A lot of people have issues about drawing faces on their cloth dolls. Sadly, this very issue can scare people so badly that they stall in their doll making or even worse, don't start doll making at all due to their fears. Well, guess what? Even those of us with fine art degrees and lots of dolls under our belts sometimes have problems. Sometimes you just have a bad face day. So what do you do when that happens? I'll tell you what I do.
1. Make faces in the mirror
You can learn all the generic rules about faces; like, the face is 5 eye-widths across, the corners of an unsmiling mouth line up with the inner eye, the flares of the nostrils line up with the inner eye etc. However, if you want your dolls to have expression then you have to observe carefully where the rules apply and where they don't. So make faces at yourself in the mirror while making the expression you want your doll to have and then look carefully. Where do the outer corners of the mouth line up? Where is the heaviest area of shadow? First learn the general rules, start herewith this lesson from Inez Brasch, and then break them when you observe something different.
2. Squint, turn the doll's head upside down or look at the head in the mirror
Sometimes when you are drawing a face you can't seem to see what is wrong with it. You know something is skew-if, but you just can't put your finger on it. When that happens,try the following:
- squint at the face - this trick is great for seeing if the shadows on the dolls face are as the shadows would look on a face in real life. Refer to a photo (stock photos on the web are great for reference) of someone making that expression. Squint at the photo and see where the darkest areas are on the face. Where are the lightest areas? What shape are those areas of shadow and highlight?
- turn the doll's head upside down - this tip is great for spotting things like the height of the eyes. One of my foibles is getting the right eye higher than the left. The upside down trick helps me to see that better. Another similar trick is to hold the doll's head up to a mirror; suddenly you'll notice things like that one eye is closer to the middle seam than the other. Or take a photo of the doll's head and look at that.
The key thing is to get a whole new perspective so that you see what's right in front of you.
3. Use light pencil marks to draft out the face and invest in a good fabric eraser
I confess that I make lots of mistakes. Tons. I erase faces all the time. Sometimes I bin heads and start again. Mistakes are how we learn. Nobody gets it right the first time. Plus, perfection is so boring. Yawn.
4. Sometimes a mistake isn't a mistake, it is just 'creative redirection'
Years ago, I made this doll in a class with Patti Medaris Culeaand horror of horrors, I got a splodge of blue dye on her face. I did the old 'jazz hands' flap of panic. Patti explained that I could soak up the dye on that spot - dab, dab, dab. And if it didn't lift - no worries she said, 'stick on a crystal and she has a groovy birthmark'. Because of that mistake, I learned how to lift the dye and I also learned that you can turn a mistake into a feature of the doll.
5. Have a boogie break
If you are having real issues with a face why not have a break? Turn on your favourite tunes and shake your groove thang. It works. Especially if you dance with great abandon and be as silly as possible. It also gets the kinks out of your neck from sitting at the sewing machine or hunching over your head to draw. It will make you giggle. Giggling is very therapeutic.
Above all else remember - what's the worst that can happen? You might lose a wee bit of stuffing and fabric and a bit of time if you totally wreck the head. Nothing blew up. Nobody died or was maimed as a result of that mistake. So no big deal. Think of how many heads Henry VIII went through and he still managed to accomplish a lot. So think of yourself as Henry VIII, only minus the bloodshed and without that silly codpiece. If it doesn't work - off with her head!
