How to Draw an Elephant

Video Transcript

"Hi. I'm Jay French from Jay French from Jay French Studios dot com. And I'm going to teach you how to draw an elephant. Of course you could do a cartoony elephant is going to be much simpler. But we're going to show you the basics of drawing a realistic elephant. You kind of want to get your egg shape for a head. And we're going to come at a kind of a profile shot. And another thing, is that we are doing an African elephant. An Indian elephant looks very different. They have much more dropped ears. They're smaller. The backs of an elephant, because of their size, are always bowed downward. You can have basically the mass of the body, and you can think of it as a sort of curved oval, is a good way to start. And the head of an elephant's very complicated. Or will throw you off, because it's not just a big round thing like you'd think it would be. From this angle, we got a nice oval start, but when you get to the face we want to get a lot more precise. I'm getting the edge of the ear in here. Again, here's where we can tell it's an African elephant, because they have much larger spread out ears. We're only going to see the edge of this one. And one of the main things about the face of an elephant is that it's shape is something of an hour glass. You have a bulb of a forehead. It indents, comes back out, where the eyes are. So from the, on this side we'll just have a shadow. On the outer edge we'll actually see that shape. Eyes are very small and proportionate. Of course one of the most prominent features of an elephant, and this is where you start to see it, is the wrinkles. The looseness of the skin. And you'll see it right around the eyes very prominently. From this angle we can't see the other eye. Get a few across the forehead usually. Now we've got tusks on this guy. Because again, he's an African elephant. And also in this angle we're not going to be able to see the mouth very well. It's very difficult to see. You basically they have to have their trunks raised in order to see an elephant's mouth. The photo source I'm using has his trunk curled under, which actually is a little easier if you want to start there. That's a, a good, a good shot to use, because it's a simpler beginning. Learn how to draw the basics first. This is where the, the wrinkles on an elephant are, are the strongest is on their, across the nose. And we're going just get them real basic here. You see a little bit of that other tusk. So remember that hour glass shape. And then you have the, the nose extending from that. And from there, here's where the cartoony really differs from realism. They're legs are not nearly as stout as you think they are. Or as cartoons lead you to believe they are. And, but like any four legged animal the front legs are fairly straight and long. The back legs with a little more curvature to them. And there you have a basic lesson in how to draw an elephant."