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Description
A mini tutorial for my friend SladinForever. He posted up a journal asking for help on drawing canines from the front.

The post I made on his journal:

Okay. I have to admit. I haven't drawn dogs from the front, like EVER.

So I took up your journal as a challenge. I tried my hand at sketching the front views of dogs. These are all of my sketches.

What I've learned:

Google is your friend
References are a great way of learning. Take a reference, make a quick thumbnail sketch. Don't take too long or focus on the details. Get a general feel of the anatomy. You can spend time on details later.

Triangles are your friends.
The chests of dogs have a gentle curve - and it seems very triangular in shape. If you look at mine, I drew out a sort of 'triangle' on each of the canines' chests. The helped me visualize the skeleton of the dog- drawing out the chest let me envision how to take the next step and draw out the legs.

Dobermen look weird
All dogs come in different shapes and sizes - their chests can be either really wide or fairly narrow, almost like a cats. I didn't choose wolves as a reference for all of the images just to show that that's not the ONLY type of canine you should be drawing. The more shapes you have in your allocated drawing memory, the more hollistic of an artist you are and the easier you can pull out information from your environment rather than simply being on autopilot (makes sense?). And oh man, let me tell you. The anatomy of a doberman... it's so weird. But, by drawing it, I let myself explore canine anatomy further.

Take your time in learning~

All of the drawings, except for the last, I drew out of reference. The most bottom drawing I drew just a solid hour of sketching/practicing off of references. So there, that's one of my first canines I ever drew from the front.... by myself c:

I hope this helps.. even if just a little bit. Good luck!

Description
A mini tutorial for my friend SladinForever. He posted up a journal asking for help on drawing canines from the front.

The post I made on his journal:

Okay. I have to admit. I haven't drawn dogs from the front, like EVER.

So I took up your journal as a challenge. I tried my hand at sketching the front views of dogs. These are all of my sketches.

What I've learned:

Google is your friend
References are a great way of learning. Take a reference, make a quick thumbnail sketch. Don't take too long or focus on the details. Get a general feel of the anatomy. You can spend time on details later.

Triangles are your friends.
The chests of dogs have a gentle curve - and it seems very triangular in shape. If you look at mine, I drew out a sort of 'triangle' on each of the canines' chests. The helped me visualize the skeleton of the dog- drawing out the chest let me envision how to take the next step and draw out the legs.

Dobermen look weird
All dogs come in different shapes and sizes - their chests can be either really wide or fairly narrow, almost like a cats. I didn't choose wolves as a reference for all of the images just to show that that's not the ONLY type of canine you should be drawing. The more shapes you have in your allocated drawing memory, the more hollistic of an artist you are and the easier you can pull out information from your environment rather than simply being on autopilot (makes sense?). And oh man, let me tell you. The anatomy of a doberman... it's so weird. But, by drawing it, I let myself explore canine anatomy further.

Take your time in learning~

All of the drawings, except for the last, I drew out of reference. The most bottom drawing I drew just a solid hour of sketching/practicing off of references. So there, that's one of my first canines I ever drew from the front.... by myself c:

I hope this helps.. even if just a little bit. Good luck!