Recently, I've been watching and drawing along with Aaron Blaise's lessons on human anatomy and facial features. Aaron Blaise is a vetran from the animation and illustration industry and has worked on movies such as “Beauty and the Beast”, “Aladdin”, “The Lion King”, “Pocahontas”, “Mulan”, and "Brother Bear".
He is currently having a HUGE sale on his website on a ton of different lessons for sale at a deep discount. This course was originally $60, but I only paid $1! Due to the current pandemic, they are trying to make online art education as accessible and affordable as possible! If you are interested, you can check it out here: https://creatureartteacher.com/product-category/special-sale/
In his Human Anatomy course, Aaron starts by going over the proportions of the full body before going into lessons dedicated to each facial feature and body part.
I admittedly have very little experience with drawing humans and it is something I am actually pretty intimidated by. If I draw a plant with a leaf that is a centimetre off, no one is going to notice. But you would definitely notice if someones eye in a portrait is way off kilter. Our brains are so tuned into faces, I think it's a lot easier to find things that wrong, so I find myself often being overly critical of my work - even when it is early on.
I also find it quite challenging to really capture the 'essence' of someones look. Sometimes I will draw a portrait based on a photo and it looks alright on it's own, but it doesn't really capture the likeness of the reference photo. This is something I would really like to work on, but as with all things I know it will come with practice!
I like Aaron's lessons, and watching him quickly draw a face or feature with just a few basic lines. He does a great job breaking down the parts of the face into ratios and planes. It is easier to figure out where the eye line is when you know it should be halfway between the chin and the hair line, then you can build with all the features.
I will say, that unfortunately Aaron sometimes does more drawing than explaining HOW to draw. It would be nice if he would show how to draw a simplified version of features and broke down the most important lines. And if I'm being nitpicky - I'm a big fan of homework and direction, so I would have really liked even a suggested amount of practice after each video.
Overall, I think it is a decent course - especially for the price I paid! I'm not sure I could recommend it for the original $60 price, but I think it is a nice supplement to other lessons and videos I've watched.