3.Planes of the Face

The study of anatomy helps us build a kind of mental blueprint of the figure – an imaginary three-dimensional model of muscles, bones and connective tissue, typical structural relationships, symmetries and asymmetries within forms, and even perhaps an idea of scales and proportions. This understanding really helps inform our looking when we come to work with the life model.

In a sense we have a bit of a head start (no pun intended) because we already know the structures and forms that people have in common, which gives us things to look out for as well as an understanding of why they might look that way.

This structural understanding provides a framework that helps us to organise the immense range of visual information provided by