Figure Drawing Methods for Artists

Learn over 130 simple methods for quickly rendering the human form.

When we try to draw a person, we typically confront various challenges: The proportions need to be correct, the attitude must be clear and vivid, and the face should show resemblance and be expressive. Doing this takes courage.

Yet with a little practice and training, you can quickly learn to draw figures in a wide variety of styles with just a few key characteristic strokes. Figure Drawing Methods for Artists shows both beginners and experienced artists to do just that.

The various sketching methods are divided into 12 general approaches, including:

• Shrink—quickly draw miniature figures to develop a sense for proportions and an eye for posture
• Outline—create simple, concise figures from three-dimensional entities
• Join together—consider the limbs on a figure as reduced singular shapes that are combined into many variations
• Fill in—use common geometric shapes to serve as outside shapes into which a figure is fit
• Bandage—using circular, swinging movements, wrap lines around a body to show its shape

At the center of this collection is not the perfect figure, but the joy of drawing, and how, with simple methods, drawing people is possible. By reducing your work to a few lines and using clear contours and simple surfaces, the human figure emerges, constructed and elaborated.