Drawing Hair Tutorials

The extraordinary tutorial how to drawing a real hair.

Hair is very difficult to draw, because what we see is different than what we know. You can't simply draw all the hairs in the form of lines, because that's not what we see when we look at hair. What we see must be simplified to lines and shades, and there are many ways to do it.

If the thought of drawing hair overwhelms. It's easy to see all of the details and textures within hair and assume that it must be difficult to capture it all in a drawing. But it doesn't have to be overwhelming and we can simplify the process, making drawing hair a bit more manageable.

A common misconception that many beginners make is that a line represents a strand of hair. I've seen alot of instances where hair was drawn with lines and it always looks flat and lifeless. In reality, strands of hair are defined by darker areas around them. In this tutorial, you will see that I didn't try to draw every single strand of hair but rather drew tones to suggest the texture and form of the hair.

In this tutorial, I will show you one of these ways a simple method that's great for quick rendering and sketches. I will present this method on four examples: long straight hair, short hair, wavy hair, and afro-textured hair.

Straight hair: Straight hair is the easiest texture to achieve. Simply draw straight lines down or in the direction of hair flow if the hair is tied up.

Wavy hair: Similar to straight hair but slightly alter your lines into long “S” shapes to give that natural beachy wave effect.

Curly hair: Drawing curly hair is kind of like drawing wavy hair except the “S” shapes are much shorter and more condensed.

The way you render the strands of hair makes a significant difference on the overall texture you are trying to emulate. If you want to draw short hair, draw short choppy strokes. On the flip side, if you want to draw long hair make longer strokes. It might sound a little straightforward, but believe me it makes a big difference. You can also reduce the pen pressure in order to get thin tapering lines that capture the soft wispiness of individual hair strands. This is tutorial about drawing wavy hair.

How to Draw Wavy Hair:

1. Draw the volume of the hair around the head. Wavy hair is often quite full and elevated.

2. Draw the parting.

3. Draw the outline of the strokes surrounding the face.

4. Make the hair seem elevated by filling the area between it and the scalp.

5. Add gentle waves above the first strand-lines without touching them.

6. Create more waves following the same rhythm. These waves shouldn't touch each other.

7. Close the shape of each strand by mirroring its wave and adding a pointed tip.

8. Draw some more thin tips on the bottom of the haircut. Their curl should complement the other waves.

9. Draw the shape of the strands on top of the head.

10. Draw the direction of the strands all over the head. Do it lightly.

11. Each strand should be divided into more strands at the tips.

12. Make the strands on top of the head more detailed.

13. Outline the whole hair without making the waves too obviously separate.

14. Shade the strands and the spaces between the waves.

15. Give a strong outline to the hair, keeping it soft.