Rendering Mouth

Savannah starts by sketching the planes of the lips on the edges of her paper, showing that the upper lip is more planar, while the lower lip is more cylindrical. The area between the nose and mouth is also concave at the center. She works on the corners of the mouth to define the forms and terminators that connect to various muscles. Using white chalk, Savannah marks subtle highlights above the lip, ensuring she uses a Mahl stick to prevent smudging. On the lip itself, a sharp pencil creates a smooth gradation in the space. Savannah darkens the line between the upper and lower lip, but she avoids making it too dark to prevent simultaneous contrast, where highlights can make a dark line appear even more pronounced. Adding subtle texture on the upper lip helps avoid generalization of the form, while the cast shadow under the nose helps define the maxilla, or upper jawbone.

As she continues to render the lips and the surrounding areas, Savannah consistently works to accurately represent light and shadows, always modeling from the terminator of each shadow. She then models the chin, visualizing it as an egg shape in its simplest form. Using an HB pencil and light pressure, she creates softer, darker lines for the terminator under the chin and continues to render from there.