In the basic’s section previously there was no area on how to draw men. This is mainly because when drawing my own characters I was never very good at drawing guys. it’s a little different when I have pictures of already created characters to draw from, but as time has pasted in the year my site has been up I’ve tired my hardest to study up and practice drawing men. I’ve gotten books on it, gathered lots of reference materials so hopefully I am now ready to offer you all a half way decent tutorial on the male figure.

              Here we have an outline for a male figure. Male bodies are so hard for me to draw because they are so long and don’t have much in the way of curves. With broad shoulders and small waists (and in the case of some younger men in some anime shows the waists are very, very tiny) I just have trouble with getting the look I want. I also have problems with making the legs to thick and shapely. The guys I draw, or used to draw, would look more like Goku from DBZ rather then what I want like a Spike from Cowboy Bebop. Now there is nothing wrong with Goku, I really do love him but if you have seen both of those shows ever you’ll know they look nothing alike and you could easily see my problem.

Anyways, lets get back to the topic at hand, lol.

              The picture you see just to the side is actually an outline of Vive. I wanted to use Xan in this tutorial but when I did this outline it made me think more of Vive then Xan but it will do for the purposes of what I need. As you can see I drew on graph paper and I have learned to love using it. Because most of my drawings go through a computer coloring process I don’t have to worry about the lines in the end product and if you do the same with your pictures, I highly recommend using graph paper, it allows you to line things up and keeps stuff even.

             As you can see this male figure is nearly 8 head lengths tall. A head length is a measurement used in most all realistic style drawings when it comes to people. The shoulder on a man should be two head lengths, and on a women it should be two head widths. This is important to note: Length is from the top of the head to the chin and width is from ear to ear. If you draw a women with man shoulders she will look like an Amazon, lol.

             As you move down the body the second head length should reach the nipple and the fourth should line up with the crotch. As you can see neither of these things sink up. This is because you should trust your eyes and your gut when it comes to drawing your own anime. Often times as I have found in pictures from shows and stuff, the measurements don’t’ sink up there either because people drawn realistically kind of look like they have long bodies and short legs, lol. I’d say most anime characters, Manga characters are included, have shorter bodies and longer legs. (which is how I tend to draw my characters anyways) So do you best when and use your own personal style when coming up with the height and proportions.

            The difference between Vive and Xan is Vive is taller and more slender with less muscular definition. Xan is a shorter and his body is a little more blucky because he has more muscle. Besides physically Xan is younger so he would be shoulder anyways. Vive is around 8 head lengths tall and Xan comes to 7 or just a tiny bit over 7. Above you can see the naked, or near naked, outline of Xan. Next to this is a clothed finished version of Xan. Isn’t he cute ^_^ lol.

            To the right you can see something of the same thing for Vive. Yes, he isn’t wearing shoes, lol. Vive is older, around mid to late 20’s where as Xan is around 17 to 19. Also another way to mix up the looks of your characters is by simply changing different skin tones and fashion styles. Vive is something of a Goth and I’m thinking a vampire (since I’m doing a tutorial on vampire characters) and Xan is something out of an adventure video game kind of thing. Anyways, once more I am getting off topic.

              As a male character gets older their waist tends to widen as do there shoulders. Eventually when they get really old the shoulders generally start to slope and as male, and females both do, bodies start to shrink. But to clear the water from my rambling lets get shit out in the open. There are three basic male body types:

Muscular: (I.e. Goku type body) This is what is known as a heroic body type.

Normal: Normal is an average every day body type. (Like Jet Black from “Cowboy Bebop” )

Slim/Lean: This type tends to be used most often used, at least I think. (Sesshomaru from Inuyasha and Spike From “Cowboy Bebop” are two examples) This is known as an “anit-hero” body type which is the most popular now a days. These types are normally lean but very strong in a martial arts way.

              The reason why I haven’t given a real step by step account on how to draw a man is because the information I have provided, and the first picture I provided should be just enough information for you to try out your own character. If you haven’t looked through all my tutorials here are the steps you shoulder fallow (or could, its what I use anyways) when drawing.

                Start out with a circle or oval for the head. Next draw out a line that will run down the center of the body, this can double as the spine. It helps often times to, too draw in an oval for the rib cage. The ribs should end around where the elbow is when the arm is slack at the side. Next plot out all the major joints with smaller circles such as the shoulders, elbows, hips and knees. Draw lines to form the “bones” between the joints. In the little picture to the left is a small example of a thumbnail sketch of what I’m talking about. I normally do this with all my pictures, specially when doing a group picture.

              I really hope I explained everything well enough to actually be helpful. I’m sure I’ll add an update to this in the feature as I get better with drawing men myself so in away we’ll all be learning together.