This is the first in a series of three tutorials on how to draw figures simply. In this first video
I'm going to show you how to work out the basic proportions of an adult and a small child. Okay,
I'm not going to draw any of the face in detail, because I've done that in previous videos. Now to
draw an adult we need to take measurements from the head and I'm going to take three measurements
one, two, three. Now that is going to be where the pelvis is, so I'm just going to block this
in very, very, very simply and put the neck about here. We've got a little line here. That's going to
be about where the chest is, the waist would be and then we get the hips sort of shape okay. Down
to that sort of size there. Let's just draw this in very, very, loosely to start with. Now if I now take
this measurement down to here, that is where the feet will be, and half the distance between here
and here will be where the knees are. So I take half that distance approximately there, that is
where the knees will be. That is half way and it's eight times the size of the figure. So we're just
blocking the legs, just bring the shape down here. And if we round that off slightly and that in
round there and we'll bring a little shape to the the legs here, and the feet at the bottom. All I'm
going do very, very, simply just draw a series of circles, getting smaller, just to give the suggestion
of feet outside this one. We'll just bring the foot out slightly to the side. If you put your
arm next to your body, you'll find that your elbow comes down to your waist . So if we bring down the
shape down to this and the top part of the arm from the shoulder to the elbow, is exactly the
same as from the elbow to the wrist. So turn that measurement there, so that's how long the arm will
be. Here, there and then obviously you've got a hand from there. So we'll do the same on the other
side come down, down to the where the elbow would be., bring that out slightly and so, we now have the
basic shape of the figure in proportion. I'll just go over this very briefly again. I'm not
gonna do anything with the head. I'm just going to leave that as it is, but we'll just curve this off
a little bit here. Just bring a line, little lines in here and I'm sure will be about here. Bring this
in slightly curve around. I'll give this person a sense of speedos or something, very trendy. Bring
the arm in here, curve it out, it curves around in slightly else like around down for the arm and
the same thing with the legs bring the curve down just to give bring this line in slightly. Slight
curve out here and as you can see. We're beginning to get the basic shape of the figure. And you have a
figure now that looks in proportion. Don't make the feet too small, remember feet are approximately
same size of the head. This one we're just suggest that. Now, if you are drawing a younger person
you simply change the proportions. So, for example, say you've got a small boy and he's say this size.
So we start off again with an oval shape, but this time we take one, two, down to this point. So
it's two, rather than three. So again I'll just do this very, very quickly, now because you know
basically how this works. An angle here, a little out and in. That now is the height, bring that down
there. That's where the feet will be, halfway is where knees would be. So again the same thing applies. We
bring the legs down to a section here, just round those off a little bit, bring this out to here
and again the same thing applies. Elbows down to waist again, take that measurement, so that the same
thing again, that about here. Hands down there and again you can see now you have a smaller person.
As you can see, a small person again perfectly in proportion, same proportion, but as you can see
here, the head determines the size. Here the body, the body is twice the size of the head. Here,
on the adults three times the size of the head. I hope you enjoyed this our tutorial and if you've
got any ideas for topics I can cover in the future for you, please get in touch. Also, if you want to
see the very latest Paul Priestley art tutorials don't forget to subscribe to this channel. Cheers