Perfect Your Anime Drawing Skills, Lesson 1

By Rick Feathers

Yes, how do I draw my anime and manga characters to look perfect all the time? The answer is simple, you practice, practice and then practice some more. After a while of drawing the same face or costume it may or will become boring to you. Hey I understand but what is the outcome and what do you want to accomplish. The long term goal is to improve your work with each new layout.

Here is an idea to help you make this a fun time and not boring.

First, start by drawing your favorite characters face and keep the sketch simple with basic outlines of the face. Now at this point a good layout is what you want by taking time and get it just like right. The key to the first step is to get a good illustration of your anime and what you consider a great drawing for you to work with.

Second, take some tracing paper, place it over your drawing and trace it then trace it again but with each time do it from another starting point. In other words draw the eyes first one time then the next time do the hair first and so forth. The point of this exercise is to get a rhythm of your hand and how it flows across the paper and getting familiar with the pencil strokes.

Third, now the fun begins. When you feel or believe that you can now draw the anime in your sleep you are ready to move on. Take a new plain white sheet of paper, position your hand and pencil as thought you are ready to begin tracing again. Close you eyes and begin to sketch the anime character. That’s right try doing it with your eyes closed and don’t be to concern with how the drawing comes out.

The purpose of this lesson is to help you focus in another way to draw your anime art. By visualizing the character in your mind and trying to draw it you become more aware of many other details that you might have missed. So close your eyes and watch the creativity flow as you layout what your mind is saying it should look like. Remember, the mind processes tons of information, therefore use your sketch pad to transmit the ideas as though taking visual notes. Yes, you can open your eyes while doing this and most important, practice. Talk with you later in lesson 2.