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Morpheus306 β€” How I sketch Homer

Published: 2011-06-27 05:45:52 +0000 UTC; Views: 13093; Favourites: 212; Downloads: 142
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Description This was a quick tutorial on how I go about making my sketches when I was on The Simpsons, or for any drawing. One thing I always tell people is to not worry about the end result, focus on the pose and the story you're trying to tell. Every pose has a story, weather simple or complex. The way a person stands can tell you a lot about that character, but this has more to do with character design than just drawing bodies. I added a pic so you can see my process.
1. When drawing a body I always start with a line of action, it's a guide that will help you flush out that perfect pose. Of course you also want to think about what emotion you want your character to have, and the line of action will express that. Oh and I almost never go with my first sketch, I always make several sketches until I find the right one.
2. From there I start roughly sketching out the torso, arms, legs, etc. Nothing detailed just yet, I want to get the right feeling for the pose before I start adding details. *notice how I pushed the 2nd pose to get more emotion.
3. When I'm happy with the way the body feels I'll add hands, feet etc. For me the hands and feet are an extension of the arms and legs, all flowing together. Remember bodies need to have fluidity. I also start to fix model problems like proportions and what not.
4. Still sketchy I start adding face details because I might want to change the body a little if I see the face. I also start to "commit" to my lines, meaning making them more refine rather than just quick strokes. This makes the drawing for solid, but notice how I'm still sketchy. Oh and always draw through your forms, example: Homer's sleeves and body, I draw the whole circle not just where I think it should go. *The lines on the floor is a little trick I use to help my characters feel grounded, or like they're actually standing on something. It's just a quick 2 point perspective and with it I can make any changes to make him feel like he's standing.*

Normally this would be the last part of my job because we don't clean up the drawings, but from here you can take some tracing paper and clean up the drawing. You can see in my clean up that I had to adjust his model because his body was looking a little to big. That's basically it in a nut shell. This is how I make any drawing, weather simpsons or not. Everyone works differently so just keep practicing and you'll find something that works for you.
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Comments: 19

Mailmetothemoon [2018-07-04 07:07:14 +0000 UTC]

Now this is helpful!

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Gulliver63 [2017-05-31 21:54:11 +0000 UTC]

I really love these as I do more and more on the Bamboo. It looks like you have a definite system with your line colors. And his head really does look like a person's thumb - you really see that in drawing number 2.

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Venomrabbit [2015-07-06 11:15:21 +0000 UTC]

Certainly looks very helpful but for some reason I still have a fair bit of trouble with posing and such.

Or drawing in general really.

It's like that feeling you might get when you can tell something's off but no idea why or how to fix it? I might just be hopeless.

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jpox [2013-11-14 04:34:54 +0000 UTC]

very nice demonstration!

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CatsTuxedo [2011-09-05 18:42:15 +0000 UTC]

It's a pity that your drawings for the Simpsons characters couldn't be as lively as your regular stuff. Animated sitcoms have a way of not applying classic cartoon principles like that.

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Morpheus306 In reply to CatsTuxedo [2011-09-06 00:07:15 +0000 UTC]

Yeah I agree, but one thing I learned while on the show was that it wasn't about the flair of the visuals, it was all about the writing. Because it's a sitcom our drawings had to backup the witty dialogue and situations. Also, because the show had been on for so long there was a science to drawing the characters that everyone followed. We weren't allowed to do anything with the characters other than what they told us ie. squashing or stretching the forms. Go look at work, he was on the show with me. Thanks for all the comments!

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CatsTuxedo In reply to Morpheus306 [2011-09-06 04:12:32 +0000 UTC]

No prob.
That kinda thing is the reason I generally don't like animated sitcoms (along with a lot of other animated shows these days); that method of pretty much tracing off model sheets goes against the whole point of animation and its principles, that is to create entertaining but functional character acting and movement that is otherwise impossible in any other medium. I feel that as long as you can recognize the character, they'll always be "on-model". However, that shouldn't be interpreted as "draw sloppy", hence the importance of the exaggeration and other classic cartoon principles that you apply to the rest of your gallery; cartoon drawings should have life and energy while still having a sense of weight and power to them. Sure, tracing model sheets is easy, but you might as well be doing the show in live-action that way.

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Morpheus306 In reply to CatsTuxedo [2011-09-07 05:40:56 +0000 UTC]

I agree with you 100%. One thing I learned though is that the big wigs don't see it like that. All they see is this $$$$ so they don't care what it looks like, as long as it makes money. But I do love the old Simpson eps, and not just because of the models. The early writing has always been brilliant. Until people find a way to blend good animation with good writing AND make money, this is what we have.

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Lupy-the-Rabbit In reply to Morpheus306 [2012-10-11 23:13:43 +0000 UTC]

The Simpsons actually seemed a bit more animated in the earlier seasons. How did it get so stiff?

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Adultanimationman [2011-08-11 16:46:29 +0000 UTC]

Homer had witnessed the horror of there being no donuts at the all you can eat donuts restaurant.

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mariobros123 [2011-07-15 23:22:21 +0000 UTC]

cool, i'd like to draw homer simpson as good you do

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Mokuu [2011-06-30 23:05:47 +0000 UTC]

Hey man, big question for you -

How do you apply this technique to two characters interacting?

Do you need to have both of em flow into each other- Action line wise?

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Morpheus306 In reply to Mokuu [2011-07-01 01:07:00 +0000 UTC]

Wow very good question, with multiple characters each one will have it's own line of action. But the trick is to use them in a convincing way to tell a story.
If you're talking about two characters that are physically touching each other then yes, one solid flow would be needed. I'll do a drawing to show what I mean. Your goal is to guide the viewers eyes to what you want them to see. But be careful, you don't want your picture to get too jumbled. Great question!

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teddybearbones [2011-06-29 07:18:02 +0000 UTC]

Nom. Delicious thought process

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JoshawaFrost [2011-06-27 23:04:34 +0000 UTC]

This is great!! Thanks for this!!

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nasakii [2011-06-27 14:16:21 +0000 UTC]

Great info. I love seeing other people's processes.

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CartumanBrasil [2011-06-27 13:32:38 +0000 UTC]

ThankΒ΄s for sharing your process with us!

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chaosangel424 [2011-06-27 10:52:09 +0000 UTC]

cool, how do you get ride of the framing lines

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Morpheus306 In reply to chaosangel424 [2011-06-27 14:12:39 +0000 UTC]

Well I did this in Photoshop so it's as easy as doing the dark lines on another layer or just knocking out the color lines. But if this was on paper I would simply do the final lines on another piece of paper. That way there's no mess.

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