How do I learn to draw comics or manga?
There are many "how to draw comics and manga" books on the market. Very few of them will tell you everything you need to know. Developing this talent requires daily practice of the following six steps:
- Learn to draw.
- Master drawing in perspective.
- Draw the human figure realistically.
- Practice drawing what you’ve seen from your imagination.
- Explore various styles of cartooning.
- Learn how comics work as a visual medium.
Learn to Draw
You can’t draw anything without basic drawing skills. Drawing is a complex skill that requires developing excellent hand-eye coordination, so that you can render what you see into a reasonable facsimile on a blank page. A basic drawing book, such as Bert Dodson’s Keys to Drawing, will teach you basic skills such as matching angles, making measurements of an object or figure, using plum and level lines, composing objects out of basic shapes such as spheres and cubes, understanding light and shade, and using modeling factors to make your drawings appear three-dimensional. Alternatively, you can learn these basics from a local art school or university art program.
Practice is critical. Draw every day, at least 30 minutes a day. Carry a sketchbook with you, and draw whatever you see – people, buildings, flowers, trees. You’ll notice a dramatic improvement after just six months of daily drawing.
Master Drawing in Perspective
Perspective is an artistic device that enables artists to map collections of objects – such as people and buildings – onto a two-dimensional surface (paper) so that they appear three-dimensional. Developed during the Renaissance, this method involves imagining a horizon line on your picture, and drawing the objects in a scene as their edges recede to one or more vanishing points on this horizon.
Drawing in perspective is an essential skill for any comics or manga artists who wants to depict scenes with any semblance of realism. Jason Cheeseman-Meyer’s Vanishing Point: Perspective for Comics is a great book that will walk you through the basic types of perspective, and give you challenging assignments for mastering this time-honored technique.
Draw The Human Figure Realistically
Many comic and manga artists start by attempting to draw human beings like they see in comic books and manga – i.e., drawing straight out of their imaginations. That’s a mistake! It’s important to spend some time understanding the actual human body, and especially understanding the underlying anatomy of the human figure. Spend some time every week (if possible) drawing nude models from life or from photographs. Many local art schools and universities offer nude life modeling sessions that are open to non-students.
Your comic drawings will also feel more realistic if you understand how the mechanics of the human figure work. Do you know, for example, that if one foot is is front of the other, the weight of a standing figure is always on the back foot? Or that the shoulders and pelvis of a standing figure always tilt in opposing directions? The book Drawing The Head and Figure by Jack Hamm is a standard reference packed full of such observations.
Practice Drawing What You’ve Seen from Your Imagination
Spend some of your drawing time every day reproducing what you’ve drawn from life out of your imagination. (Some art instructors call this "drawing from memory.") This applies especially to the human figure. Your drawings of people will look much more realistic if you attempt to reproduce poses you’ve previously copied from life.
Practice various techniques for drawing the human figure from imagination – e.g., drawing the chest and pelvis as ovals, drawing them as three-dimensions solids, using gesture lines, or simply drawing the contours of the figure. Again, the Jack Hamm book is an indispensable reference on this subject.
Explore Various Styles of Cartooning
"Cartooning" is just another name for deformation, or the process of rendering the human figure and objects in larger or smaller proportions than they actually exist. Comics and manga are host to a range of different cartooning styles. As a budding artist, you should explore all the styles available to you.
Many superheros are depicted as seven-and-a-half or eight heads tall, which is slightly larger than the actual human figure. Figures in manga, by contrast, are usually depicted as much shorter – sometimes as six or even five heads tall. Super-deformed, or "chibi," characters in manga are even more cartoonish, with large heads resting on bodies barely larger than their noggins!
Deciding which style you prefer also involves deciding how much detail you wish to render. Some artists in comics and manga depict their characters very realistically – using an abundance of light and shade, and rendering all of the muscles and visible underlying bones of the human figure. Other artists, especially manga artists, prefer a more stylized rendering, usually involving just three types of shading – a light tone, a middle tone, and a dark tone.
Play around with different styles. Find which one works for you. Over time, you’ll make small changes and adjustments – until, one day, you’ve developed a style that’s uniquely yours.
Learn How Comics Work as a Visual Medium
It isn’t enough to learn how to draw. Comics are a specific type of storytelling that use a combination of words and images to weave a tale. A comics artist needs to decide on any given page how many panels to use, which camera angles to employ, and how to depict the passage of time from one panel to another. The books of Scott McCloud and Will Eisner contain most of the basic information you will need to convert your newly-developed drawing skills into stories that bewitch your readers.
Here are some tips to draw comics or manga :
1 .Create your characters : Desing a good character with unique look and style.
2. Think of a plot : most of mangas and comics based on superhero which are very interesting. so creat a plot that interesting and awesome.
3. Begin drawing your manga : Drow you manga character with only grayscale color.
4. Once you are finished make copies and give them to friends.
