What is wrong with this head's mouth?

Aww, don't throw him out the window!

Now, I don't know what you are going for exactly besides what you've said here, and style of this stuff is sooooo personal taste - I tend toward more realistic styles than anime/stylized stuff, so please take any suggestions here with a grain of salt and feel free to throw them out entirely if it's not what you're going for. I hope I'm not nitpicking too much here - I realize he's still a rough version and not nearly finished, just this is what stood out to me.



I've sketched over a little bit in kind of blobs - this is what I do on my own clay to see where to add and remove material. + means add a bit, - means remove a bit, ++ and -- respectively mean add a lot or take away a lot.

The contour of his nose bridge could use a bit of cutting away in profile - I LOVE the shape of the rest of the nose, just the bit between his eyes/lower forehead is a bit too straight, IMO.

The area over and under his eyes is quite puffy, too. The nostrils could use maybe a little rounding, and a bit of thinning on the cheekbones. Possibly a little more contouring to the sides of the forehead too, for a more masculine look.

The browbone seems quite high to me - a high browbone is a distinctly feminine facial trait, while a low one (basically putting the eyebrow almost directly above the eyelid) is quite masculine. The right eye is also a little higher than the left.



The mouth, I think, is mainly a matter of a very weak chin/jaw (especially small for a male), and the outer corners being very low. It makes him look pouty and dour. Try strengthening the jaw and chin by adding some material there, and bring up the corners of the mouth some so that the line in the middle of the lips is more straight than a downcurve. You can always have the main part of the mouth downcurved and then curve the outer corners up (like a recurve bow) a little bit, though that can look like a smirk.

 

I am quite rusty at critique.
Also, I do not do oversketch very well, so I hope my description suffices?
I think it was John Singer Sargent who said that a portrait is a likeness of someone, with something wrong with the mouth? I know you are not doing a portraint. Mouths are hard to do.

What is wrong with this head's mouth? (Re: Second set of pix.)

1. In the first picture, the mouth seems too flat. However, I can see from the profile pix, that it seems to have a nice curve.
2. The pronounced cheekbones may make the mouth seem flat? Smoother transitions from one plane to another might help?
3. In the second picture (profile) the chin seems to angle out directly from the bottom of the lower lip. Maybe a small transition space between the bottom of the lower lip, and the start of the angle of the jaw?
4. The jaw looks much better now than it did in the first set of pix. Now, the jaw just looks too pointy? Maybe try giving him a cleft chin to start with, to square it up a little bit? I'm thinking a Mickey Rourke type chin? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0p749yQew0U
I chose Mickey as an example because he is/was a fighter.
5. The mouth is not as pouty looking as it was in the first set of pix. If you want the face to look mean, remember that when the mouth pulls down, it isn't just the mouth that moves, but other muscles in the face as well. http://grimace-project.net/

Overall, your changes so far, are all in the right direction, and I see much improvement from the first set of pix, to the second set of pix. He is getting there!