How I learned to draw anime faces in 30 days ( + XP-PEN GIVEAWAY )
Summary
TLDRIn this engaging video, the artist embarks on a 30-day challenge to master anime art, sharing insights on facial structures, proportions, and avoiding the Uncanny Valley effect. With the support of XP pen's tablet, the artist explores the balance between visual appeal and structural accuracy in anime drawing. The video also features a giveaway, inviting viewers to participate in a 'draw this in your style' challenge for a chance to win an XP pen tablet.
Takeaways
- 😀 The speaker admits that drawing anime is harder than it seems and decides to challenge themselves by practicing more.
- 🎨 The video includes a sponsored segment for XP pen, who provided a 22-inch screen tablet for review and a giveaway.
- 🖌️ The speaker shares their first impressions of the XP pen tablet, highlighting its spacious screen, sleek design, and anti-glare matte film.
- 🔍 The importance of understanding anime facial structure and proportions is emphasized, with the speaker detailing their learning process.
- 📚 The speaker used Pinterest and art station to gather references of appealing anime faces for study.
- 📝 The process of tracing over anime faces to understand proportions and then redrawing them was part of the study strategy.
- 🤔 The speaker encountered the Uncanny Valley effect in their initial attempts and sought advice from a friend with experience in anime art.
- 👁️ The advice received emphasized the importance of facial feature placement for visual appeal over strict anatomical accuracy.
- 🎭 The speaker learned to think in terms of 2D shapes rather than 3D structure for anime art to avoid overworking the piece.
- 🎨 The video concludes with the speaker successfully completing anime pieces, applying the knowledge and techniques learned.
- 🎁 The video ends with a giveaway announcement for an XP pen tablet and a smaller screenless tablet, with details on how to enter.
Q & A
What was the main challenge the artist faced when trying to draw anime?
-The main challenge the artist faced was understanding the structure of anime faces, the proportions, and how to avoid giving their drawings the Uncanny Valley effect.
What did the artist decide to do to improve their anime drawing skills?
-The artist decided to challenge themselves by doing more anime drawings and studying the style, focusing on facial structure, proportions, and painting techniques to finish anime paintings.
What advice did the artist's friend, who specializes in anime art, provide?
-The friend advised focusing on visual appeal first and justifying it with structure later, keeping the face flat to avoid the Uncanny Valley effect, and making proportional adjustments specific to anime style.
What tool did the artist use to gather references for their anime studies?
-The artist used Pinterest and ArtStation to put together a reference board of appealing anime faces they wanted to replicate.
How did the artist approach the initial study of anime facial structure?
-The artist started by tracing over references to map out basic forms and noticing particularities about proportions, then tried to redraw realistic people into anime characters based on references.
What was the issue with the artist's first attempt at an anime painting?
-The issue was that the painting had the Uncanny Valley effect and the artist didn't know how to paint anime noses correctly, leading to an overworked and unsatisfactory result.
What is the significance of the anti-glare matte film on the XP-Pen tablet mentioned in the script?
-The anti-glare matte film is significant because it helps in seeing the colors and values accurately without the interference of external light sources, which is beneficial for digital artists.
How did the artist change their approach after receiving advice from their friend?
-The artist started thinking in terms of 2D shapes rather than 3D structure, focusing on visual appeal and exaggerating facial features and proportions as seen in anime.
What was the character chosen for the artist's final successful anime piece?
-The character chosen was Black Swan, inspired by a cool cutscene and her interaction with a creature called unto death.
What giveaway was mentioned at the end of the script, and how can one enter?
-A tablet giveaway was mentioned, including an XP-Pen 22 plus and a Deco LW. To enter, participants need to draw a specific character in any pose and lighting, using a provided hashtag and tagging the artist, with a deadline of August 31st.
What criteria will the artist use to judge the giveaway entries?
-The artist will judge the entries based on creativity, acting, and overall visual appeal.
Outlines
🎨 Artistic Growth: Embracing Anime Drawing Challenges
The speaker begins by acknowledging the difficulty of anime drawing and their decision to challenge themselves by practicing it over 30 days. They share their journey from not knowing how to draw proper anime faces to completing anime paintings. The speaker also discusses the support from XP pen, who provided a tablet for review and a giveaway opportunity. The review highlights the tablet's features, such as its spacious screen, sleek design, and anti-glare matte film, which the speaker appreciates for its eye comfort and color accuracy. The speaker's goal is to understand the style, study the key differences, and avoid the Uncanny Valley effect in anime art, with advice from a friend who specializes in anime.
📚 Learning Curve: Overcoming Anime Art Obstacles
The speaker describes their process of learning anime art, starting with creating a reference board of appealing anime faces and studying the structure and proportions of anime characters. They discuss the initial struggle with creating an anime painting, which led to the realization of the importance of understanding the 2D nature of anime art over the 3D structure. The speaker emphasizes the advice from their friend Kuno, who highlighted the priority of visual appeal in anime over strict anatomical accuracy. They also touch on the flexibility of anime facial features and the influence of expressions on the overall look of the character.
🎭 Creative Evolution: Refining Anime Art Techniques
Building on the advice received, the speaker focuses on visual appeal and the 2D aspects of anime art, learning to exaggerate shapes and features while maintaining a balance between structure and style. They discuss the importance of studying exaggerated expressions and the flow of shapes in anime, as well as the need to expand their visual library of anime styles. The speaker also shares their experience with using Clip Studio for the first time, noting its stroke smoothing feature, and their approach to completing anime pieces by applying the knowledge gained from their studies.
🎁 Community Engagement: Anime Art Giveaway and Challenge
The speaker concludes the video script by announcing a tablet giveaway sponsored by XP pen, including both a 22-inch screen tablet and a smaller screenless model called The Deco LW. They invite viewers to participate in a 'Draw This In Your Style' challenge, encouraging creativity and unique interpretations of a provided character. The challenge has a deadline of August 31st, with the speaker promising to select and feature top entries on their social media, awarding the winners with the sponsored tablets based on creativity, acting, and visual appeal.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Anime
💡Uncanny Valley
💡Proportions
💡Facial Structure
💡Study
💡Visual Appeal
💡2D and 3D Thinking
💡Expression
💡Gesture
💡XP Pen
💡Giveaway
Highlights
The challenge of learning to draw anime and the creator's initial struggle with it.
A 30-day commitment to improve anime drawing skills and the learning process involved.
Sponsorship and review of XP pen's 22in screen tablet for digital art.
The importance of tablet size and screen texture for digital artists.
Advantages of the anti-glare matte film on the XP pen tablet for better color visibility.
The significance of pressure sensitivity in digital drawing tablets for brush accuracy.
The creator's personal journey from realism to stylized anime art.
Misunderstandings about the simplicity of anime art and the need to unlearn certain artistic rules.
The strategy of using references and studies to understand anime facial structures.
The trial and error process of creating an anime painting and learning from failures.
Advice from a friend with extensive anime drawing experience on facial feature placement.
The concept of prioritizing visual appeal over strict anatomical structure in anime art.
Insights on the flexibility of anime facial expressions and their impact on character design.
The distinction between 2D and 3D thinking in art and its application to anime.
Proportional adjustments and the typical features of anime characters.
The approach to avoid the Uncanny Valley effect in anime drawings.
The creator's realization and shift from 3D structural thinking to 2D shape language.
The process of gathering references and sketching for a successful anime piece.
Incorporating experimental colors and balancing visual weight in the final anime artwork.
Using Clip Studio's stroke smoothening feature for clean line art.
The completion of the first successful anime piece and the lessons learned.
The announcement of a tablet giveaway and the 'Draw This In Your Style' challenge.
Criteria for judging the challenge entries based on creativity, acting, and visual appeal.
Transcripts
do your anime drawings look like this or
this first of
all that couldn't possibly be
[Music]
me okay fine fine you got me I'll admit
it anime is a lot harder than it seems
which is why I decided to challenge
myself by doing more of it and from
barely knowing how to draw proper anime
faces to being able to finish anime
paintings like these by the end of the
30 days here's everything I've learned
including how I went about studying the
style the key differences I've learned
from those studies along with some
perspective shifting advice from my
friend who specializes in anime art
[Music]
so really quickly thanks to our sponsor
today XP pen who was kind enough to send
me their 22in screen tablet and today
I'll be giving it a really honest review
really quickly and I'll also be giving
this away along with a screenless tablet
uh from them called The Deco LW at the
end of the video so definitely stick
around to the end to figure out how you
can possibly enter the win I grew up
mainly using huon because it was a
cheaper alternative but I've had my fair
share of experience using screen tablets
so I am quite curious to try XP pens
tablet for the first time and so first
impressions as someone who started
digital art with screen tablet I can
attest to the fact that size does matter
and so first impressions very spacious
it's got a big screen nice Sleek design
simple to set up the monitor feels
perfectly textured so it doesn't feel
too slippery like glass or too textured
the biggest Plus for me is the
anti-glare matte film because the first
tablet I've ever used had a highly
reflective surface which would make it
incredibly hard to actually see the
colors and values when there's external
light sources shining on the tablet and
bouncing into your eyes so what I did
was I would close the curtains to draw
in the dark which was not good for my
eyes which is why any tablet that has
this anti-glare matte film is usually a
big plus for me along with the 16,000
levels of pressure which is double of
your typical tablet which in theory
should really help in the accuracy of
your brush settings like line weight
through pen pressure or pen tilt all in
all it's a pretty solid tablet I can
feel the quality so if you're in the
market looking for a good quality screen
tablet definitely go check them out so
thanks again to XP pen for the sponsor
and back to the
video as someone who grew up watching
anime and still do to this day I really
enjoy the style because of how visually
appealing yet simple it looks and
because I mainly started learning art
through realism I assumed that if I knew
the rules rules to realism stylized art
like anime wouldn't be too hard
considering it's simplified and
exaggerated to reality if I understood
the rules then how hard could bending
them be right but upon remembering my
many failed anime attempts in the past I
knew that I could be severely
underestimating how much I actually
needed to learn this won't be easy I
mean how does this structure work do
anime faces have noses or snouts how the
[ __ ] does this make any sense I was on a
quest to find the answers to these
questions my my brain was too wired in
one way of thinking and I needed to open
my
[Music]
mind so here were the main points I
wanted to tackle number one how does the
anime facial structure work in different
angles number two what are their
proportions and number three how do I go
about painting them without giving them
The Uncanny Valley effect and like I
mentioned in my previous video about art
Improvement when you don't know how to
do something just do it rather than
wasting your time on trying to plan
everything out problems will come up
either way and just deal with them as
you go so to start I immediately went on
Pinterest and art station to put
together a reference Board of the most
appealing anime faces I could find and
the ones that I wanted to replicate I
also used some AI ref and while I don't
support AI stealing artwork to train
their systems without having the rights
we might as well use what's already out
there to our advantage as a learning
tool after all it is trained off really
good
artists once I had my reference say I
started doing studies aka the input
during these initial rounds of studies
my main focus was to better understand
the structure of anime faces so my first
inclination was to trace over and map
out the basic forms while noticing any
particularities about the proportions
and after that I tried to immediately
Implement what I learned about the forms
and proportions by trying to redraw a
realistic person based on a reference
into an anime character and I think this
is an efficient study strategy
especially because the reference does
all the hard work for you you don't need
to figure out the Expressions angles or
the pose all you need to do is to
readjust the proportions and forms to
match the anime style so I did a couple
reps of that while constantly comparing
what I was drawing with other anime ref
proportions and after doing a couple
more sets I prepared myself to make an
actual anime painting at the time
freerun was very popular so I chose her
and long story short it didn't go as
planned while at first glance it
actually looked okay and admittedly I
could have taken it to a finish if I
worked on it long enough but the longer
I worked on it the worse it got it had
exactly what I disliked about my
previous paintings which was The Uncanny
Valley effect and more importantly I
still didn't know how to paint anime
noses since working more and more on it
was making it feel well overworked
instead of pushing forward I chose to
cut my losses and went back to the
drawing board to re-evaluate because
there was something really important
that I was
missing and so it was back to the
drawing board and in my time of of need
my friend Kuno with a millennia of anime
drawing experience who literally came
straight out of the womb to draw anime
came in clutch with some advice that
really changed my perspective on things
and while I don't have time to explain
every single point he went over here are
my main takeaways besides some of the
tips I learned about proportions which I
will get into later the biggest thing is
this and what he means by facial feature
placement is kind of a meme is that the
placement of the facial features on the
face doesn't always structurally make
sense for example look at these drawings
in some the eyes are really close to the
side of the face and while anatomically
it doesn't really make sense the visual
appeal or graphic read comes first
before the structure and the structure
doesn't actually matter as much as
people think when it comes to anime it's
once we have the visual appeal then we
can justify it with structure to make
things look more sound it's a simplified
version of reality so Clarity visual
appeal and simplicity is King at its
extreme you can think of it almost like
an emoji Kuno also mentioned that anime
expressions are heavily influenced by
how the eyes sit on the head and the
anime faces can be so malleable because
there is no one right way to place the
eyes depending on the expression or
style this explains why some anime
drawings have the eyes or mouth on the
edge of the face and still get away with
it the key was to justify the graphical
shapes afterwards with a little bit of
structure to make it make sense
sometimes the Expressions can even break
the conventional structure to emphasize
the acting and because I love to
visualize Concepts into systems you can
think of it as a spectrum on one side we
have the 2D way of thinking emphasis on
visual appeal and shape language and on
the other the 3D way of thinking
emphasizes showing form and structure I
would even say that it's kind of similar
to not 10 versus kiso where one studies
purely the graphical read through light
and dark shapes while the other studies
how to show structure through the use of
light and Shadow one is not necessarily
harder than the other just different
modes of thinking now equipped with this
knowledge the reason this had The
Uncanny Valley effect was because I
tried to justify a 2d Style with a 3D
way of thinking similar to why the
reception of liveaction Pokémon or sonic
wasn't well received was because they
were using 2D Concepts as well and
forcing them to be 3D not to say that
it's completely impossible there
definitely are artists who have found a
good in between luno suggested that I
should avoid shading the face for the
most part while the rest of the body
could still be shaded now let's talk
proportions generally speaking anime
figures have incredibly long legs thin
limbs tiny rib cages whether it's male
or female and for female characters they
usually have an hourglass figure so wide
hips and a tiny rib cage now for the
head the cranium is going to be enlarged
along with their hair so make sure you
give it a lot of volume faces usually
have big eyes with cat-like proportions
between the eyes and the nose and here's
a more broad tip that kind of applies to
just drawing faces in general where you
place the ears in relation to the eyes
tell tells the viewer at what angle the
subject's head is tilted in so make sure
you're aware of that when you're drawing
faces so here are the main takeaways
focus on visual appeal and then justify
it with structure keep the face flat and
don't try to paint too much to avoid The
Uncanny Valley effect and finally the
proportional adjustments we talked about
round
two now with all this new found
knowledge I knew what I had to do stop
thinking about things in terms of 3D
structure and start thinking in terms of
2D shapes so to kick this off I
immediately went to grab some references
with exaggerated shapes and I found that
a lot of anime shots with extreme
emotions would fit this category I tried
to be as Loose as possible so a lot of
these drawings were either
proportionally off or structurally
flawed but that was the goal I had to
discipline that need to make the
structure make sense out of me it was
almost like I was a recovering League
addict every time they heard this
sound it was like an itch that I needed
to scratch every time I saw something
something that didn't make structural
sense like why I overworked Fan's face
rather than leaving it 2D and flat but
the more consciously I overcame the urge
the easier it became I was also trying
to simultaneously implement the things I
learned from the previous study for
example exaggerating the flow of shapes
the size of the cranium and adding
different kinds of hairstyles with
volume and also making a mental note on
any facial proportions or placement of
facial features that were really
surprising to me part of it was like
expanding my anime visual library on
what's acceptable to exaggerate by
taking mental notes on the small details
and another part was loosening up my
eyes and my brain to stop thinking so
structurally
[Music]
and by the end of everything with a few
more study sessions over a period of a
week I felt like I was ready to attempt
more anime pieces and apply everything
I've studied the solution seemed simple
I found the fix to The Uncanny Valley
effect solidified my understanding of
how to exaggerate facial feature
placement and proportions and also
expanded my anime visual Library by just
a little and while I could have
continued to study even further like I
mentioned in my previous video it was
really important that I balanced out my
input the studies I was doing with my
output actually applying what I studied
it was a challenge that I was pretty
confident that I could handle and now
for the last step the final boss was the
[Music]
execution so I chose the character Black
Swan here after after seeing a really
cool cuts scene along with her fighting
this creature called unto death and as
always Gathering reference is the first
step this time I separated my references
into a few categories the characters
themselves to reference their design
details Expressions interesting pose
angles I could explore anime shape
language that I found cool and a ton of
color SL mood reference I had been
seeing a lot of art from Twitter lately
that had a lot of experimental colors
and I really wanted to test the waters
with that and see what I could make this
piece in particular was a huge
inspiration for me and so after
Gathering the references I started
sketching and while for other finished
pieces I usually sketch a bunch of
thumbnails before I choose the path I
want to take I decided to only go with
the first idea cuz I wasn't trying to
make this a portfolio piece or anything
it was just uh a fun experimental piece
I also made a 3D reference later to help
me figure out the structure of the body
and the pose and to those who are
curious how I did it I made a really
simple tutorial from start to finish on
how I did this in this video at this
time anyway I not only wanted to
practice anime but also add other
challenges outside of my comfort zone
for example using very experimental
colors like I mentioned earlier by
playing with saturation and different
Hues adding two different characters
with equally as strong visual weight and
learning to balance the two focal points
and focusing on the flow of gesture to
guide the viewer's eyes and in the end
to wrap everything together I cleaned up
the line art by using clip studio for
the first time because I was told that
clip Studio had a very nice stroke
smoothening feature helping your lines
feel more clean and less bumped I didn't
want to overwork it like the last time
and I felt like I've already practiced
what I came to practice and so I called
it a
day and so I finished my first
successful anime piece and in the
remaining time that I had of the 30 days
I was also able to complete two more
anime pieces and I kind of reverted back
to my old ways with this one when all I
had to do was not paint the face but
that's something I can always work on
while I definitely can't say that I've
mastered the anime style and I still
have a lot to learn I was able to get a
taste of what I could potentially be
capable of and that not only excited me
but also made me look forward to
creating even more awesome pieces in the
future this learning experience over the
period of 30 days was another piece of
the puzzle to understanding visual
appeal and another skill unlocked in my
mental library to potentially use in the
future for problem solving I didn't
really want to get into the specifics of
the process like how I went from Gray
scale to color or for example balancing
foreground versus background elements
just because I wanted to keep this video
short and to the point but for those who
are curious I'll be posting my full
speed pain process without commentary on
my Gum Road for free another thing is
that I feel like in the previous video I
was a little vague at times about the
advice I gave in terms of art
Improvement and so I hope that I was
actually able to show you guys how I
might put what I talked about into
practice here wait wait hold on I I lied
I realized after I recorded that that
actually gumroad requires the price to
be at least $1 if the file size is
bigger than a certain size um so the
speed paints will actually be up for $1
unfortunately
[Music]
thanks for sticking around to the end of
the video or if you skipped here that's
fine too like I mentioned in the
beginning there is going to be a tablet
giveaway it's going to be this tablet
along with the Deco LW which is like a
smaller screenless tablet that XP pen
was kind enough to offer to add to the
giveaway and because I already have a
tablet that I've been using for quite
some time now that I'm more used to I
thought I'd just give it away to someone
else who might need it and so to enter
the challenge all you need to do is to
draw this character in any pose with any
lighting that you choose it's going to
be a draw this in your style challenge
use this hashtag and make sure you tag
me in the post and the deadline will be
on August 31st I'll be choosing my top
five favorite pieces and I'll enter them
into a random generator like kind of a
raffle and two of those five people will
either win the XP pen 22 plus or The
Deco LW but I'll also be posting any
cool ones that I see on my story I'll
mostly be judging off of creativity
acting and overall visual appeal like I
talked about in this video so definitely
try to have fun with it you can have her
interacting with an animal or eating
some food uh either way good luck and
have fun
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