Start by drawing your circle large so you have room to draw the features. Otherwise, your lines may get messy and it could be hard to draw correctly.
Your measurements do not need to be precise. If you don’t have a ruler, estimate the distance with the end of your pencil instead.
If you’re drawing a female character, place the mark at a distance equal to ⅓ of the circle’s diameter since female anime and manga characters tend to have rounder faces.
Female anime and manga characters tend to have rounder faces and pointier chins than male characters. Use curved lines rather than angled ones if you plan on drawing a female character. Characters that are older usually have taller, narrower faces than younger characters. Curve the lines more when you’re drawing the jawline.
Younger manga or anime characters will have narrow necks since they aren’t as muscular or defined. When you’re drawing a young boy or girl character, make the necklines closer to the chin than the sides of the jaw. Hold your drawing out in front of you to see if the neck looks too long or short while you’re drawing it. Erase or extend the lines further depending on how it looks to you.
Look at your ears or pictures of real ears to get an idea of what they look like. Ears can be various shapes, so choose whatever looks best on your character.
You can also draw a long straight or curved line extending up toward the eye line if you want to make your character’s nose more defined.
Anime or manga characters have a variety of different eye shapes, so check your favorites to get ideas on how to draw the eyes on your character. Practice drawing different eye expressions if you want your character to have a particular emotion. For example, an angry character may have narrower eyes and a surprised character will have their eyes wide open.
Anime and manga eyebrows can be many shapes, like triangles or even circles. Angle the eyebrows more if you want to make your character more expressive. For example, if the eyebrows are angled down toward the nose, then your character will look angry, but if you angle them down toward the ears, they’ll look sad or scared.
Look at different mouths and expressions for anime characters online to see how to make different expressions. If you want to draw your character smiling with an open mouth, you do not need to draw every individual tooth. Only draw the line between the top and bottom teeth to separate them.
If you drew your guidelines too dark, then they may not fully erase off of the paper. Use a thin eraser to get in detailed areas, like the eyes or ears.
Anime or manga hair is usually broken up into clumps that end in a point. Look at the hairstyles of various characters to get ideas of how to style your character’s hair.
You don’t have to add any additional details to your character if you don’t want to.
Be careful not to make your shadows too dark or else they will look too harsh and be difficult to erase. If you want to improve your drawing skills, find a good teacher. Do a lot of sketching. Read about drawing. [16] X Research source Try to develop an artist’s eye.
