How To Draw A Female Body

In this tutorial, I will teach you how to draw the female body from a 3/4 view. A lot of tutorials tend to show how to draw the female body from a full frontal view. While it is still useful, a 3/4 view will make your drawing look less flat and rigid. It brings a level of depth and three-dimensionality to the drawing which would explain why it is the most common drawing view used by concept artists. This easy to follow, step by step tutorial will guide you through the whole process of creating an impressive rendition of the female body. We will start drawing by a dummy, that will serve as a base over which we will draw our final sketch.
So, how to draw the female body?
If you want to draw the female body, you should follow these simple 7 steps:
• Step 1: Drawing the torso
• Step 2: Drawing the hips
• Step 3: Drawing the arms
• Step 4: Drawing the legs
• Step 5: Drawing the head
• Step 6: Drawing the final line art on top of the dummy
• Step 7: Detailing

Step 1: Drawing the Torso

We will start our drawing of the female body from the torso. I like starting my drawings with the torso as this is the part that will dictate the position of the body of the character. With the torso in place, the rest of the body will go in easily. We will draw the torso using curved and straight lines. A curve line is drawn in the bottom of the torso to separate the space between the abdomen and the ribcage.
The slightly higher part of the curve will mark the end of the breastbone and the lower chest. On top of the torso, we will also draw another curve line to define where the neck of our character will be situated. From the base of the neck to the curve line representing the end of the lower chest measure one head of distance.
Once we have gotten the outline of the torso, we will divide it with a vertical line extending from the base of the neck to the lower chest line. We are drawing the female body from a 3/4 view so one side of the drawing will be slightly hidden from the viewer's perspective which means the torso will have different sizes. The viewer's right view of the character being the closer side will be bigger than the further left. Since we are drawing a girl, I will draw two ellipses on each side of the torso to give an outline of the breasts.

Step 2: Drawing the Hips

The next part of the female body we will draw is the hips. I will draw the hips and crotch area to look like the girl is wearing some type of female underwear. We will then join the hips by drawing the abdominal area to leave some space between the two parts. Remember the vertical line we drew from the base of the neck to lower chest line while drawing the torso? We will simply extend that line to the crotch to bring a sense to three-dimensionality to the drawing.

Step 3: Drawing the Arms

With our torso and hips in place, we can then proceed to draw the limbs starting with the arms. I like to draw the arms starting from the shoulders which are usually represented as inverted egg-shaped spheres. The top part will slightly flatter while the inverted pointy end will go into the biceps. This shape is similar to the triangular deltoid muscles, giving the drawing a more realistic body line.
• The biceps and triceps
Because of the pose of the girl, the right arm is almost fully hidden behind the body with just a small part of the arm left in view. The left arm is however in full view. Since the left arm is nearer in the viewer's perspective, it will also be considerably bigger than the farther right arm. The biceps and triceps will be drawn as tubes for each arm. The tubes will gradually decrease in width towards the bottom as you get to the elbow.
• The Forearms
The left forearm is in full view while the right forearm is slightly concealed behind the hips. However, there is still enough forearm in view. We will just draw a tube to represent each forearm. The wider end of the tubes will be connected to the elbows which will be placed at the same height as the floating ribs. The narrower end will be joined to the wrist which will be aligned with the crotch.
• The hands
The right hand is not visible behind the hips so we will focus on drawing the back of the left hand which is in view. We will use simple geometric shapes to get the outline of our character's hand. We will draw a big irregular five-sided polygon for the back of the hand while the fingers will be drawn as small rectangles.

Step 4: Drawing the Legs

With the arms out of the way, we will proceed to draw the other set of limbs on the female body – the legs that is.
• The thighs
Just like the biceps and triceps, we will use massive tubes, about 2 to 3 times bigger than those of the biceps to draw the thighs. The tube will connect with the hips at the wider end and with the knees at the narrower end. Regarding the length of the thighs, the distance between the crotch and the knees will measure 2 heads.
• The knee
The demarcation at the joints will be indicated by ellipses on both knees.
• The lower leg
The lower leg, referring to the part between the knee and the ankle is made up of the calf and the shin. Because of the girl's pose, we will draw a full frontal view of the left leg and only a 3/4 view of the right leg. There are two distinctive shapes on the lower legs forming the exterior and interior sides. The exterior will have a very short curve line on top and a longer curve line descending to the feet. For the interior side, we will draw one curve line on top of another with the curve line below descending to the feet.
• The feet
We will draw the feet using geometric shapes like trapezoids. I decided to draw the toes as our girl will not be wearing any footwear. I will use very small circles and rectangles to represent the toes.

Step 5: Drawing the Head

The next chapter on our journey will be to give our character a head. First of all, we will draw a sphere to represent the cranium and the face. The sphere will be slightly flattened at the bottom to define the jawline. The head will rest on a neck which we will represent with an isosceles trapezoid. The neck will connect the head to the rest of the body. Next, we will draw two horizontal curve lines across the sphere.
The upper curve will define the placement of the eyebrows while the lower curve will define where the mouth will be placed. The upper curve will also define where the ear will be placed on the left side of the head as the right side is completely hidden from the viewer's perspective due to the 3/4 angle. Then we will go across the face with two vertical lines, the line to the left will define the placement of the nose.

Step 6: Drawing the Final Line art on Top of the Dummy

Now that we are done with our dummy, it is time to draw the female body following the base structure. With the proportions of the dummy, drawing the body will be very easy. However, before we start drawing on the dummy, we will need to erase some part of the dummy. If you do not erase out certain parts, you will have the dummy interfering with your drawing.
If you are drawing on paper with a pencil, you can use a kneaded eraser to partially erase the mummy's sketch. You can check out my Recommended Art Supplies for the kneaded eraser I use when working.
• The face
There are two vertical lines on the dummy's head, the vertical line on the left, right under the first horizontal curve line is where the nose will be drawn. The eyes will be drawn on the first horizontal curve line while the mouth will be at the intersection of the second horizontal line and the left vertical line. We will draw the eyes as two curves representing the upper eyelids with a circle inside for the pupil. Because of the 3/4 angle of the drawing, the eyes will not be of the same size. The left eye which is closer to the viewer will be drawn wider than the right eye which is farther. For more information on how to draw a human face( male or female ), feel free to check our tutorial "How to draw a face. Drawing the Male and Female Head".
• The hands
The hands of our girl not fully open or extended so drawing the hands shouldn't be difficult. The right hand is out of view so we will only focus on the left hand which is within view. Ensure that the knuckle bone is accurately aligned with the center of the finger. Remember that knuckles should always be drawn on top of the fingers. The knuckles are the joints in the fingers that enable the fingers to move, so if you want a realistic drawing, start by making your knuckles look realistic.
• The feet
The feet are placed almost frontally so we have a good view of all the toes. Drawing the toes is actually quite simple. We will draw the toes of our girl using small circles and rectangles. Start from the big toe till you get to the last toe. Remember to pay attention to the length of the toes, making sure that each successive toe is shorter and smaller than the previous toe.
• Clothing
Next, we will draw the outline of our girls underwear. We will draw a curve line just a little above the crotch to make it appear as if the girl is wearing underwear. Then on the torso, we will draw two straps and connect them to the outline of the breast to make it appear as if the girl is in a sports bra.

Step 7: Detailing

One piece of advice I like to give beginner artist learning to draw the human body is to avoid fully drawing the muscles. The primary essence of detailing is to make your drawing look as realistic as possible. Do not fully draw the lines separating muscle groups, make the detailing as subtle as possible. Just erase the interfering lines from the dummy and you have your drawing completed and ready.

Conclusion
We have come to the end of our step by step tutorial on how to draw the female body, I hope you will find this guide very useful whenever you are working on one of your drawings. You can go ahead and practice on your own, practice it as many times as you like. If you follow the guidelines strictly, you could draw a female body like the one illustrated here or even better. You can check out my Drawing Tutorials if you want to see more cool tutorials about drawing a wide array of characters.

In case you are interested in learning how to draw the male body you can check the step by step tutorial clicking here.

Writer: Eseandre

Drawings: Toni Justamante Jacobs. Toni is the creator and owner of improveyourdrawings.com. if you are interested in knowing more about him and his work, feel free to check the "About This Blog" section.

Summary

How to Draw the Female Body. Learn to Draw a Girl

Article Name

How to Draw the Female Body. Learn to Draw a Girl

Description

• Step 1: Drawing the torso • Step 2: Drawing the hips • Step 3: Drawing the arms • Step 4: Drawing the legs • Step 5: Drawing the head • Step 6: Drawing the final line art on top of the dummy • Step 7: Detailing

Author

Writer: eseandre Artist: Toni justamante Jacobs

Publisher Name

Improve Your Drawings

Publisher Logo

Improve Your Drawings

Toni Justamante Jacobs

About the author: Hi, I'm Toni Justamante Jacobs. I´m a professional Concept Artist and Illustrator with more than 10 years of experience in the industry. Some of my clients are Gameloft, Fantasy Flight Games, Kunlun Games and Games Workshop. Currently, I´m working at Socialpoint as an in-house Senior Concept Artist.