A car's headlights are like a person's eyes, we look at them as if they were eyes. On modern cars, the headlights are highly stylized, they blend into the fenders and create a unified "look." Some extra time spent in drawing the front lights correctly will pay dividends in making certain that the likeness of the car is accurate.
In modern cars, the term "headlights" is not very accurate, they usually contain several lighting elements, from turn signals, to hazard flashers, and more. Some cars have lights surrounding the headlights that seem to serve no function other than to tell you what brand of car they are (Audi springs to mind here).
Because headlights have to undergo such rigorous testing to be approved for highway use, they are very expensive (I have read estimates of upwards of $1,000,000 to get a light through the approval process). This is good for the automotive artist, it means that once the light is produced, it will probably remain in production for some years.
Another benefit for the artist is that car makers want their different models to have a certain family resemblance, so a maker's small cars will look similar to its larger models. If someone was willing to buy a certain small car, based on the styling, why risk them being unhappy to buy the next higher model because the styling is completely different? So the artist wins again, once you have drawn one of a manufacturer's cars the other models' lights will probably be very similar.
To illustrate this point, I once was asked to participate in a "focus group" about auto styling. Several people were in it with me, and we were asked questions about the styling of different vehicles. We were shown photos of various vehicles, all of them disguised to make it hard to tell what brand they were. As an automotive artist, I had little trouble in telling the brand of every vehicle. The car builders go out of their way to maintain the same look to their vehicles, so be sure to study the lights, it will make it much easier to render the car, or truck, more realistically.
If you draw the front lights faithfully, you will be well on your way to a great car drawing!
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