How to Draw the Dark Mark

Last Updated: December 17, 2023

The Dark Mark represents Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters in Harry Potter. Drawing it may seem difficult and be a long process, but it's simpler than it seems. It's a process of mainly just mapping out the shapes, drawing the outline and highlighting other features. ^{[1]
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1

Get a reference image if you can, then lightly map out the general shapes. This image has a circle for the skull, two more circles for the snake's body, and a hook for the snake's head.
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2

Draw the outline of a skull. A circle and chin will do. It doesn't have to fit your earlier circle exactly; that's just a rough guideline.

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3

Draw the basic facial features. Two round, oblong shapes will work for the eye-sockets and a round triangle represents the nose. Two slanted "L's" for the cheekbones will suffice.
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4

Outline the upper jaw. At this point, it should slightly resemble Darth Vader's helmet.
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5
Make some more light guidelines, but detail the position of the snake this time. It protrudes from the skull and then twists on itself into a figure eight. It should follow the general path of the guide you made earlier.
- Give yourself a guide for the snake's head. We see a circle for the skull and a rectangle for the jaws. What about you?
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6

Edit the spots where the lines cross. Erase as needed so that the snake overlaps itself.
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7

Sketch the places where the snake turns, exposing its belly when it had shown its back and vice versa. Erase your original guidelines while leaving one for the chin.
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8

Refine these lines and darken them. Use your reference image to draw the snake's head.
9
Add some patterns and shading to the snake.
- The canon snake has patterns that look like smooshed together hills, in either a group of one, two, or three, in a dark color. A lighter color is used to make spots inside of those hills, as well as to color the surrounding skin.
  
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10

Shade the skull. Everything inside the outline of the mandible (lower jaw) should be pitch black.

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Color! Nothing has to be in black and white unless you want it that way. Maybe adding some green in the eye sockets would make it look eerie.

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Add some more advanced shading. This article only uses a light color and a dark one. Determine a light source, and then see what you can do with midtones!

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