How to Draw Dragon Eyes Art Tutorial for Beginners

Dragon Eye Drawing Tutorial

Today you’ll learn how to draw dragon eyes on black paper. Artwork created on black paper adds a little something to it. And let’s face it, dragon eyes are super cool looking to begin with. So dragon eyes drawn on black paper is the perfect combination.

When creating your artwork on black paper, you have to take some things into consideration. Your colors will look slightly different on black than they do on white paper. And not all colors will show up very well on the black paper.

There are other mediums out there you could use, but I like the amount of detail that is possible with colored pencils. So for this lesson, I’m going to show you how to do a drawing with colored pencil on black paper. All of the pencils I used for this are Prismacolor and the exact colors will be listed throughout the lesson.

If you’re interested in using a different medium, check out this video using markers.

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Art Supplies

Black paper (I used black cardstock)

Graphite drawing pencil (optional)

Prismacolor Colored Pencils

Dragon Eyes

There are many different options for drawing your dragon eyes. You can change the shape of the pupil, and the color of the eyes. The scales can be drawn in many different ways. And you can color the scales in a variety of ways.

Dragon eyes are very similar to reptiles, so take a look at some reptile photos for inspiration and ideas for your dragon eye drawings.

Black Cardstock Artist Trading Card Blanks

I’m using black cardstock for this drawing. I’ve also used black Post-It notes, which work really well. Black construction paper is a suitable option too.

I began by cutting some black cardstock into 3.5 x 2.5 inch cards using my paper trimmer. If you’ve read some of my previous articles you already know I do a lot of my work on Artist Trading Cards (ATCs), for a couple of reasons. They are small, so they don’t take as long to complete, and I am extremely limited on free time. Trading ATCs is a fun hobby to have and this way I have cards already available to trade.

You can do your rough sketch with a graphite pencil or a colored pencil. I prefer to use graphite as it is easier to correct mistakes. When doing your rough sketch, make sure you’re not pushing down too hard. The last thing you want to do is make indentations on the paper with your pencil. Also, the lighter you do your sketch, the easier it will be to cover up.

FREE Artist Trading Cards Guide

How to Draw Dragon Eyes Step by Step

Step 1 – Draw your Guidelines

Begin your drawing by putting in some guidelines. Dragon eyes are typically slanted, so start by drawing a diagonal line from corner to corner on your paper. I’m using a white colored pencil for the demonstration to make it easier for you to see.

You can use a graphite pencil or a colored pencil for your initial sketching. Either way, be sure you are sketching very lightly.

Next, draw a circle for the eyeball. Part of the eyeball will get covered up, so make sure you draw it fairly light. You can use your diagonal line to represent the location of the upper eyelid by drawing your eyeball in reference to that line.

The lower the diagonal line is on your circle (eyeball), the more closed the eye will look. If more of your eyeball is showing, the eye will look like it is opened wider.

Step 2 – Draw the Upper and Lower Eyelids

The structure of a dragon eye is pretty similar to that of the human eye. As I said earlier, the placement of the eyelid in relation to the eyeball will determine how wide the eye is open.

The shape of the eyelids should follow the curve of the eyeball. Lightly draw in the upper eyelid, and then the lower lid. Remember to draw very lightly. The lines for the eyelids are guidelines and will get covered up later.

Next, draw in your dragon’s pupil. I like drawing them a diamond shape, but you can do them as a different shape if you want to as well.

The shape of the pupil will help determine the personality of your dragon. Is he going to be friendly, or not so nice? Diamond shaped pupils will make your dragon seem more aggressive. If you want your dragon to seem cute or whimsical, a round pupil would be a better option.

How to Draw Dragon Eyes – Choosing Colors

If you want to use a color other than white for the rest of your sketch, you will need to decide which colors you will be using. Because you are drawing a mythical creature, you can use any color you want to use.

I wanted to make this dragon purple with a red and yellow eye. To help you determine the exact colors you will be using, it’s a good idea to make a color swatch on scrap paper. Some colors will show up better than others.

Drawing Dragon Scales

Now comes the fun part, drawing in the scales. Draw your scales along the curve of your upper and lower eyelids, overlap the guidelines for your eyelids with your scales.

You don’t want a straight line where your eyelids meet the eyeball. Vary the size and shape slightly to make your drawing more interesting to look at. I drew mine with a Lilac (pc956) colored pencil.

This is the pencil I’ll be using to sketch out the rest of my drawing, as it will be easier to hide than the white.

Draw the scales at the lower eyelid a little smaller than the ones at the upper eyelid. Again, overlap your original eyelid guideline when drawing your scales.

How-to-Draw-a-Dragon-Eye-Lower-Eyelid-Scales

Continue working on your scales, adding more to the upper and lower lids. Keep adding rows of scales until you have as much of your paper filled in that you would like. You will have to decide if your scales will go all the way to the edges or if you want them to stop before going off the edges.

Dragon Eye Drawing Colors

I’ve decided to draw my dragon eye a red color. The first thing I did was add some yellow next to the pupil. The pencil I used here was Spanish Orange (pc1003), which is a yellow-orange color. When adding colors to your drawing you don’t want to just color everything in using one color like you would in a coloring book. You want to add several colors to make it more interesting. For my eye, which will be red, I used three different colors.

Next, I added some red and a purple-ish color for the darker areas. The colors I used were Crimson Red (pc924) and Tuscan Red (pc937). I overlapped some of the yellow to help blend the colors together.

How-to-Draw-a-Dragon-Eye-Colored-Eyeball-Red

Once I was happy with the colors on the eyeball, I added some white in the pupil for a highlight. Then I went in with a black colored pencil and filled in the pupil.

How-to-Draw-a-Dragon-Eye-Colored-Eyeball-Highlight

How to Draw Dragon Eyes – Scale Colors

Now it’s time to start adding colors to the scales. I started with the first row of dragon scales above the upper eyelid. Use more than one shade of the color you are using. I used Lilac (pc956) and Brite Purple (pc995).

Next, I moved down to the scale along the lower lid. I like to work my way back and forth between the upper and lower scales. The order you color them in is entirely up to you. I also went in and added some black around the edges. I typically use a lot of black outlining in my drawings. If you don’t like how the black looks, try using a different color on yours.

At this point I went in with some white and added more highlights to the eyeball and some highlights to the scales.

Continue working your way around your drawing, filling in your scales.

Keep working until all your scales are colored in. When doing mine, I used the lilac for the bottom of each scale and the bright purple for the top of each scale. A couple layers of both were required to get bright colors. After you are satisfied with how the colors look, go around the edges of each scale with a black colored pencil. Then go in with white and added a highlight to each scale.

I didn’t like how the edges look, so I took the black and shaded the corners a little bit to add some variety to the overall look of the card.

How-to-Draw-a-Dragon-Eye-Finished-With-Black

Dragon Eye Drawings

There are so many different options when drawing a dragon eye that I couldn’t possibly list them all here. There are a variety of ways you could draw the scales. An endless number of color combinations. The eyeballs and the pupils could be drawn many different ways. There really are no limits to the variety of ways you could draw your dragon eye.

To see some of the different drawings I came up with, take a look at 7 Day Dragon Eye Drawing Challenge.