Traditional Can I have some help with this anatomical drawing of mine please?

[Anon06]

I’m currently drawing an anatomical sketch of a Dorian head. (The Dorian are a humanoid alien species that I made up.) And I’m having a little trouble with it. If you look at the left side of the image below, around about where the other eye will be when I draw it, I think the shape of the head looks a bit wrong. Could I have a bit of help with fixing it please?

 

[Anon06]

Sorry my handwriting is so awful if you wanted to read the little bits of info

 

[The Great Sage]

Disclaimer: I am not a good artist, and what I can do can be generously described as 'doodling', but I gave it a little shot.

Seems to me that the eye is too far away from the bridge of the nose, which gives him a really alien and prey-like look. The mouth is pretty good though! The horns don't really seem to line up with the center of the head which seems a little strange. I did just some quick lines to show you what I mean:

 

[Nihilum]

Brow ridge, orbital socket, and cheekbone are missing from the right (your left) side. For creatures that have funky eye structures, they're going to look very odd unless you emphasize the orbital socket. Jaw looks like it doesn't extend back far enough for how the eye is sitting on the face; if the jaw was that short, that means that the eye would be wrapping around the side of the head. Back of the head shouldn't connect to the jawline; should connect to the back of the neck. The angle of the nose looks a little off to me because it seems like the rest of the face is operating on a slightly upturned angle, but the nose has the angle from if the head was looking down.

...Am not a mouth expert and cannot judge the anatomical accuracy of it. I avoid drawing teeth and open mouths for a reason.

 

[Anon06]

Disclaimer: I am not a good artist, and what I can do can be generously described as 'doodling', but I gave it a little shot.

Seems to me that the eye is too far away from the bridge of the nose, which gives him a really alien and prey-like look. The mouth is pretty good though! The horns don't really seem to line up with the center of the head which seems a little strange. I did just some quick lines to show you what I mean:

Thanks for your insight, Great Sage! I’m still improving my drawing, and haven’t done much anatomy until now, so thanks for pointing out the horns’ misalignment. I did want the eyes to be a bit farther out to make room for the ocular tract and because despite appearances Dorian are quite social creatures, but I’ll move them a little closer together. Thanks for the compliment on the mouth! I’ll take all of that into account, and thanks also for the red overlay you provided. That’ll be very helpful.

Brow ridge, orbital socket, and cheekbone are missing from the right (your left) side. For creatures that have funky eye structures, they're going to look very odd unless you emphasize the orbital socket. Jaw looks like it doesn't extend back far enough for how the eye is sitting on the face; if the jaw was that short, that means that the eye would be wrapping around the side of the head. Back of the head shouldn't connect to the jawline; should connect to the back of the neck. The angle of the nose looks a little off to me because it seems like the rest of the face is operating on a slightly upturned angle, but the nose has the angle from if the head was looking down.

...Am not a mouth expert and cannot judge the anatomical accuracy of it. I avoid drawing teeth and open mouths for a reason.

Wow that’s a lot of info, thanks a bunch, Saturninum. Yeah this sketch is still a work in progress, so not all of that is done, this is also the first time I’ve drawn 3/4 view, so I’m expecting to make a few mistakes. Alright, I'll make sure to do that. I've extended the jaw back before, but it didn't look right, though I probably just did it wrong tbh. Oh that would be bad. Ok, I'll draw the neck in and connect the head properly. I wanted to flatten the nose and make it less humanlike for whatever reason, which is why it looks that way.
That's ok, I did reference an image of my own open mouth so I think it would be fairly realistic.

Thanks again for your wonderful insight, the both of you, it's gonna help me out a ton.

 

[Nihilum]

I highly recommend pulling up some 3/4 views of the human skull for reference. It's a pretty easy-cheesy way of getting the basis of the humanoid features down without making things look too human. I'd do a couple realistic references and then maybe one or two simplified ones so you can actually see what shapes make up what bones. You should be able to find ones with open mouths fairly easily, too.

 

[Anon06]

That's a good idea, thanks!