NOTE: ALL ART SHOWCASED IS MINE.
This is one of the most frequently asked questions I receive. So, to those of you wondering, "Hey Gem! How do I make my characters consistent or make them look like they are balanced, instead of wonky?" this first Lesson is for you.
Well! Do I have a story to tell. When I was a freshly budding blossom of an artist (well, I am still sorta tryna blossom), my proportions were all over the place! But what are proportions? They are the "length of something, relative to something else, used to help artists accurately draw things". Even people other than artists use proportions, but for the sake of this lesson, we are focusing on us drawers.
To help you get started, look at yourself in the mirror, or look at your hand. How many feet tall are you, or how many inches long is your hand? These types of measurement are hard to immediately find, without a ruler, and it is equally hard to translate that onto drawing paper, which is much smaller than you. So think of it this way. How many HEADS tall are you? An average person measure 5 to 6 heads tall.
"Wait a minute," you say. "You're an anime artist. Aren't your characters shorter than that?"
You have been paying attention! However, anime and realism are different in too many ways to count. This exercise is just to help you see yourself as a subject or proportion as well. We will be doing anime, but right now this is a demonstration. For example, your hand may be, from your finger tips to your wrist, 2 fingers long, or, from the side of your thumb to the side of your pinky, almost the same width.
However, anime is much different. Children are usually 3-4 heads, teenagers 4 1/2-5 heads, and adults are usually 5 heads. Of course, in between styles, it can vary, and heights in anime may be different between artists. For example, a little girl may be the same height as a teenager in one anime, but in another, that same character may be as short as a toddler! Proportions are important, and you must learn them, but once you know them you'll learn to grow more reliant on heights in relations to your other cast members. Proportions won't become as big a point, but the way you use them will.
To use the "heads" method, see the example below.
Example 1.1
In this example, measure the top of the character's head to the feet (they are just below the visible ending of the drawing). How many heads tall is she?
Yes! She is 5 heads tall. Did you notice that the second head encases her neck to the bottom of her chest, the third head encased her torso, and the fourth head encased her waist and thighs? Lastly, the fifth head was the remainder of her legs: calves to the feet.
I used Goldicat, my FNAF animatronic character, as an example because of the clear joint differences and sockets. Some other proportion hints include: the wrists, when resting, will be level with the upper thigh; elbows will rest near the hips; and shoulders, to look "real", must be longer than the head.
However, sometimes, proportions can get tricky. A character may be bending, or she or he may be covered in clothes or thick fur. For help on this, see the below example.
Example 1.2
Here, the character is bending. She is also holding a sword, wearing clothes, and has fur. This may hinder your measuring when you first get started, but it is actually quite easy. How many heads tall is she?
Correct! She is
4 heads tall. The second head encases her neck and chest. The third head encases her waist and lower legs, and the last encases the remainder of her legs.
As you may have noticed, measuring Oceania proved to be a bit confusing. Her shorts are hiked high up on her rump, so you may have been tempted to measure her shorts with it. In fact, the shorts are also halved into both the waist and legs. Sometimes, a character may be uneven in terms of heads measuring, and when they bend it may make your measuring inaccurate. However, this is not math: there are be many right answers, as long as you are somewhat close to the ideal one.
How about faces?
Example 1.3
This is a young girl, so her face is wider and shorter than an adult's. How many eyes long is her face?
Yes! Her face is
3 eyes long and
2 1/2 to 2 3/4 eyes across!
Shii, a character in CoWR, is a young girl around the ages of 9 or 10. Her face, therefore, is much shorter than her fellow cast members, Anwil, and Aomidori.
Example 1.4
Snowyl Aomidori is a young woman. How many eyes across and long is her face?
Righty-o! Her face is
4 eyes long and
3 1/2 eyes wide.
Since Aomidori is a woman, her face will be longer and her features smaller, except the nose. Now that you are getting a hang of it, let's do a few more, of males. The last one is bit more complicated, which is a little preview of consistent proportions!
Example 1.5- 1.6
These two characters, Bale and Finn, are KnightStar's characters. They are males, so they will have slightly different proportions How many eyes tall and long are their faces?
Yup! Bale's older-looking face is
4 1/2-5 eyes long, and
3 1/2-4 eyes wide! Finn, on the other hand, has a face that is youthful and is therefore
3 to 4 eyes long and 3 eyes wide! Also, his face is viewed from the front, but the proportions are not very different from a 3/4.
Anwil Quar is a young man, yet his proportions are different from a woman's. How many eyes long and wide is his face? Since this is a side view, your answer will be different from a front or 3/4 view.
Amazing! You are right, his face is
3 1/2 to 4 eyes wide and 3 1/2 to 4 eyes long!
Yay! You're doing great. While Anwil's proportions weren't all that different from Aomidori's, I usually draw his face longer. And now, what about turnabouts? Proportions are very helpful here. A turnabout is when you draw a character from many different angles while keeping the proportions. This is how characters stay looking the same!
Example 1.7
This character's turnabout sketch keeps in proportion. How many heads tall and eyes wide/long is she and her face?
Yeah! While some may vary to keep a certain look, most of these faces are 4 eyes long and 3 eyes wide! As for the body, she is 4 1/2 heads tall.
As you can see, this sketch deals with side views, front views, 3/4 views, and back views. This was drawn in a different style, a common one I see, so I thought making it of my Assassination Classroom OC Akira would help. Many people use this style and many people may find it helpful! My style, is, in fact, a lot different from this.
Thanks a lot for reading.
What would you like the next lesson to be on?
PRACTICE PROBLEMS
How many heads high, or eyes long/wide, are each of these characters?
(Some may need both measurements.)
1)
Oceania (Skyrim OC)
2)
Bleach characters.
3)
FNAF characters.
(BTW this is my official style.)
