How to Draw Caricatures

Caricatures are those typically unflattering portraits people buy at amusement parks. If you like them, you can learn to draw humorous pictures of others rather than subjecting yourself to the caricaturist's satire. You can draw caricatures of your friends and family just for fun or sell them for extra money.

Difficulty: Easy

Instructions

Things You'll Need:

• Paper
• Pen or pencil

Learn Caricature Basics

1. Study good caricatures, and notice the variation in the thickness and darkness of the various lines. Contrast between thick/thin and light/dark lines can help to bring life to your caricatures.

2. Plan to layer caricatures that feature more than one subject.

3. Plan to compose the caricature by drawing people in shortest to tallest order, placing one in front of the other. This will add dimensionality and interest to your drawing.

Draw Your Caricature

4. Examine your subject closely. Although you will exaggerate her features, the drawing must resemble the subject to be a successful caricature.

5. Begin by drawing the eyes in a thick, dark line. Be sure to capture the relative distances of your subject's features. The eyes are the most expressive part of a face, so they are an excellent place to begin.

6. Draw in the nose. As people tend to have very different nostrils, you should exaggerate your subject's nostril features. The sides of the nose should be drawn lighter than the nostril line.

7. Draw in the mouth, using a heavy line for the lower lip and where the lips meet. Exaggerate the mouth with personality by drawing a huge smile for a friendly subject.

8. Observe the length and proportion of your subject's chin and draw it. If the person has a small chin, consider drawing it so that his bottom lip rests right on top of his chin.

9. Draw one continuous line for the jaw line and cheeks using a thick, dark line. Draw in cheekbones only when your subject has very angular features.

10. Have fun with ears. Greatly exaggerate ears that stick out or hang down low.

11. Pencil in the hairline and hair. Begin the hairline high on the head for people with large foreheads. Draw hair that fills the top of the page when your subject has puffy hair.

12. Add the eyebrows. Use a thin, light line for people with few eyebrows, or draw thick caterpillars for thick-browed subjects.

13. Finish off your drawing by including any unusual features, like wrinkles, moles or under-eye bags.

Tips & Warnings

• Start drawing the left side of the face first if you are right handed. This will prevent you from smudging your work when you move on to draw the right side.

[Sue-Z]

on 12/18/2007 I'll give it a try, you did a good outline of progression to work this - I'd have liked illustrations - perhaps a photo, with the line drawings showing how you exagerated the features.