How to Draw Mha Eyes

((Idk who featured me, but thank you guys! And thanks overall to everyone for the support!))

I'm yet to see anyone do one of these so I thought it would be fun to go all out! Huge thanks to Boo for giving me this idea. :wave: 🏾

DISCLAIMERS:

- I'm obviously not Horikoshi. This is just what little I've learned from observing his style. If I'm wrong about something here (which I may be at some point), feel free to correct me

- Naturally I used a lot of Horikoshi's art as reference

- If you don't draw at all, this might be a little fast paced. Feel free to ask any questions you have below!

This is going to be long so I'll just start.

EYES

Horikoshi draws eyes a million different ways. If you're having trouble drawing a character's eyes, start with the general shape of their eyes. Are they rectangles? Squares? Ovals? Round at the top, square at the bottom? Square at the top, round at the bottom? Be as specific as you can. How big are the pupils? Are the eyes hidden underneath the eyelid a little? Focus on those questions first.

I'm yet to see a female Horikoshi character who doesn't have long lashes on either their top or bottom eyelids (or both). I've noticed when female characters have a neutral expression, their bottom eyelids usually aren't drawn in. If their eyes are squinted (ex. out of anger, determination, or if they're smiling), that's when their lower lids show.

Horikoshi kind of, sort of draws his characters cross-eyed...? They shouldn't really look cross-eyed if you've done it right, but the eyes are very close together. At a 3/4 view, even if a character is looking straight ahead, their eyes should still be inwards, close to their nose.

Now the veiny eyes! This is something he does a lot when his characters are experiencing some sort of adrenaline rush. Make sure the veins are specifically pointing at the pupils. And they shouldn't be all that long. If you're really having trouble, I guess you could use a ruler. You can also shade under the eyes a little so the eyes pop

NOSES

Not much to say about these that isn't already written in the picture. Horikoshi's noses are pretty straightforward (no pun intended). One thing I should say though is that I find the nose is usually very high up on the face. Very close to the eyes. Sometimes even between the eyes, depending on the angle and the length of the nose. And like it says above, girls usually have shorter, smaller noses. Guys have a variety of noses, some of them being short, some being longer like Iida's or Mr. Aizawa's.

Again, pretty straightforward. Besides All Might's nose. His is tough. I don't have any tricks to make it easier. (Sorry.)

MOUTHS

Closed mouths are pretty simple and similar to other mangaka. The rest of the mouths aren't simple. Let's just get into those.

The first half is self explanatory. Horikoshi doesn't usually draw lines directly through the mouth when the teeth are shut tight. There should be two lines on either side of the mouth that don't connect.

But the second half might be confusing. What I mean when I say "the smile fits the curve of the jaw" is that the bottom lip should kind of be at the same angle as the line of the jaw. Like in this drawing of Stain below:

Notice how Stain bottom lip is perfectly aligned with the shape of his jaw? The bottom lip doesn't have to be super close to the jaw (that's just how Stain specifically is drawn), but in general I find the bottom lip tends to be angled to match the jaw's angle pretty closely. Especially when the teeth are close together. When the teeth are seperate, this rule sometimes goes out the window (I mention this in the sketch on the left below).

Just to reiterate, the open mouth positions aren't ALWAYS aligned with the jaw in this style. Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn't. But I feel like with teeth CLOSED SHUT, the mouth is consistently aligned with the jaw. That's why in the left drawing, I drew a mouth that's OPENED and isn't perfectly aligned. When the mouth is open, the jaw alignment rule ISN'T consistent. When the teeth are shut tight, the jaw alignment rule IS consistent (from what I've seen). Does any of this make sense?? I hope so lol.

Anyway, onto the fun mouths to draw! The ones that add some real expression! When Horikoshi draws an open mouth, he really goes in. He draws the teeth in detail (but usually not so detailed that every tooth is defined) and if the mouth is open wide enough, the gums should also be outlined at the top of the mouth. Maybe even a little at the bottom. (I feel like drawing the gums is usually reserved for heightened emotions like anger or frustration. Usually they're only drawn on guys.) I wouldn't worry about drawing anything beyond the tongue though. No need to draw the back of the throat or the uvula. He tends to just shade the very back of the throat in all black.

If you're having trouble drawing teeth, I find that the top and bottom row of teeth (before going into detail) should kind of be a little similar to a 2D rotary phone. Like this:

If that's not very helpful, then my only other suggestion is to just practice... Mouths are tough.

EYEBROWS

Okay, this topic is much simpler. You know how some mangaka draw eyebrows through the hair as if it's see through? Horikoshi doesn't do that.

You know how some mangaka draw angry, furrowed eyebrows that slope upwards like this?:

Horikoshi draws them sloping downwards like this:

Pretty easy right? :grin:

And here are some characters' eyebrows. I wish I had more to say about them, but I think this is the simplest section. One thing worth noting though is that the eyebrows can be short or long. Sometimes they're really short like Jiro's, drawn at the bottom of pic above.

That's it! That's all I've got. Hopefully that was kinda helpful. Somewhat. 🤷🏾‍♀

I'm thinking I might make this a wiki on my page so this won't get buried in my feed. Would that be helpful to anyone?

If you have any other helpful tips for drawing in Horikoshi's style that you'd like to share with others, please comment them below. And if you read this and we're just as confused as I am while trying to explain some of this, feel free to ask me any questions. :joy:

Here's the proof:

And here's a more collected version of the guide below:

watsonhunhis.blogspot.com

Source: https://aminoapps.com/c/my-hero-academia/page/blog/horikoshi-art-style-guide-faces/Vrzz_8VU7u42wxWenrNJqb33MQKendzK4Q

Share this post