How to Draw a Simple Dog

Video Transcript

"Hi I'm Joel Hickerson from grindog.com and we're going to draw a simple dog. To start on our simple dog lets turn our sketch pad sideways because it's a little bit longer than it is tall. We'll start with some basic geometric elements like a lips for the main part of our dog. Then the head, now the head isn't connected on most dogs so we're going to separate the head. Maybe make a little circle for the main part of the head, another circle for the mussel, and another circle still for the nose. Two circles for the eyes and maybe some more circles for the ears. Connect the head to the body, two simple lines. Dogs have four legs, one, two, three, four and a tail. Now we'll thicken up the legs and we're going to put the first leg behind the body, the second leg in front of the body, the third leg behind the body, and the fourth leg in front of the body. In the bottom of his feet will be more ellipses. That's the start of our dog. Now, what we're drawing right now is pencil lines which are considered or called construction line work. So, what these lines are are basically just a guide so you want to draw them light because when you come back to do your finished lines with your marker you're going to have to go back and erase your construction lines. So, you want to keep them light so they're easier to erase. OK? So, we'll draw our dogs nose. The eyes, if you make the dog kind of looking over towards us which means you move the eyeballs to the outside of the circle, it gives it a little more interest. Then, the ears. Finish off with a round head and he can even have a little tongue because I don't think I've ever seen a dog, a happy dog anyway, without the tongue sticking out of his mouth. Connect the head to the body and you can whittle away on the body if you don't want a really fat doggy. Tail. Now, we're coming down to the legs. The first leg is going to be behind the dog so we cut across that leg. Second leg's in front of the body so we bring that one to the foreground. That's kind of a real simplified perspective. Again, the third leg will be behind the dog, fourth leg in front. Give the dog a little collar and you can even exaggerate the name tag and write any name you want in there. This is where you come in, grab your eraser, and you erase the lines that you don't need. If you drew them light enough they should come off relatively easily. The best eraser that I like to use for this is a wide eraser, usually a Stadler Mars makes a great one. You can also use art gum erasers which are also good for this type of work. Once you get the eraser lines taken off you can go back and see what details you'd like to fill in. Maybe you want to put put toes or you want to do some ear lines or maybe you want to do some spots on the dog. That's how you draw a simple dog."