[Gallagher]

... Or it could make them look like they're trying way too hard to seem young.

Older folks are difficult for a lot of people because they don't really understand how the aging will actually work, or they try too hard to keep the old look while still keeping it pretty.

Knowing the subtle details of a person's face really helps there. If you're the kind of artist that relies on the same general facial shape every time (sorry Espy, but your faces kind of all look the same to me), then you're going to have a harder time. Things like hair and clothes certainly help the picture, but what happens when you have that older character that dresses young? Those shortcuts just won't work then.

There's just so many tiny bits of anatomy in the face that we seem to forget, some practice just on that could really help. Take some time, learn which parts wrinkle first, which ones thin out, which ones start to sag. Don't be afraid of skin imperfections like variations in color. As we get older, gender gets more and more ambiguous, too, so don't fret too much about that until you get age itself down first.