Drawing the Female Body

Series Summary

Drawing and sketching refers to two-dimensional pieces of art made by marking on a surface with a variety of mediums. Drawing tools can include graphite pencils, pen and ink, colored pencils, charcoals and chalk and pastels. It is the most foundational skill an artist possesses. The practice of drawing and sketching as an art form became widely popular in 15th-century Europe when paper became generally available. The famous journal of Renaissance master Leonardo da Vinci contains hundreds of sketches, brainstorms and observations that inspire draftsmen today. Almost every form of imaginable art involves some level of drawing or sketching. In this free series of videos, a professional illustrator and graphic artist demonstrates a number of drawing techniques and shows how to draw a variety of animals, mythical figures and other features. Discover how to draw a face, a flower and devil wings. Learn how to draw anime eyes, dragons, elves and horses, all while learning about shapes and artistic vision.

Video Transcript

"Hi, I'm Jay French, from jayfrenchstudios.com.Today, I'm going to teach you how to draw the female body. The big differences between, of course drawing men and women, is that when you're working on your artist's skeleton, let's start with our head here, is that the shoulders, the big differences of the shoulders and the hips, are about the same width. In fact, the shoulders may even be narrower. Whereas, on a male figure, the hips are about only two thirds of the width of the shoulders, so now you don't have any difference in the head, until you get to the details, such as, more delicate features, more delicate jawline. Doing the rib cage on a female figure, you probably wouldn't start, you want to start a little smaller and get bigger, and get smaller again, as opposed to on a male figure, you'll actually start at, almost just do a half circle. You really will start in the middle of the circle, for the chest barrel, and you notice I've done it as if it's cut at an angle. This is a good basic shape for a rib cage, by the way. Now, on a female figure, of course you're going to come out to the hips. Hips are also lower on a female figure. The shoulders are going to be narrower, sharper. This is a definition of the collar bone. Now, from the collarbone, which is essentially, we've got the body twisted slightly, so the collarbone is essentially in the center. We have it a little off to the side, because of the twist of the body, so you can kind of imagine, a middle line down the center of the rib cage here, and the collarbone, the dip in the collarbone, being right in the center, there. From there you point outward, and you get the approximate center point, forward of the breasts. Now, at an angle like this, you'll want to show some definition, to the edge of the rib cage. You may smooth out the outer part of the rib cage, where you can see it at the back. You want to still show some definition in deltoids, even if you're not drawing a muscular figure, a muscular woman, an athletic woman. You still want to show some bulge to the deltoids, because they are present. It's a large prominent muscle. There's more curve to the inside, of the forearm. Pretty much, you just have a tube shape, for the upper arm. Of course, you want more delicate fingers and legs, always a trick. To get a more feminine look, you can cross your legs. Thighs on a female figure, very much descend in size. There's a male figure. While they do descend, they don't descend as dramatically. You don't want to put as much definition into a kneecap on a female figure, and you definitely want to get the curves of the calves. That is a strong point of female beauty. There you have your basics, in how to draw the female figure."