Drawing a Healer - part 2 form and anatomy

Hi, this is Ian of Studio Kyuu here again! I’m continuing the Drawing a Healer series.

[Candice, I lost your contact info! Please email me from my website! ^_^;;;]

I’m starting to put a little more love and thought into the final piece — The second step that I follow for a piece of art is to establish the forms and the anatomy, but I wanted to think of the hair and face a little bit. I doodled a bit and found a nice hairstyle and attitude for her face Click to see it better!

So, having done that, I returned to the main picture…

What is form? Take a look at (1) — Each part of the body can be simplified in 3d. The form I’ve used for the forearm is a simple cylinder. Cylinder is the fancy word for a tube, or even a can. Mmm,  pringles :9 and soda

The curved edges along the edge of the form should look like a bracelet or a rubber band being worn around the arm. Or, you can imagine how a sleeve or a watch might look if it was there. The way it curves helps show you which end of the cylinder is coming towards the viewer. The side lines of the cylinder should follow the gesture.

Now take a look at #2. The cylinder has deformed a bit according to my knowledge of anatomy. We’ll have a whole exercise based on that later ^^;;; For now, just take a look at how the top of the thigh is thicker than the thigh near the knee. To make the form more solid, I’ll make the line go from the edge of the top curve to the bottom.

Throughout the rest of the drawing, I repeated this process. I thought of the cylinder, then made adjustments to the curves and lines based on anatomy.

If you’re just starting out, don’t be shy to skip anatomy for a little bit — You’ll be surprised how nice a drawing can look as long as the forms are good!

Next week, I’m going to start adding in the details. Not yet finishing, but just making sure they’re in the right place!

Have a great weekend! –Ian