Getting the Proportions Right Again

I've been drawing a lot of people recently--partly because I was working on the cover for Craig English's newly published novel "Anvil of Navarre." I realized that I had been getting a bit sloppy with where the elements go on the human head. My ears were too far forward and kind of pinched. The eye on the left hand side of the page always seemed to be a bit off, no matter which direction the person was facing, and I seemed to skew the nose/mouth/chin quite often.

Back to the drawing board, as they say.

I found some good links online (like this one) and started mapping out craniums to put things back in order. After a couple of pages of this, I felt a lot better. I still need to keep up the practice, though. It keeps me from getting sloppy.

UPDATE 2/2/2013:  I have been editing my [very long and much evolved] fantasy novel. Along with that work, I've been drawing more concept art, working toward a visual anchor for some of the characters and places. While I was discussing this with Ping, I suddenly realized that after years of trying, I had inadvertently drawn one of the main characters! This is a man known simply as "Ender." It's exactly the age and demeanor I've been going for all this time and could never quite draw.

Sometimes the unconscious mind brings things to the fore that the conscious mind only discovers later!