Last week's article showed you how to make realistic people. This week I will teach you how to make realistic/cartoonish animals.
Dogs
First of all draw the head. It should be sort of like an upside-down head only fatter and not a pointy end. Draw lines going downward on the head to look like fur.
For the ears, it depends on the type of dog. If it's a husky, the ears should be pointed. If it's a bichon, the ears should be droopy. To draw droopy ears, make an oval like shape on each side of the head. It should be situated near the top of the head. For pointy ears, draw a rounded triangle shape on either side of the head.
Next comes the eyes. The eyes should be kind of droopy. Have you never heard of puppy dog eyes? To make it look like the eyes are droopy, make sort of two oval shapes slightly higher than the middle of the face. For the pupil draw a circle in the middle of the eye and draw another smaller circle inside the pupil to make it look like light is hitting the eye.
For the nose, draw it about 1 mm from the bottom. For the shape of the nose, draw a mushroom shape and color it in.
The mouth is basically just a line coming down from the nose. If you want the tongue sticking out, just draw the shape of a tongue at the end of the mouth.
I'm sorry I can't show you how to draw a body for dogs. I am not very good at it so if I showed all of you how to draw a body, it would most likely turn out lopsided.
For shading in, look up a picture of the type of dog you are drawing on google, then shade in the markings. For example, let's say your drawing a husky. There should be markings that look like eyebrows and a marking down the face.
Cats
Start out with a slightly oval head. You can do the same thing you did for the dog head, and add lines going down the outline of the head to show fur.
For ears, draw rounded triangles at the top of the head.
There are different ways to draw eyes. If the cat is sleeping, draw the eyes as a half circle near the center of the face. It should be the bottom half of a circle. If the cat is awake, draw the eyes not circular, but slightly slanted. To get more of an idea look at the examples.
For the nose, draw a "T" shape near the bottom of the head. Add dots on either side of the nose, then draw whiskers.
For the body, it depends what your cat is doing. If it is laying down then make a long oval below the head. It should be fairly bigger then the head because it is going to be the body. In the oval, draw a line that is supposed to be the tail, then two other things that are meant to be paws. Again, to get a better idea, look at my examples. If the cat is sitting up, draw an oval shape going up and down, NOT side to side. Inside the oval, draw two smaller ovals on each side for front paws. Don't connect the top though. Look at my examples. For the back paws, draw two half ovals coming out at the bottom on either side. The tail can come out of the back of the body.
To make it look like the cat is really fluffy, draw lots of lines at the side of the face. For coloring, you can add stripes or anything.
This week there will be a quiz! I am going to draw a little cartoon cat. The person who comes up with the best name wins any design I have made in Akbar's Face Mall! Y-mail me your ideas! The winner will be announced next week!
So that's all for this week! Next week might be birds . . . or maybe not . . . It is gonna be a surprise!
-ocean10kv
Author's Note: These tips may not work for all types of cats and dogs.
