Don't Draw ANIMAL CHARACTERS Like This!
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- Опубліковано 25 лип 2024
- How do you draw animal ears on a human head? Where do you place horns? What is the correct way to draw a snout? Learn the top tips for designing half-animal half-human characters, as well as biologically accurate ways to draw animal features!
Winged Canvas art instructor Jessie Chang teaches us her personal techniques for thoughtful character design, and common mistakes beginner artists should avoid in this short art tutorial!
🕓 Timestamps:
0:00 - Introduction
0:05 - How to draw animal SNOUTS
1:58 - How to draw CAT EARS on people
4:30 - How to draw HORSE EARS on people
5:39 - How to draw HORNS on people
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• 🔴 How to Draw: ANIMALS...
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I really enjoy making demon characters with fairly large horns and never really noticed that I always kept their horns to the front! The amount of variation horns can carry is such a fun idea to play with.
Halo horns thar connect at the top in a point is always an interesting idea to play with too
Think about what personality the character has too, that could apply to how dainty or masculine they look.
@@spacecowboy7148 OOH THAT FIRST IDEA! And yup!! I’m gonna use my character April as an example. She’s usually sort of strict and work oriented, and has a fairly feminine appearance. Her horns are sort of like that from more classic depictions of demons, fairly straight with a slight curve.
I wonder how heavy the horns are tho
@@AlicornHana depends on the person's build i'd think.
Horns are often made out of the same thing as hooves and nails so they're not that weighted unless they're spiraled or overly large.
i always wonder how they sleep with those
0:17 "disproportionate, this is not in perspective"
- talking avatar with mouth on the side of face
I think that kind of thing works with very cartoony reasons.
had no right to call them out like that LMFAOO 😭😭
it's an over simplified cartoon avatar so it works
My thoughts exactly!
@@bbew2914 ok but what if the person was drawing a cartoony animal like that? It sounds like they're calling it out whatever situation it is 😂
The animal ears thing is such a good point! The cat girl anime thing is cute until you think about how weird they would look in a ponytail. I feel like the most common mistake i see with horns/ ears ect is that they look like they’re attached to the hair rather than the skull.
Yeah, you’re right when I think about it
Ngl I place the ears directly where human ears would be, idk it just feels more natural to me yk?
If anyone’s wondering to make sure that ears/horns don’t look tacked onto the hair, it’s always better to draw them as you’re drawing your character’s head before you add hair
@@Mystery-Wolf same, I always try to make the ear connect to the original ear canal in some way to make it look better.
I also make the ears the same color as the hair, but thats because i'd assume if they were an actual animal, they'd have the same coloration as the hair. The only time I don't is when the hair is colored lol
I originally started doing it because I’d end up in a conflict about the human ears if I didn’t draw them connected
I love how you made the point about snouts being angled wrong, and to think of them like boxes. I wish I had learned this when I had started drawing lol-
like this video :)
Some famous art youtuber: DON'T DRAW BOXES
People who uses them and it makes their art better: you sure bout that
(Also, i don't draw boxes, instead cylinders if its rounded, but im not stopping you for using boxes, so many ways to draw that you should find your own way)
@@AlicornHana i use mostly cylinders and such with arms and legs but with snouts being so boxy its super useful. However box shapes rarely occur in real life. Its a balance of knowing where boxes should and shouldn't go :)
I remember a while back I saw a video giving out advice for proper character designs and such. Their character had the side ways snout. •_•
I wish
Yeah drawing a snout is harder than it sounds. I neede a lot of redraws to get a snout right cuse it was slighty tilted
I personally am a fan of floating horns. They're just hovering over the character's head. Maybe they're magic, who knows? They certainly defy physics.
one of my main characters i write has floating horns lol, they're so cool
I love when people make actually useful drawing videos.
I have a faun oc that has the lower part deer legs, deer antlers and ears, but his antlers are actually white/golden flowers trees and for anatomy I always make sure the ears align right, he also has a deer type nose so his face structure almost resembles the Na’vi
Ooh, cherry blossom wood? I wonder how its texture is like(i never touched cherry blossoms before so-)
He sounds very pretty! 🥰
that sounds adorable, I'll be sure to use that for future inspiration
sounds like the offspring of a satyr and a druid
Me obsessing over everyone's awesome ocs:
I like the different perspectives you gave about where to locate ears and horn/antlers on a more human like character. Fun fact, there may be a reason why you like forehead horns. Biologically speaking animals that have horns or antlers growing from their skulls actually grow them on the part of the skull right above the eyes, which compared to a human’s skull is the forehead bones.
There are reptiles that are able to grow “horns” around their heads in other places, but those are considered fake horns since they don’t have a true bony structure underneath.
I learned this in my Mammology class, and I understand that information may have changed however I though it could potentially add to the conversation.
Very nice video. :)
I'm glad the weight thing was brought up, because different animals actually have different skull thicknesses at varying locations. The side of a human's head is the thinnest, if I remember right, about around the ears and slightly up or kind of to the side of the eyes ish. Whereas on a horse it's more down the nose between the eyes. Almost forehead level. But that area is decent on humans, even if not the thickest point of a human skull. So the section mentioned in the video would have the best structural support for bigger horns, as well as the best foundation to have some actual bone to grow from.
Both my husband and I like unique horns, but while some designs are FASCINATING to me I still prefer to have something with a BIT of believability based off of actual anatomy. For example, if you want horns on the face they'd have to follow the cheekbones...probably up along the apex...or the jawbone line. Also, many things with horns and antlers, (not fond she called them 'horns' for deer, but enh), is that they're usually for defense and use. So the animals that have them have specialized skulls and muscles and fat deposits to handle the shock and cushioning needed to handle such regular blunt force trauma. Sooo, if you've got weight on your cheekbones how is that going to pull and affect the rest of your face? Even if not for fighting, cuz placement, can still be grabbed and whatnot.
yeah.
I often slap the animalistic-ears right where the ears actually would be cuz I thought it’d make sense, but this is a pretty cool concept! :0
That only works with deer-like ears and the ones that are look liek it so-
Cause then the ear goes into the brain if it on top like that tho
@@AlicornHana spop 2019 did it with catra lol
@@AlicornHana it works with all ears, ya just gotta do it right
@@AlicornHana its all about angling. Sure, cat ears as they are on a cat don't work, but if they're angled to the side they do. Same with dogs, the flip on ears would just happen further down instead of straight up and down.
as a horse owner i would like to say - some types of horses do have very fluffy ears compaired to most! such as a brumby, but it all depends on the location from where theyre all from, the season, ect :DD
this is just for the people who like the small details tbh
What would you say about drawing fish people? (I love dnd and oc making in general, so how would you go about it? From a dnd perspective: merfolk, tritons, etc. Not typically mermaids as they tend to have half fish body.)
You Will love starbound and hylotl race
Hello fellow starbound player
We actually have a video on drawing fish people that may give you some ideas! ua-cam.com/video/_9gpFTyTjpI/v-deo.html
I personally like how you draw animal features on a human like person! It’s cute.
The age old dnd character design wisdom when it comes to horns is something like this: “What side of their head does your character sleep on?”
im that person who loves to doodle little animal ears onto every character i make, so this is very helpful for me!! tysm :DD
my favourite kind of horns to draw are on the sides of the head and wrap to the top, because it gives me an excuse to move the ear canals, and because it feels like the weight of the horn balances itself on their skull rather than away from the head!
One of my characters, his horns come out from the back/base of his skull and wrap around just above his ears then go up. Probably my favorite horns
Very good explanation!
I never thought about the functionality of animal ears
can't wait for more ^^
I already knew all of this XD but tbh it was really nice to refresh and also how you talk about it is so respectful and nice, it was just chill to watch and listen to you explain
I am so jealous of how easily you can draw a side profile 😭😭
i feel like horns work pretty well when their mass is concentrated a bit further towards the back of the head, it somewhat helps balance the naturally uneven weight distribution on human heads, because the pivot is about as far back as it can be.
the heads of most animals are front heavy but with humans its more subtle,
our heads are still a little front heavy so we also have very small neck muscles compared to other animals of our size to counter act.
i would say any weight distribution on a human head works if its counteracted by the right posture and neck muscle mass
You literally saved my life with drawing 3/4 animal head views, they always look like the first Version you drew, I never knew how to fix that problem and this really helped me figure it out and learn how to do it properly! Cant wait to apply these tips and tricks to my own drawings ^^
does drawing characters with animal features make you a furry? Or does it have to be fully anthropomorphic animals?
I think it's neither. I mean I like drawing anthropomorphic animals, but I have no desire to be one
@@tas4940 being a furry simply means being a fanatic of anthropomorphic animals, not wearing a fursuit or wanting to be an animal.
@@daenite2480 oh, well I'm still not a furry. That's mor of a choice than anything. Also I'm pretty sure a good amount of furries have fursuits
@@tas4940 tiny amount. The internet is very stereotypical, you should know that by now.
@@daenite2480 I know. Btw you shouldn't assume anything
I love the sideways snout as a dorky little style thing
Never drawn them before, but they always look so derpy and it makes me smile :)
I appreciate that horses get something of a pass if only to avoid being mistaken for fawns XD Honestly though I really liked this video and it has nice points as well as examples (and I love me examples!). My favorite part was especially horns and the weight of them.
I love the follow along presentation style with plenty of references! It really helped me visualize everything. I'm always a big fan of making my characters and drawings somewhat realistic, so this was very helpful.
When I work with digital art I don't really think about this but now I realize how this would actually really help me.
Oh this is very well put together I wasn't sure what to expect from the title when this video was recommended but you've explained your point really well. I'm glad you acknowledged functional vs realistic as I to often hear that as a way to dunk on character designs. Ie (you cannot do that in a fantasy game because it's not realistic etc.)
I follow more of a simple and chibi artstyle. So the first one doesn’t really work with me however the rest of them work well with my artstyle
As a furry artist I approve of all of these tips (not that you needed my approval but w/e), took me a lot of trial and error to figure all of these out on my own 👍
Also, here's just one of my personally hard-earned "art hacks": If you ever get hung up on the shape of the muzzle, you try and try but it always ends up either too long or to short or doesn't go where you want it to, and already have the eyes sorta in the right position (or just roughed in where they'll go), just squint a bit and imagine where the nose should go and work backwards from there. This sounds stupid when I say it like that, but just, like, put down the nose, then draw the upper lip, the lower lip into the chin, the jawline and finish up connecting the nose to the brow. I don't know why but for some reason that's like my get-out-of-jail-free card when all my construction sketching doesn't look right. YMMV, but I hope it helps somebody
It makes sense :3
You are right and that makes sense-
WOAHHH ILL TRY THIS
Starting with the nose is so helpful I do this as well,
I love the look of your characters in the example pictures, the way they’re mostly human, how their animal features look like a natural extension of them instead of cosplay like anime catgirls, it makes them look like magical forest spirits. I'd love more videos about creating that look! :)
I have this half-dragon OC that has full control where her draconic features appear on her human body. Because of this, I've already come to terms with animalistic features will tend to shift your center of balance. Whenever she needs to lay low and hide her horns/tail/wings, she's always incredibly off balance and complaining about it.
OMG THANK YOU!! I’ve been saying the animal ear thing for so long but now one ever listened to me, hell I think it looks cuter when they ears go all the way down
I absolutely love the idea of bringing the ears down- especially since it doesn't give me as much of a crisis as I slowly start thinking about whether or not my character has 2 sets of ears or not because I think it looks funky with the ears on top
Amazing and incredibly helpful tutorial! i personally think this is the best channel tutorials i have ever seen! thank you for your content
I draw characters with all different types of ear placement. Like I have some with animal ears on top of the head, connecting to the ears and canine-like ones sticking right out like elf ears.
Same with horns, I have characters with all different types of horns in different placements.
I like the functional ear placement more than the aesthetic ear placement
I really like that you don't ramble on for 10 minutes before getting to the actual tutorial. Your videos are fast-paced and to the point, I like that!
Omg what is this channel
It's literally the first video I've ever seen and it has a lot of interesting stuff I been looking for lately
Definitely will watch other videos after this!!!
Oh i remember watching this live! It feels nice getting a refresher on stuff like these especially with my poor memory nowadays.
This really helped a lot. I really like how you kind of did a step by step or the footage wasn’t sped up.
I already kind of did the "Come up from the side and up top" thing mentioned on the second section, nice to hear it validated!
The ear thing! That's actually something I've thought of and sorta implemented myself in my worldbuilding! I like that this is being talked about, ty I learned so much
I feel like subconsciously I knew and was already doing the ear thing but I never really thought about the logistics of how an animal person could hear with it until now
This is short but really well explained and understandable, thank youu!
Finally I’ve been looking everywhere for something like this!
Also can you do a part two on the body of antro characters like the legs cuz I cannot draw legs 😅
Yes! Drawing Legs on antro characters is our video premiere for this week, premiering Tuesday at 12pm ET :) ua-cam.com/video/JIeB9SqrXxY/v-deo.html
@@Wingedcanvas thx
The notes on the ears and horns are great! I just drew a Teifling character to go along with my player character’s back story, and I knew I wanted him to have horns from an animal that would live in the same biome IRL. What I did with the horn placement was observe the placement on the reference animal and used that to help map the placement on the character’s head so that the looked balanced. Oh! also made sure he didn’t have a skinny neck since since the muscles would need to accommodate the weight of the horns as well 😅
Tbh in my own opinion
The don’t do works just as fine as the do
When coming to art tips.
Depending on what art style your working with tho.
i love this channel, i could be in the deepest pits of art block and even then it stands no chance whenever i watch one of these videos ❤
this is awesome! thank you for the help and advice and lovely art!
i feel like this also would go hand in hand with cosplay and such, as far as positioning the ears and horns go
Very useful and entertaining! I will be watching more of your videos!
This is the thing I need as I now feel happy for my creative endeavors of character designs
I am so glad I have been recommended to this video. I have been trouble with my own drawing when it's up to human animal in a away.
Just what I needed for the horns! I'm thinking about making at for my best friend, and I didn't know how to place the horns TwT
What I do with small ears is just make a cartilage? I think it's called in english that makes them appear "up", I still experiment though to be aesthetically pleasing and functional
Cartilage is like bone but not bone
Low key needed this video for some perspectives. Thank you 😊💓
I love that while you are teaching us the correct places and proportions of human/animal mixs i notice the disproportional image of you on the side. Anyways, this helps a lot. I never really drew animal people cause i didn't know how to go about it
I always have this personal "pet peeve" about the placement of functional non-human ears on humanoids, because I see many artists treating the animals ears like they are a pair of horns which they aren't. I'm glad that you mention those tips in the video.
5:02 now this is something i think we can all appreciate! its so adorable :D man i love it
I love how to the point and helpful this was thank you!!
I do the smaller horn straight from the forehead only to really small ones or like somewhat small ones It's really cool you mentioned it!
I think it's funny that you talked about the horn balance but then said how you like the horns coming straight out of the forehead which is only balanced if they go back over the head, not balanced in many cases. Though I mean in the end besides the beginning part this video is entirely opinion based not fact based and that's fine, I just thought that that was a little funny
I thought the same 😄 As little nubbins they work, but longer horns on the forehead look too heavy!
You mentioned bear ears and I have always struggled to make a more "accurate" version of it and just do an aesthetic version. Do you or anyone have any tips? Thank you
There's something about asking ourselves if our character would be okay with our design choices that I find wonderful. Great video!
You explain stuff in a rlly good and simple way!
4:51 kind of depends on the season - generally yes they will be skinlike with very short velvety fur, but during the winter (or even other seasons if you live in a cold area or just have a very hairy horse) they can become very fluffy both on the insides and the top of the ear :) I had a horse as a kid / teen and his ears were very fluffy inside and outside during all seasons except summer where they were only fluffy towards the bottom of the ear
issue with big ears is that if you make them too big they don't seem like the proper proportion to be cat ears. start lookin' like mice or elephants or somethin'. it's just kind of assumed that if someone has the anime cat ears that the earholes are moved (or sometimes they have both ears in which case it's definitely aesthetic, or they have 4 functional ears)
I literally get jumpscared every time the "don't" and "do's" sfx is played LOL
Anyhow amazing video! Keep it up :D
Yep, I'm adopting the lower-bigger ear model, thanks for the idea ^^
i love this video tysm!! i do have questions for aquatic features though, since i want to make an accurate-ish mermaic character :,D
they have another video on mermaids on the channel! i would post the link but idk if youtube is gonna delete the comment, but its one of the most recent one they have posted, shouldn't be difficult to find
you dont need their permission to design a character lol
@@Sputterbugz ???? They were asking for advice, not permission lol
@@cottonballbats tysm for telling me 😭😭
Hey there, you're welcome -- glad it was helpful! Here is our video on drawing fish people ;) ua-cam.com/video/_9gpFTyTjpI/v-deo.html
also what i like to do is just LOOK AT ANIMALS MORE and see where their ear canals are in relation to the skull. you could adjust the humanoid cranial shape to lend more towards ears ontop of the head. you get some real weird-lookin' characters and it's a lot of fun, looks really unique!
I’ve never thought about function when drawing these sorts of things! I always jsut go for aesthetics but this was really interesting hopefully I can integrate it into my art!
Just found your channel, love the way you explain it. Immediately subscribed! Love your videos❤
Honestly, when drawing ears, I’ve noticed many characters I see have 4 ears, and everyone knows how weird it would look if cat ears stuck out of the head, so I made the ears larger, the base starting at the human hear canal, and then make the ears connect more to the sides of the head, glad to see that you’ve pointed it out.
3:16 FINALLY SOMEONE SAID IT. I thought I was the only one who did this!
I remember my art teacher put this video on the class tv and we watched it I'm so glad he did cause now I can watch your videos and be inspired! :)
this is exactly the thing i have a really hard time with, thanks a ton for this!! :D
6:53 for the record, deer have antlers, not horns. Great video! This was really helpful ❤💖💗
OooooOOOooooohh furries are going to have fun with this one
Oh yes indeed we are!
finally someone pointed out the ears-at-the-top! I've always thought it weird with the function and stuff. Love the video!
Thank you for this. It really helped me figure out some character design stuff, since I'm drawing a lot of hybrid animals recently.
🎨Familiarize yourself with creating new characters by joining our Cartooning & Anime class! Not only will you be learning from professional instructors, you also get the opportunity to receive personalized feedback to elevate your characters: www.wingedcanvas.com/virtual-art-class/cartooning-and-anime
I have a question: Have you done a tutorial on hair? Because hair flow is kind of hard to do, and experimenting with different hair types are also hard for me to. I mostly just do short hair that I can do because it's the easiest😅 so all the people I draw, mostly, have the same hair.
On the ears, Thank You! The top of the head style always bugged me. Even cats’ ears technically aren’t on top of the head either. If you look at most mammals, the ear canal, like ours, is very close to being level with the eyes. Animal heads are just proportioned differently and depending on the animal, the shell of the ear extends either upwards or outwards. Our own do too, but our skulls are taller, and our ears relatively smaller, so they can’t stick up above the head as animals’ so. I have a few characters with feline ears, for mine, I match the human positioning since it’s on a human head and have them standing out more to the sides than up.
@@That_One1_guys What about a spider or an ant or bee?
Bugs are hard to draw as humans
@@solarix2308 wrong person-lol
horse ears are like a circle with a triangle on it and its really long if you just have the ears, they still follow the same base as the other ears! they do lay further back however
The ram one with the horns on the back of the head looked fine to me, but that's probably because the character looked a little hunched over, balancing out the imbalance you mentioned.
So yeah if you're going for an imposing character or something with good posture, you should put them more in the front.
I love that point about ears thank you!
I’ve had that problem before where it doesn’t feel right but I didn’t know what would be
This actually really really helps me!!! Thank u!!!!
4:15 I DONT KNOW WHAT ANIMAL THIS IS BUT GAIA THAT IS SO CUTE-
me with my horrible depth preception:
uh oh
The ears just make so much sense and they look good. Thank you!
I love these videos sm they're so interesting and helpful
2:36 but if the ears are on a headband it works, right?
Yes, since those ears aren’t connected to the ear cannel 😊
@@MushBunny k, thx! (Sorry for the late reply :3)
Oh I’m so excited for this one!
I appreciate these tips since I’m trying to practice more on drawing and practicality of.. animal/fantastical features on a human base. Thank you :]
This and the wings video were so useful to me, thank you for these amazing tutorials
Very interesting video BUT
4:10 - idk if you noticed, but arknights characters have both human AND animal ears! There are even some theories that use that as a significant thing after some events since it is consistent over most characters... At least all that don't have the ears covered by hair or smt.
That was not relevant to the video at all. Just a fun fact I wanted to share.
what about hybrid characters like a jackalope character
how and where do you place the antlers and where to you place the bunny ears
or like a horned griffin character. placement of the feather and horns
or for a chimera character
Usually Jackalopes have deer horns that go up so I imagine the horn is up, so It would have a space difference or height difference between the ears and horn i think?
I am so happy this video exists as it's hard to find references on human-animal anatomy for more realistic? fantasy worlds.
I needed this I’m like actually taking notes and drawing the doodles cause I have been struggling with drawing animals basically all my life
When i read manga or comics with those features i always pay attention on this, if they did just the same as always or if it's well made to be on the more "realistic" way. And one of my favorite manga with it, have the ears drawn just like this, perfect. Idk, it's more satisfactory to see it on the most realistic way than the most used one, it gives more details and make it more beautiful
Remember your artstyle can be whatever you like!! This is just tips on how to improve if you’d like and more realistic!
10/10 tips thank you soooo much, sent this to all me friends and they all agree!
I've never noticed that i usually draw horns in the frontal area/forehead! Design wise it feels so much more balanced, and I especially like when the horn kind of wraps around the head!