Drawing Expressions with Meaghan McIsaac

Conveying a character's emotions clearly

Meaghan McIsaac

joins us this week to share approachable ways to push facial expressions to maximum capacity!

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I love drawing facial expressions.

It's the first thing I think about when I draw a character. Everything else, I draw to support that expression - that mood, that attitude, that vibe. Its the most fun part about creating character. Because to me, facial expression is where I can do a LOT of storytelling.

When people ask me what I do, I tell them I’m a writer. I’ve published a few books for kids with traditional publishers, and so that’s how I see myself, and how readers know me - a writer. Drawing was always just for me, something I did in the evenings to relax, but in the last few years my drawing has taken a front seat in my creative life, becoming a major part of how I tell stories. I’m currently working on my first graphic novel and picture book. So, that’s the background of who I am - and I think it explains why I am so obsessed with facial expressions. If I can convey a character’s emotions clearly to the viewer, I’ve told you a big part of their story - and hopefully leave you wanting to know more.

And I guess this obsession with facial expression has shown in my drawings because it's the number one thing I get asked about when people ask me about drawing and illustration - how do you draw your facial expressions?

And I always give the same advice because it has always held true for me - just keep it simple! If you can draw a smiley face, you can draw any expression on your character. Whatever you can convey in a smiley, you can convey it in your character.

So - can you draw these smileys?

Go ahead and draw them - I’ll wait.

You’re back? That was fast. Ok great. Basic expressions. Done. Now the fun bit - this is where we get to really play. Can you push those same expressions to get more extreme expressions? If you exaggerate the mouth, the eyes, the brows, even further, can you get clearer expressions? Be as outrageous or as subtle as you like.

What do you come up with?

Here’s mine.

If I’m ever stuck on a character expression, I like to try to make that expression on a smiley. Yes, there’s a lot going on in a face - a lot of muscles and planes and anatomy. But forget all that for now! Or at least….put it over there. Right at the edge of your desk. If I can draw the expression on a smiley, then I know I can get it onto my character.

We’re trying to simplify - to get clarity. Trying to convey confusion on a smiley face? One eyebrow up, one eyebrow down. Maybe a gaping mouth. Or maybe a tiny dot mouth. Simple - your map to your character's expression. Now try taking the basic features of the smiley doodle and apply them to your character. If your smiley has an arched eyebrow, so should your character. If your smiley has a gaping mouth, so should your character.

And if the expression is simplified on a smiley, PUSHING that expression becomes clearer and simpler too. You’re removing all the noise and just looking for the information the viewer needs to read the expression. If the smiley has one arched eyebrow, how high can I arch that eyebrow on my character to make them look REALLY confused? If my smiley has big eyes and no mouth to indicate shock or horror, how big can I push my character's eyes? Will they bulge a bit? How teeny tiny can I twist those lips? The farther I push, the better I find the emotion reads.

So here we go, lets do it in real time….er….real blog time.

Let’s start with a smiley.

We smiley-faced happy sad mad and scared but I wanted to go with something a little more interesting. Lets go with amused. How do you draw an amused face? Your answer may be different from mine, all are valid! Just as long as the viewer takes “amused” away from the expression at the end of the day - and here I go, shooting myself in the foot by picking a tricky one. Whatever! We’re in it now!

Here’s my amused smiley.

So now, I draw my character’s face using my smiley as a map.

Hmm… it reads. But I feel like this amused gal is much cooler than whatever she’s looking at that’s amusing her. So she’s gotta be tool cool amused. Tool cool to me means she’ll be looking down on whatever hilariously pathetic scene is unfolding in front of her. So I’m going to try to tilt her head up, so she can look a bit down on us. Really make us wither under her too cool eye.

Better.

But I also feel like she’d look over at her other too cool friends in a sort of “are you seeing this?” kind of way. So I’m gonna shift her gaze to the side.

This is more fun to me. Tells more of a story.

Now to clean it up and add a touch of colour!

And that's it!

I hope you have fun with smileys and mapping out your character expressions! There's so much storytelling you can do with just the features of a face. And thanks so much to you and Beth for having me here on Introvert Drawing Club - happy drawing everyone!

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Many thanks to Meaghan for sharing these tips to help us create expressive characters! Be sure to subscribe to

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