bit more of a cast shadow, and we can also darken this edge of the lip a little bit more since the shadow is on this side of the face. All right, great. So now we've drawn the lips from a three fourths view. The last view we need to draw the lips in is from a side profile view. So the way you draw the lips from a side view is very simple. So first you start off with your middle line like so, and then you need to go ahead and add the top part of your lips, and then you need to add the bottom part of your lips. And the bottom parts are basically going to be a rounded curve that will then turn into sort of a raindrop type of a shape. So and then the top part of the lips is just almost going to be a straight line back to that point. And then that will turn into the top part of the lip. And we're kind of creating a little bit of a pouty face here. So I'm going to go ahead and bring the shape back a little bit more. I'll go ahead and erase that, and then these lips will turn into the chin. So we'll go ahead and curve that out like so. And then basically this top area gets all the shadow. And then this bottom lip gets a little bit of shadow on this bottom side. Just like so. And then it gets a little bit of shadow right here, and you can go ahead and further detail that out. But that's basically how you draw the lips from a pro file view. All right. So that brings us to the end of this lecture. So in this lecture, you learn how to draw the lips in a front view, a three fourths view and a profile view. Your assignment for this lecture is to go ahead and draw these lips, and then I want you to post one of them to either the Q&A section of the course or the Facebook group. Thanks for watching this lecture and I really look forward to seeing you in the next one.