50 ideas

Skull Drawing Ideas

Deal one skull to study, from a ball-and-box construction to a stag with a full rack, with the view to take and a way to shade it.

Skull Drawing Ideas

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Drawn: A skull turned away in a lost profileA skull turned away in a lost profileBack three-quarter view. The cheekbone arch and jaw angle show; the face does not. Broad side-of-pencil tone.

Next step More tonal studies for charcoal or pencil

All 50 ideas

Human skull views 13

A full set of 32 adult teeth in closed jaws Front view. Adults have 32 permanent teeth, 16 in each jaw. Shade the gaps between teeth, not the teeth.
A lower jaw drawn on its own Side view of the mandible, the skull's only movable bone. Body, angle, then the upright ramus. Parallel hatching.
A skull built from a ball and a box Construction study, any view. A sphere for the cranium, a block for the jaw, one centre line over both. No shading.
A skull carved into flat planes Three-quarter view. Cut the form into facets like chipped stone. One flat tone per plane and no blending.
A skull lit from directly above Front view. Sockets, nose and the underside of the cheekbones drop to black. Chiaroscuro is Italian for light-dark.
A skull reduced to a simple icon Front view. A dome, two ovals, an upside-down heart for the nose and a row of short lines for teeth. Line only.
A skull turned away in a lost profile Back three-quarter view. The cheekbone arch and jaw angle show; the face does not. Broad side-of-pencil tone.
Human skull in clean side profile Profile. A circle for the cranium and a wedge for the face. Light parallel hatching under the cheekbone arch.
Human skull seen from above and behind High back view. The sagittal suture runs along the midline of the dome. Soft smudged graphite, no hard outline.
Human skull seen from below the chin Low view. The jaw turns into a horseshoe and the teeth arch over it. Curved contour hatching round the chin.
Human skull seen straight from the front Front view. A round cranium over a squarer jaw. Fill the two sockets and the nose opening with flat tone first.
Human skull turned three-quarters to one side Three-quarter view. The far socket narrows and the centre line curves. Cross-hatch the side plane, leave the brow pale.
Skull with the jaw dropped open Profile. The jaw hinges on the temporal bones, high up and well back. Put the darkest tone inside the mouth.

Animal skulls 13

Beaver skull with long orange front teeth Profile. Four chisel incisors never stop growing, and iron compounds colour the enamel orange. One spot of colour.
Cat skull with large eye sockets, front view Front view. Cat skulls have a short muzzle and very big eye sockets. Stipple the shadows to keep it delicate.
Crow skull in profile with the bony beak Profile. The bony beak is slimmer than the living bill, which wears a keratin sheath. Fine contour hatching.
Horse skull in long side profile Profile. Behind the incisors is a toothless gap, which is where a bit rests. Long flat planes, parallel hatching.
Owl skull with huge forward-facing sockets Front view. Owl eyes are tubular and fixed, so the head turns up to 270 degrees instead. Soft pencil tone.
Ram skull with curled horns, seen from the front Front view. A ram's horn is live bone in a keratin sheath and is never shed. Wrap ridge lines round each curl.
Rhinoceros skull with no horn on it Profile. Rhino horn is keratin with no bone core, so the cleaned skull has none. Long low outline, flat tone.
Snake skull with the jaws opened wide Profile. An elastic ligament joins the two halves of the lower jaw, so they spread apart. Thin pen line, no tone.
Stag skull with a full rack of antlers Three-quarter view. Antlers are bone, shed and regrown yearly from a pedicle on the skull. Light hatching.
Triceratops skull with frill and three horns Profile. The name means three-horned face: one horn on the snout, one over each eye. Solid frill, broad hatching.
Tyrannosaurus skull in profile with open windows Profile. Large openings called fenestrae cut the weight; the biggest skulls reach 1.52 m. Fill the openings black.
Walrus skull with two long tusks Front view. The tusks are canine teeth and both sexes grow them. A wide blunt muzzle; shade only under the tusks.
Wolf skull with the jaws slightly open Three-quarter view. About 23 to 28 cm long, with a long blunt muzzle and heavy teeth. Cross-hatch the side plane.

Designs and vanitas 12

A candle melted down on top of a skull Three-quarter view. Wax runs follow the dome, so curve them. The flame is the light: shade away from it.
A skull and crossbones on a pirate flag Flat front view. The Jolly Roger became the most common pirate flag in the 1720s. White shapes on solid black.
A skull carved from clear glass Front view. No outline: draw only the highlights and the dark shapes seen through it. Hard edges, sharp contrast.
A skull in a single unbroken pen line Front view. Start at the jaw, loop each socket and never lift the pen. No shading at all; the wobble is the charm.
A skull planted with succulents like a pot Three-quarter view. Rosettes crowd the open top and one trails from a socket. Flat tone on bone, line on leaves.
A skull resting on a stack of old books Three-quarter view. A memento mori: the Latin means remember you must die. Hatch the spines, smudge the bone.
A skull shaded entirely in dots Three-quarter view. Stippling builds tone from dots of one colour: the denser the dots, the darker the shade.
A tiny skull on an old mourning ring Close-up. Mourning rings once carried tiny skulls, bones and coffins. An oval face, a dome, two sockets. Hatch the band.
A vanitas table with skull, hourglass and wilting flowers Still life. Vanitas is Latin for vanity, in the sense of futility. Light from one side, deep tone behind the skull.
Half living face and half skull, split down the middle Front view. Line up eye with socket and lips with teeth across the split. Blend one side, hatch the other.
Skull outline filled with geometric patterns Front view, outline only. Divide the bone into zones and fill each with stripes, scales or dots. Pen, no shading.
Skull wearing a crown of roses and peonies Front view. Overlap the blooms across the brow and let one hide a socket. Soft tone on bone, crisp line on petals.

Paint it 12

A deer skull against a flat desert sky Front view. Cerulean sky, bone in white and raw sienna, violet-grey shadows. Keep the sky one even colour.
A glowing skull with a green rim light Front view on black. Paint only the edges in lime green fading to dark green. Leave the middle black.
A gold skull on a deep teal ground Front view. Yellow ochre base, burnt sienna shadows, lemon and white highlights. Metal wants hard-edged lights.
A loose watercolour skull with wet-in-wet blooms Three-quarter view. Drop indigo and rose into damp paper for the shadows and let them spread. Bare paper is bone.
A pop-art skull in four flat colour panels Front view, repeated four times. Two flat colours per panel and no blending. Swap the pair in each square.
A skull and its reflection in a mirror Two views at once. Earth palette plus one cool grey for the glass. Soften every edge inside the mirror.
A skull and poppies in red and green complements Still life. Red poppies on grey-green leaves, bone in warm white. Mix the red and green for the darkest shadows.
A skull by candlelight in an earth palette Side-lit. Burnt umber, yellow ochre, black and white only. Warm on the light side, cool grey in the shadow.
A skull in blue and orange complements Three-quarter view. Orange light side, blue shadow side. Mixed together, the pair gives the grey half-tones.
A skull in one colour plus white Three-quarter view. Mix five steps from ultramarine to white and use nothing else. Value does all the work.
A skull silhouette filled with a galaxy Profile outline. Fill it with indigo, violet and magenta, then flick white for stars. Leave the background bare.
A white skull on a black canvas Front view. Start from black and paint only the lit planes in white and two greys. The canvas is the shadow.

How it works

These skull drawing ideas treat the skull as a form study: it holds still and shows every plane of the head. Fifty subjects sit in four groups: human skull views, animal skulls, designs and vanitas, and paint it. Each hint gives the view and a way to shade it, often with a checked fact. Group and level combine: Animal skulls plus Easy holds four.

Read the full guide

Find the landmarks before any detail

A skull is a ball with a box hung under the front. Mark the two sockets, the nose opening and the cheekbone arch along the side first. The lower jaw is the skull's only movable bone, and it hinges on the temporal bones, high up and well back. Adults have 32 teeth, 16 to a jaw.

What the four groups and three levels hold

Most of the 16 easy ideas are front views or profiles, such as A skull and crossbones on a pirate flag. The 14 hard ones ask for more: an awkward angle, a rack of antlers, clear glass, a mirror. Animal skulls holds 13, from a cat to a Tyrannosaurus. For skull painting ideas, tap Paint it: 12 set-ups with a named palette, such as A white skull on a black canvas.

Squint at your reference. The sockets, the nose opening and the shadow under the cheekbone should read as dark shapes before any line goes in.
Draw the whole row of teeth as one curve, then divide it. Shade the gaps, not the teeth, and let the back ones fade.
No skull to hand? A plastic model from a science room beats a photo, because you can walk round it.

Questions and answers

Which skulls should a beginner start with?

A skull built from a ball and a box, which is construction with no shading, and A skull reduced to a simple icon: a dome, two ovals and a row of short lines. Both teach the proportions the harder views rely on, and both are among the 16 in Easy.

How do I draw a skull from the side?

Start with a circle for the cranium and hang a wedge off the front for the face. Put the socket at the front edge of the circle, run the cheekbone arch back from under it, then drop the jaw angle below and behind. Light hatching under the arch is enough shading.

Where are the sugar skulls?

On the Day of the Dead drawing ideas page, beside the marigolds and altars. This list keeps to bone: human views, animal skulls, vanitas still lifes and palettes. Nothing here is gory. A vanitas skull sits on a table beside books or an hourglass, and that is as dark as it gets.