'Simple' Animal Figure Drawing Tips?

Hi! The figure drawing tutorial on this site that broke down human figure drawing into consistent steps (1- draw line of action, 2 - add head, ribcage, pelvis circles, 3 - use lines/dots to add in limbs) really helped me.

When I try to apply these same ideas to animal figure drawing though, I'm struggling a lot more. I think in particular I'm struggling with the line of action step - partly because the motion/poses of animals feel like they lend themselves more to s-curves than c-curves and I've been told specifically to avoid s-curves for the human lines of action. Then I struggle a bit because the spine feels harder to define for animals and less expressive of their overall poses when I try to use that as a base for a line of action.

I'm sure some of this struggle is a matter of practice and it will get easier to see these things the more I actually do it, but I just wanted to ask: for folks who do animal gesture drawing, when starting out doing timed sketches, did you typically follow the same basic steps as you do for human figure drawing, or do you break things down differently? Anyone have a good breakdown/lesson they can link me to?

(also, sorry if someone has already asked this here and I missed it!)

When I draw animals, I think it's helpful to follow the spine/tail as a basic guide, followed by the head and ribcage (and pelvis)... limbs and other features last. Sometimes the spine is in more of an S curve, sometimes it's more of a C curve. I wouldn't worry too much about following any strict rules. Focus instead on getting the gesture information down on the page in a direct manner. Break it down as needed. After all, what's an "S" curve", but two separate C curves combined? I hear you saying that it's hard to follow the spine but I do think the principle stays more or less the same between human and other animal anatomy. Keep in mind that not all photos will have a strong action to them. Some photos feel awkward or are a difficult angle and that's ok. Just do your best!

A couple of books helped me. For drawing animals specifically, I'm been loving the book "How to Draw Animals" by Jack Hamm. He will give you several blueprints to work from and show you how to block in the basic shapes. A more general figure drawing/ gesture approach that helped me was Force Drawing by Mike Mattesi. I think what that one helped with was gaining confidence in my mark making and also with how to start "feeling" the gesture as opposed to just drawing it. You're drawing a living breathing creature. Try to imagine bringing that to life on the page.

I'm sure others will chime in too... but honestly, a lot of it just comes down to practice. With time and effort, I think you'll start to get the feel of it. :)

[img]https://imgur.com/a/lIJg8B9[/img]Gesture drawing Example

Finally, I made a quick example using some images I found of Toothless from How to Train your Dragon. Sometimes it's easier to see a gesture in someone else's art (note: these are not my images!). With Toothless's super long tail, though, I think it's easy to get a feel for the line of action. For these, what I wanted to do was to show you how I might approach these. The idea is to get as much information possible using just a few strokes. Again, I tend to start with the head or spine and kind of work from there.

I also stuck an example there of how you might get an 'S' curve using two 'C' curves. You can sort of "chain" them together as needed.

Hope that helps a bit!

I often just look for big clean 2-D forms to start with and go from there. I mean, "animals" is quite a wide field anyways, there is a big difference between a bug and a fish, a flying bird and a sitting bird, a snake and all types of mammals, so it is hard to formulate a general method of approaching them all.

At least with vertrebrates having an idea where skull, chest and hip are is still helpful, just as in drawing human figures, and the spine is still the tension, that holds this masses together.

Great question and you're definitely not alone in finding animal gesture drawing trickier than human figures at first. Animals bring so much variety in anatomy and movement that it's natural to feel a bit lost when trying to apply the same step-by-step breakdown as with humans.

What helped me was shifting my mindset from “copying anatomy” to “capturing energy.” With human figures, the line of action often follows a simpler arc (like a C-curve), but with animals especially in dynamic poses S-curves are not only common, they’re often the best way to express movement. So don’t be afraid to embrace them! As others have mentioned, an S-curve is just two C-curves, and breaking it down like that can make it feel more manageable.

When I’m doing quick timed sketches, I still start with the line of action, but I let it flow through the whole body from head to tail imagining where the weight is shifting. For example, drawing a cat mid-pounce, I’ll exaggerate the curve of the spine and let that guide where the limbs will go. I still place the head, ribcage, and pelvis like you would with humans, but sometimes those shapes shift or squash based on the motion, so I stay flexible. Thinking in 3D space, even if you’re sketching in 2D, really helps maintain volume.

One resource that’s been unexpectedly helpful for me is observing miniature animal sculptures. There's a great collection of hand-painted ceramic animals at Camp Hollow that I use as desk references. They're stylized, but the forms are simplified in a way that makes it easier to see how weight, gesture, and personality come through even in still poses. Plus, having a few at hand is like having little pose mannequins for inspiration.

It also really helped to pause and sketch from videos instead of still images getting a sense of the motion before freezing a frame gave me more insight into the gesture behind the pose.

Keep going with it! Animal gesture drawing can be incredibly rewarding once you start to feel the rhythm of different species.