Draw Realistic Animals With Depth
Have you struggled to draw an animal the way you would like? Do you draw it and it looks flat or disproportional? Or it doesn't capture the range of values as the picture does? Keep reading!
Steps
- Find a good picture. Pictures with detail that are fairly large will work well. Also, just use your artist's eye to imagine it composed on your paper. If it doesn't seem to look quite right in your mind, find another picture.
- Find a solid measuring area. A measuring area is some spot on the animal that you can measure and compare it's length to the rest of the animal to make the proportions accurate. An example is if you were drawing a dog's face, you might want to use it's ears as a reference. Your reference should be clear and not have fuzzy edges.
- Determine how many measuring areas tall and wide your subject is. For example, if it were a person standing up straight, it would be 7 head lengths high. Play around a bit so the location of your subject on the paper looks best and fits comfortably. Assign a certain measurement for your measuring area on the paper. Make the subject however many measuring lengths tall and wide with a fixed number of inches or centimeters for your measuring length. Play around a bit with the length so the subject fits well on the paper.
- Using your measurements, make a very loose sketch of the subject. Don't pick up that eraser at all, just use a light pencil and sketch lightly, with lots of loose lines. You can sketch along as you measure points in the middle of your subject (such as the eyes of a dog, which might be 1 and a half ear lengths from the bottom of the ear). It is important to remember that your measurements aren't very exact, and your subject may need to be shorter or taller than what your measured out. Use it as a guide line.
- Look very carefully at the different areas of value. Make each area a shape. Do this carefully, but not overly exactly. If you do it carefully, even before you begin adding in detail just the lines will give your subject good depth.
- Add detail, being careful to have the range of values as in your reference photo. Use the shapes you made as a guideline. Go from top right corner to bottom left if you're right handed, the other way if your left handed. This prevents smudging, which can ruin artwork. Go from hard leads to soft leads (light to dark) for the best finished product.
Tips
- Don't go too crazy with shading. If you do, the animal you are making will look less realistic.
- Kneadable erasers are excellent for picking out delicate highlights.
- To measure, hold your arm in a position so it is steady, and won't move farther or closer to your face. Make it appear the tip of your pencil is at the top of the area being measured, and the top of your thumb is at the bottom.
- Buy a pack of artist's pencils, ranging from hard lead (like 4-H) to soft lead (like 8-B) and everything in between. This greatly adds to your ability to use the full range of values.
Warnings
- Check your hands frequently to make sure they aren't smudging the drawing.
Things You'll Need
- Pencil
- Subject for Drawing
- Eraser
- Paper
