dvsbiolife-blog

[beep-beep-kneecaps]

So I am far from an arty person and barely ever draw unless it's making a plan for some craft, but the urge to do fan art hit I guess, so here we are

[carpisuns]

anatomy tips for anon

(someone asked me for this but tumblr ate the ask lol so I’ll just answer it here)

hi anon, I actually really struggle with anatomy so i was kinda surprised to get this ask hdjsksjs but i hope my answer is at least somewhat helpful!

first of all, there are a million methods for drawing a full body. some people like sketching out a skeleton first and building on top of it, some people start with a super loose/flowy general shape of the pose, some people use ovals or 3D boxes or cylinders—i'd recommend looking at various tutorials and trying them out to see what works for you!

unfortunately none of those methods worked very well for me,, i found them kinda cumbersome and counterintuitive so I usually end up just like. going for it lol. I don’t really have a System cause my method is honestly just “try your best, hold back the tears, fix it until it looks as passable as you can get it” DHJSKS but idk maybe it will help you to see my "process" lol

(ok i've never done a speed drawing thing before so i'm about to Expose Myself but im doing this for you anon haha)

(putting the rest under a cut bc it's long, sorry lol)

as u can see, it's a lot of trial and error for me. you may have noticed how i redrew every single thing like 50 times, how i initially made her arm ridiculously long and had to shorten it, how i general just Abused the lasso and warp tools....the list goes on haha. the point is, i make a lot of mistakes and my final products are still very flawed, but that's okay because i know i'm getting better the more i practice! if you scroll back through my art tag you will see some anatomical horrors that would make picasso cry, but at the time i was really proud of them LKJDFSKJLF

ok let me break it down a bit

i usually start with the head, neck, and like a vague indication of the shoulders lol. then i add these slightly angled lines to build the torso from and leave a little gap so i can come back for the arms

then I add the legs!

i used to be so allergic to legs lol but i've been drawing them more lately and i decided i actually kind of love them?? who'd have thought. (but not feet. dni)

here are some basic examples of how i draw legs. keep in mind that i am still learning and these are not like the best examples ever! i don't tend to put a lot of detail in my anatomy and mainly stick to very simple lines and curves, partially because i prefer a simpler style and partially bc i currently lack the skill to be fancier about it lol

i usually start with basically two lines slanted slightly inward for the upper leg and then for the lower leg i do a straighter line and a line with a bump for the calf. pay attention to what direction the knee is facing because that will determine where your bumps go

once i've got the legs, i have the basis of the pose in place, so i add the arms

shoulders are a weird struggle for me lol but i usually add like a little circle or triangle to indicate the joint so i can attach the arms. and then i build the arms kinda similar to how i do the legs—like with two slanted lines and then the bump for the lower arm

once I’ve got the whole body down, there is usually a fair amount of adjustment haha. I gotta ask, does the pose actually work? like, where is the character putting their weight, and does the pose make sense that way? are the legs and arms and torso the proper length and width? and then at some point after a lot of fiddling i give up and voila, done :)

as far as proportions goes, my advice is to pay attention but not sweat too much about it. I used to try to like Vitruvian Man it lol and count how many heads tall the character was and try to be super precise about the proportions according to one of those proportion chart things. and ofc that stuff helpful and important to know! but in the end, worrying that much about it was a hindrance for me and I ended up with really stiff and unnatural-looking poses. so I mostly just follow a couple rules of thumb:

1. The elbow should hit around the waist/mid-torso

2. The arm, fully extended, usually hits the upper thigh. like, wrist at crotch level I guess?

3. The length of the legs is like roughly equalish to the length of the the whole upper body (head to bottom of hips)

these are just basics and not very Scientific haha but that’s vaguely what I go for. also remember that proportions can be pretty stylistic too! for example, a real human body is normally like 8 heads tall, but I probably do like 6ish heads normally. that’s pretty common for more cartoony styles, and the bigger heads also make the character look younger bc kid proportions are different than adult proportions. just kinda play around with it and go with what feels natural and good for the character you’re drawing

if you feel like your pose is stiff and weird rather than natural/dynamic, it often helps to make sure the shoulders and hips are tilted slightly at opposite angles. that's a tip i picked up from this tumblr tutorial a long time ago and i always come back to it, haha

ok that's about all i have for specifics but i have just 2 general tips to end with:

1. Use!!! References!!! seriously. i use references every time i draw. i look at photos of real people and screenshots from the show and i even sometimes take pictures of myself for reference. often i'm using multiple references for one drawing, like piecing together elements of various refs to create the pose i want, but sometimes i work from a single reference. i also study my favorite artists' work pretty frequently to see how they do things. getting familiar with what good art and real life looks like will help you get better at mimicking it and noticing when things are off.

2. Be patient with yourself. You’re gonna mess up a lot. Sometimes you may even post something and realize months later that you made chat noir’s upper arm literally twice as long as it should be :/

but fear not! you don’t have to live forever in the shadow of Long Arm Chat! lol. you will get better just by trying, I promise.

Part of the process of making art you like is making a lot of art that you don't like, or art that you like at first but hate later. Your skills and your eye are developing simultaneously, and sometimes your eye passes up your skills, so that you're better at noticing your mistakes even if you struggle to fix them. that's okay! that gap can be really frustrating and discouraging, but it's still a sign of growth and your skill will catch up. just keep studying, keep drawing, and keep having fun! it gets better, seriously. when i first started drawing like two years ago, i thought i'd never be able to do a passable full-body pose. it was SO hard. and it's still hard for me! but i can do it much better now than i could then, and when i get bummed out about my limitations, it helps me to remember that even though i still have a long way to go to get where i want to be, i've also come a long way. and you will too! if your current self could see what your future self can do, you'd be so impressed 😌

P.S. just to reiterate, I am Not an expert At All and these are just some methods/tips that are working pretty well for me right now. i hope they help you out too, but my methods may not be the best fit for you, and if that's the case, don't sweat. try out a lot of stuff and see what clicks and makes sense. art is a learning process and it's so individual so i encourage you to experiment!

Good luck, and have fun!