Hello, welcome to this new tutorial where I will show you my method for drawing chibis, how I color them, and how I create poses using constructions based on circles and curves.

 

Chibi: The chibi is a drawing style in which characters are drawn small, cute, and adorable. They have caricatured proportions; often they don't have fingers and their hands are represented by mittens. When they do have hands and fingers, these resemble the proportions of a baby, being plump and round.

Chibis often don't have feet. Their legs end in a kind of hoof or they can also have "stumps" in a "V" / "U" shape, like a ballerina's shoes.

Different Proportions

 

You are not obliged to follow the rules of the chibi style. There are several ways to draw them; you can draw hands or feet, give them big eyes, a nose, a neck or not. Your only limit is your imagination. You will quickly succeed in developing your own chibi style by testing different combinations.

 

Regarding proportions, they can be calculated in heads.

 

For example, on the first chibi, its body is half a head tall. Adding the head, we have proportions of one and a half heads for this chibi

The second one has a body that is one head tall. The proportions are two heads for this chibi

The third one has a body that is two heads tall. The proportions are three heads for this chibi.

The fourth one has a body that is three heads tall. The proportions are 4 heads for this chibi.

 

The more heads your character has, the more complex it will be and the closer it will get to a realistic rendering.

 

When I draw chibis, I often draw a circle for the head, on which I draw a cross to then place the elements of its face like the eyes, nose, and mouth.

 

Then, I draw a tube for the neck. You are not obliged to draw a neck; the first chibi doesn't have one.

 

Next, I draw an oval shape like a potato for the body.

On top of this, I will place circles at the shoulder and hip joints on which the arms and legs will rest, which I will represent with lines.

For the hands, I make mittens, and for the feet, lines. But as mentioned previously, you can choose not to draw feet or hands, or on the contrary, make them more realistic by drawing toes and fingers.

 

 

Once the constructions are done, I move on to the sketch on a new layer. On this, my character will take shape. You can make many lines; don't worry if your sketch looks messy, it's a draft that can be erased later when we move to line art.

 

You may have noticed, but the first one doesn't have a nose. Chibis regularly don't have noses, but I personally prefer to draw one for them.

 

The more heads your chibi has, the more complex and detailed the drawing will be.

Fingers are rounder, and I don't draw the joints in detail; you can take inspiration from toddlers' or babies' hands to draw them.

 

Between the two-head chibi and the four-head chibi, the face is less squashed; there is more space to spread out the facial elements on the latter than on the former.

 

It's up to you to choose which proportions you prefer. Personally, my chibi style is somewhere between the second and third.

On a new layer, I move on to inking.

For my inking, I use a slightly textured brush, and I like to create thick and thin lines (pleins et déliés) in my strokes.

 

Thick and thin lines are different line weights in drawing; they help make your drawing more lively and dynamic. To do this, you need to thicken your lines in certain places to make them heavier. Often where two lines meet.

 

Line thickness also helps to give depth and a sense of distance in a drawing. Elements in the foreground will be thicker and more accentuated than a more distant object, which will have lighter lines.

 

When you have finished your inking, you can hide or delete the sketch layer.

Next, I move on to flat colors (base colors). For my flat colors, I put one color per layer, which will allow me to work on each color more easily later.

I always start with a fairly light color for my flat color; the rendering will be much darker once the shadows are applied.

All that's left is to apply the shadows and highlights to each flat color. Further down in the tutorial, I'll detail my coloring method and the tools I use.

 

For coloring, you can do very basic colorings with a single shadow area, leave it as flat colors, or on the contrary, do a very detailed coloring with multiple shadows or even go for painting.

 

For my colorings, I use between three and four different shadows and a warm light.

Drawing Tips

Here's a small, simple sub-tutorial to learn how to draw a head from the front, three-quarter, and profile views.

 

For the front-facing head, I draw a circle on which I will place a cross. This cross will allow me to easily position the facial features.

 

I base the shape of my head on this circle; the top of the skull will be more rounded. Where the cheeks meet, I create an indentation and then form a bulging semicircle.

 

Once the base of the face is done, I place my eyes on the horizontal line, aligning them on each side of the vertical line, and use it as a guide for the mouth.

 

All that remains is to add details like hair and color.

 

For hair, avoid making a multitude of lines; create clumps and then you can add a few unique strokes to represent small rebellious hairs. Don't hesitate to be flexible with your strokes.

For a three-quarter face, I start with a circle on which I place my cross slightly off-center to the left. If your face is turned to the right, the cross will be on the other side.

 

I use this as a guide to place the cheek and the ear.

Remember that the base of an ear is placed on the same line as the tip of the nose, and the top of the ear is on the eye line.

Even though a chibi is a distortion and caricature of a character, basic proportions still help to correctly place certain elements of the face and body.

 

Then I place the eyes, mouth, and finish with the details and coloring.

For the profile, I draw a construction based on circles, ovals, and potato shapes :p

 

I use these constructions to sketch the character. For a chibi, you don't need to draw the lips or the chin; you can simplify your drawing to make it cuter.

 

Remember that the base of the fingers, in normal proportion, reaches the middle of the thigh, so you can base yourself on these basic proportions to correctly place body elements like the arms.

Here are some examples for drawing different arms and legs.

The first one resembles mittens and small boots; I only draw the thumb, and the rest is solid.

In the second, we have small stumps, no detail for fingers or toes.

In the third, I make big arms and feet as if the character had hooves.

And the last one has realistic arms and legs.

If you want to place the ears correctly, you can draw a line from the eyes for the top of the ear and from the nose for the bottom of the ear.

For the fingertips, when the arms are placed along the body, you can position them at mid-thigh.

You can also use trapezoids and geometric shapes to draw chibis according to their gender.

For masculine characters, the base of the shoulders is wider than the hips, and for feminine characters, it will be the opposite.

 

But if you prefer to make unisex chibis, a circle works for both.

For expressions, if you're stuck for ideas. You can base your facial expressions on the emojis found in your apps. They are a good starting point for creating very expressive characters.

Coloring and Pose Construction

In this part of the tutorial, I will show you my method for creating dynamic poses, and also my coloring method with the tools and brushes used. To create dynamic poses, I often start by drawing a curve, on which I place the limbs. Don't hesitate to make your characters' arms and legs move and not keep them in line with the body (don't do like me in the examples XD).

Then I create the basic construction of the body.

The head with a circle, the neck with a tube, the torso with a potato or a trapezoid, the pelvis with a second inverted trapezoid. I place the shoulder, elbow, hip, and knee joints with a circle and connect the limbs with lines.

The more intense and pronounced the curve, the more dynamic your character's pose will be.

I make a first sketch based on the construction by drawing the nude chibi, and then I add details on a second one. I will base my line art on the second sketch.

I do my line art on a new layer, over the sketch layer, which I will lower the opacity of for better visibility of the lines.

 

I use a slightly textured brush in black. On this line art, I will create thick and thin lines (pleins et déliés).

 

Pen 1 brush characteristics:

brush size 1.11

Antialiasing: the second option

Stabilization: 60

 

Once the line art is done, I will hide or delete the sketch to only have the line art visible.

I lay down my flat colors, each color on a separate layer. The line art layer is placed on top of all colors.

Having a different layer for each color will allow me to work on the shadows independently of each other.

 

Some people do everything by painting, but personally, I like to organize my coloring step by step.

We start with the chibis' skin. As you can see, there are two different shadows.

 

To work on shadows, I put a new layer on top of the skin's flat color, and I set this layer as a clipping mask on the previous layer. This is the small icon in your layer window that looks like two superimposed gray squares with dots. (image shown below in the pink rectangle) I always work the same way when coloring, regardless of the colors used.

As you can see for the shadows, I use a slightly darker shade than the flat color; I use two for the skin. One is closer to the flat color but slightly darker, and the second shadow is much darker for contrast, and sometimes I add a small bluish shadow under the hair.

I place the shadows under the hair, skirts, under the neck, inside the ear, as well as under the nose when there is one, and under the eye.

 

If you have trouble seeing the tool's characteristics, you can right-click and open the image in a new tab.

 

I use the G Pen

Tool characteristics: brush size 8.58

Antialiasing: the fourth option

Stabilization 56

 

After applying my shadows, I blend everything with the blending tool. It looks like two small drops.

 

Tool characteristics:

Size: 23.87

Color Stretch: 37

Hardness: 2

Brush Density: 51

 

The shadow layer is above the flat color, and I check the clipping mask on the layer below. (logo in the pink box on the right)

With the skin done, I move on to the hair. Here, I added the color of the pants for the second and fourth chibis on the same layer, so I will work on these shadows simultaneously.

After applying my shadows, I move on to lighting. To do this, I create a new layer above my flat color and above the shadow layer, which I set as a clipping mask. (small symbol in the blue square)

The layer should be in Glow Density mode; this mode will create a vibrant and bright light.

I place my light area on the left, make small strokes with the G Pen and a pink color, and then I give it a light spray with the airbrush and the same color.

 

Tool characteristics:

 

G Pen:

Tool characteristics: brush size 8.58

Antialiasing: the fourth option

Stabilization 56

 

Shadow Airbrush:

Brush size: 100

Blending mode: normal

Hardness: 1

Brush Density: 30

Continuous spraying: checked

 

Next, I move on to the character's clothes. I use two shadows: a first one closer to the flat color, and a much darker one for contrast.

I start by using a G Pen to apply my shadows; with the light source on the left, I place the shadows on the right and in areas where there are folds.

Then, I soften everything with the blending tool.

 

G Pen:

Tool characteristics: brush size 8.58

Antialiasing: the fourth option

Stabilization 56

 

Tool characteristics:

Size: 23.87

Color Stretch: 37

Hardness: 2

Brush Density: 51

 

And finally, I add the light on a new layer in clipping mask mode over the flat color and shadow layers, and I set the layer to Glow Density mode.

 

I use a pinkish color and draw touches with the G Pen, and then with the shadow, I intensify the color on the left with the airbrush.

G Pen:

Tool characteristics: brush size 8.58

Antialiasing: the fourth option

Stabilization 56

 

Shadow Airbrush:

Brush size: 100

Blending mode: normal

Hardness: 1

Brush Density: 30

Continuous spraying: checked

 

Here is the result obtained after coloring all my flat colors. I also added a bluish shadow for the eyes, and above the line art layer, I made a white circle that I softened with the blending tool to create the eye's reflection.

 

 

Also, don't hesitate to colorize your line art to maintain continuity in your coloring. To do this, simply place a new layer as a clipping mask over your line art layer and colorize your line art with the colors you want.

 

Personally, I find my colors very saturated, so I will use a correction mask and play with brightness and contrast.

To access correction layers, go to Layer - New Correction Layer and choose your correction layer. Play with the settings until you achieve the desired result.

 

For my illustration, I softened the colors I found too saturated.

 

Boy Examples

 

 

I will show you a step-by-step process, this time with boy chibis. I will detail it less than the one above.

 

I start by creating a stick figure structure to get an idea of the poses.

Next, I create the structure using geometric shapes and sticks, which I will use as a base for the sketch.

Based on the structure, I create a sketch. Don't worry if your sketch is messy and full of lines. Line art will be done over it.

I create line art above the sketch. In my line art, I make different line weights, which are called thick and thin lines (pleins et déliés).

 

Then I apply the flat colors, one color per layer, and I will work on each color and shadow independently.

I work on the shadows and highlights, colorize my line art, and add the light in the eyes, and our illustration is finished.

Animals

You don't necessarily have to stick to human chibis; it also works with animals. To create animal chibis, you simply need to maintain the exaggerated and caricatured proportion ratio, just like for humans. Give them large heads, eyes that take up a lot of space on the face, and a small body will be enough to make animal chibis.

 

 

You can make them realistic or keep the animal head and anthropomorphize the body, dress them, and make them stand upright.

For my examples, I decided to keep the original body and not give them human characteristics.

 

 

I drew a cat, a deer or doe, a bee, and a Shiba Inu.

 

As with human chibis, the creation process is the same.

I create my various constructions

I base the sketch on the constructions.

Next, I move on to the line art

I lay down my flat colors, one color per layer

And I apply the shadows and highlights to my flat colors. Then I play with the contrasts, colorize the line art, and our animal chibis are finished.

 

 

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial, that it gave you some tips or even inspiration to create your own chibis. Happy creating and thank you for following this tutorial.