Learn how to draw eyes with these eye drawing ideas and tutorials. I’ve rounded up 18 eye drawing sketch ideas for you to use for inspiration.
Why You Should Practice Drawing Eyes
If you want to get good at drawing portraits, one of the best things you can do is practice drawing different parts of the face individually. That way, you can perfect each aspect of the face and put it all together as one beautiful work of art.
And what better place to start than with the eyes? Eyes are such a crucial part of any portrait, and they can be one of the most difficult things to draw realistically. But with these easy eye drawing tutorials, you’ll be able to create stunningly realistic eyes in no time.
As you practice drawing eyes, keep in mind that one of the main things that we use our eyes for is to express emotion. Whether we’re feeling happy, sad, angry, or surprised, our eyes give us away every time. So if you want to be able to capture emotion in your portraits, it’s essential that you learn how to draw expressive eyes.
Hopefully, these references below give you all the inspiration you need to draw realistic and expressive eyes.
Eyes Step-by-Step
I love this tutorial because it shows you how to easily draw an eye step-by-step. This is a great reference to use if you’re learning how to draw eyes.
Sketching Eyes
Here’s another great tutorial that shows you how to draw eyes in steps. This sketch may seem a bit advanced for beginners, but if you’re willing to take the time, you can totally draw these eyes.
Eyes Are Not Perfectly Symmetrical
On a typical adult face, you’ll notice that the eyes are in the middle of the face. Additionally, you’ll see that the pupils are sitting on a vertical middle line.
From the front view, our eyes are one eye apart. Keeping these things in mind, you’ll see why eyes can be used to measure face proportions. When drawing eyes, don’t worry about making them perfectly symmetrical. As humans, our faces are not perfectly balanced.
Step-by-Step with Instructions
What I like about this tutorial is that it’s not only pictures, but also written instructions telling you how to draw the eye. This is so helpful.
Play Around With the Placement
Our eyes have a wide variety of shapes. Remember, the eyes should not be perfectly symmetrical.
Play around with the shape and placement of the eye and pupils, or the eyelashes and eyebrows. If you’re drawing someone older, keep in mind that our eyes get droopier as we age, and we have more wrinkles.
Anime Eye Drawing
If you’re drawing anime-style eyes, you should find this quick visual tutorial really helpful. I love how simple it is to draw these eyes.
Think About What You Need
Simple eyes will work great for animations. Close-ups on eyes may require you to add more detail. It’s good to think about these things as you go into drawing the eyes.
I advise you not to spend too much time on this so that you can give other parts of the body attention as well. However, if you’re drawing an emotional picture, it’s understandable to give special attention to the eyes.
Eye Movement
What I love about this sketch is how it shows you how to draw eyes that are looking in different directions. This is a great visual tutorial that’s easy to understand.
Coloring the Eyes
When coloring the eyes, you’ll want to consider the lighting and the overall style you’re going for. If you make the white part of the eye darker, it’ll make the highlights stand out. Play around with different color accents and draw softer or harder edges for the iris of the eye.
Eye, Nose, Lip Tutorial
If you need to practice drawing more than just the eyes, you’ll love this simple tutorial for drawing the eyes, nose, and lips. I love how the elements come together to form the face at the bottom.
Draw Your Own Eyes
A great way to practice drawing realistic eyes is to draw your own eyes. Take a picture of your eye up close and draw what you see. Pay attention to your eye’s shape, the placement of your pupil, the shape of your eyelashes, etc.
45 Minute Tutorial
Artists have told me that this took a lot longer than 45 minutes. Even so, they still really enjoyed following the reference. So while this may take you longer than 45 minutes, I still think you’ll enjoy drawing this eye.
Credit: kakoiisya
Be Light With Your Pencil
Even though the pupil is the eye’s dark area, don’t press down too hard on this part of the eye. If you need to do any erasing, it’ll be a bit more difficult if you’ve been heavy-handed in this area. Be light with your pencil in this area, and use a blending stick when needed.
Cartoon Eyes
This tutorial shows you how to draw cartoon-style eyes in four easy steps. I’ve followed this tutorial and had so much fun drawing these eyes. I think you’ll enjoy drawing these eyes too.
Eye Expressions
I love the different expressions being made with these eye drawings. Not only that, but this is great to use if you’re practicing drawing eyebrows too.
I hope you were able to find some inspiration from the tutorials and references in this post.
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Bonus Free Printable
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