Three-quarters Rear View, and Near-profiles

Circa 2001, a youthful assistant of mine was transferring a rough layout onto bristol board for me and remarked, "You know, I've never drawn someone from behind before." I was surprised and amused at the time. I almost didn't have the heart to haze him for his lack of experience. But traditions are traditions.

So what about those times when you have to draw someone whose face is turned mostly away from you? Not so easy, is it, Charlie?

The most common and most natural impulse is to indulge in a tad of speculative fakery. But this yields drawings that seem the sum of what one doesn't know, and lack the power to persuade. I was genuinely trying hard when I sketched these, but... well, I'll ask you to tell me what seems wrong with them.

Ever seeking chances to use a little research to save time and communicate our worlds more convincingly, we will review some photographic examples of the sometimes-surprising juxtapositions of features that nature hid right under our noses. Or rather, on the other side of our heads from our noses. 

Clearly, it was with such conundra in mind that God helpfully invented other people to refer to, and later, cameras.

I will seek your observations about these pictures, which again come mostly from my musty trove of late-'80s catalog clippings. 

As we go through these, let's note how far the head is turned and where the camera was positioned above or below the head's equator.

What in anything about these pix flouts your expectations?

John

Note that we have an edge-on view of her ear.

"Elvis, is that you, in the sky?" Many an excitable South American had trouble sleeping on <El Noche de Elvis Gigantico  Sobre El Atlantico>"

Jack Hamm

Jack Hamm

Jack Hamm breaks it down for you.

Sometimes these views lead to pleasing cartoonish simplicity, a la Alex Toth. 

A-a-almost a profile on Bra Lady.
"He's crazy about my kids and he drinks Johnnie Walker!" (actual headline) 

Blurry yes, but again, so appealingly simple!

Hamm for dessert.
(BTW, he didn't stir himself to give the same treatment to male heads. Are we so dull?)

Time to Work

OK, let's start analyzing these with our pencils, drawing through. Try please to infer the cranium's contour, even if there is hair or an inconvenient crop. Drawing through, approximate the how the horizontal and vertical half-way lines wrap around the skull shape. The farther above or below the equator is, the more that equator and the other dividers will be drawn curvingly.

NEXT TIME --

By request, I will try to say several useful things about "blocking" scenes, and paneling and framing decisions. Preview: I'll say "vary" a lot. 

Crazy about you nutty kids.

Till then,

John

P.S.: Since I mentioned Toth, here is a self-portrait he did in 1958. The beauty and economy of these clothing folds made me want to punish myself. (The faded-to-red lines show he was using a felt-tip pen of some kind. I honestly wouldn't have guessed they such 60 years ago.)
The casual, assured minimalism of this blows my mind.