Tip #1. Isolate & Focus

The brain learns by chunking information, so to help you learn quickly you should try to isolate and element and practice it until it becomes easy. This way you can challenge yourself without getting overwhelmed by the amount of things you have to learn

If you are new to drawing faces I recommend starting with the shape of the head and I have a free worksheet and tutorial here that you can use: https://www.jeyram.org/head

Tip #2 Erase More

When learning to draw it is really important to get comfortable with correcting mistakes and starting over if needed. This way we can develop a growth mindset and seek out mistakes which prevents us from developing bad habits.

Having to re-learn things because of bad habits is much harder than just learning it properly from the beginning. We want to make it normal to correct mistakes so that there is less pressure to do things perfectly because making mistakes is a huge part of the learning process.

Tip #3 Flip the Image

One of the challenges of drawing is that you become blind to your own work, so to see the image with fresh eyes you can flip the image. If you work digitally you can just flip the canvas (Flip horizontally) and if you work digitally you can either turn the page and hold the paper up to the light or you can take a photo on your phone and flip the image.

This tip works really well in combination with the last one, use the flipping method to seek the mistakes out and then erase and try again. If you find that the entire face is wonky, its a good idea to start over and pay attention to where you went from last time.

A common mistake when drawing faces is that the features are at different angles, so make sure to draw in the proper guidelines to help you draw them at the same angle.

Tip #4 Less Shading

If you trying to improve the structure of your drawings, focus more time on the initial parts of the drawing. The shading portion of a drawing is less important, especially in the beginning, because the structure of the face is the hardest to learn.

It is tempting to spend a lot of time shading because it is more relaxing, but if you are focused on improving your art skills then focus more on the early steps instead of rendering.

Tip #5. Use ‘Good’ References

It is common for art teachers to say that you should only draw from real faces, which I strongly disagree with. Use other whatever reference that inspires you to draw, if a heavily stylized drawing excites you then feel free to draw from that learn from it.

The whole point of drawing is to enjoy it, so use reference that you actually feel excited to use. There is benefit to learning proper anatomy and using photo references of real faces, but it isnt a mandatory step if you really dont like it.

I hope these quick tips were helpful! As always, I am just sharing what I learn so take it with a grain of salt.