Hey all! This is a quick tutorial on how I draw hands and the practices I’ve done to improve quickly.

I’m not going to go over the basics like the shape of the palm or that the fingers are cylinders because you’ve probably heard that a million times and know that already. This post will be about practical exercises on how I improved with examples. This is probably for people are in between beginner and intermediate but there are some beginner friendly tips!

 

Below is a link to my YouTube video if you want to watch:

Practice Technique #1 - Chunking

Out of all the learning techniques out there that I’ve tried, there are 2 techniques that I attribute to how I improved the fastest.

 

For the first technique instead of starting off drawing the entire hand, what I practice is something called Chunking.

 

Chunking: a way of dealing with or remembering information by separating it into small groups or chunks

 

This is a learning technique where you break up something into smaller parts, learn those smaller parts, and then put them together as a whole. It is primarily used in academic settings but to apply this to hands, you simply divide up the hand and practice each part.

 

 

There’s a lot of research done about this method and why it works but essentially how I see it is that drawing individual parts is less overwhelming than drawing it all at once, especially when you’re just starting out. This also makes it easier to help you determine what parts you struggle with instead of drawing something and seeing it looks off but not knowing what to fix (For example, when I draw an entire hand, I struggle with the thumb the most, so in my warmups I draw thumbs the most).

Practice Technique #2 - Blind Contour

Blind contour drawing is a technique I recommend everyone does before starting any drawing. Blind contour drawing is drawing a reference without looking at it. Yes you heard that right! Drawing without looking at what you are drawing helps you improve.

 

When you do this, as you trace your eyes over our reference, try to observe every shape, line, curve. I think the idea is that because the left side of your brain wants to look and make corrections, because you’re not allowing yourself to do that, it gives up and your right artistic brain takes over

 

Generally speaking, the left side of the brain tends to control many aspects of language and logic, while the right side tends to handle spatial information and visual comprehension

 

 

If you’ve never done this before, trust me you are going to hate it but just 15 minutes of this before you start helps your observational skills so much. And I know it’s going to be hard but remember to not look at what you’re drawing until you’re done.

 

These are supposed to look ridiculous but every time I do this as a warm up I find my art turns out 10 times better because I’m in a mode of observation I wasn’t in before. 

Finding hand references

The Clip Studio Asset Store has tons of hand references you can download.

 

There are assets with pre-posed hand positions, hand brushes, pre-drawn hand templates and more! The asset you use will depend on what you are doing:

 

3D posable hands: If you want to draw a specific hand pose from different or several angles, 3D pre-posed hands are perfect for that.

Also great if you want to change the position of a finger or two. The settings make it easy to open and close fingers or position them how you want.

Pre-drawn hand templates & hand brushes: Great to use for webtoon and comics, will save you lots of time!

Other great places for references: ArtStation, Pinterest, Line of Action, Taking pictures if your own hands.

 

Now that we have our references we can start putting everything together!

Example 1 - Drawing the hands

First some quick general hand proportion rules:

 

1 - When looking at the back of the hand, from the knuckles to the tip of fingers and to the wrist is the same length.

2 - From the palm side, since the knuckles aren’t visible, The entire palm is slightly longer than the fingers

3 - From the knuckle to the tip of the finger can be divided in half

4 - The whole hand is about as big as the face length wise

Import your reference photo into the canvas and position it next to where you will draw (Clip studio has a navigator feature where you can load images in but I mostly only use that for when I draw full bodies).

To start, I basically take what I learned from my practice of splitting up the hand and combine it together.

 

I begin with marker lines at places that bend: The wrist, knuckles, and the phalanges. The last markers I place at the end of the longest finger or whatever the longest finger is depending on the angle and the thumb.

 

Drawing down these lines like this helps me determine the proportions and length better. I then try and draw the same markers next to the reference.

Block out the palm and start placing the fingers keeping in mind how long each finger is  and following the direction of your markers. This is why the first technique I mentioned is important, because once you figure out the shape and length of each individual finger, putting them all together becomes easier.

From there I continue to draw in the rest of the fingers, paying attention to where the lines are curving. Once you continue practicing more, you won’t have to rely on the markers, but they’re really useful if you have a hard time with proportions or perspective!

Lastly, refine it and add details; nails, veins, bones, any lines and color.

If you are a complete beginner, you can start off by drawing the hands “robotic” like, marking individual parts that bend.

Example 2 - Drawing the hands attached to arm + torso (with a little perspective)

For this, I’m drawing the whole arm and upper body - here is the reference and download link I’m using (I changed the angle of the hand and perspective in my drawing a bit!):

I follow the same rules as I outlined before: Mark where the wrists, knuckles, tip of the longest finger is. Draw the shape of the palm and then draw in the fingers following the direction of your markers.

P.S. This is actually another form of chunking I used that helped me improve a lot and not get overwhelmed. After learning how to draw a hand, you move on to learning the arm, then the torso, and so on connecting everything until you can draw the entire body.

Refine your line art

And color!

Troubleshooting your hands

Extra trouble shooting for when you draw and can’t figure out why it looks off (some of this won’t apply to hands in different perspectives):

 

1 - Check that all the fingers are the appropriate length

2 - Check that if looking at back of hand, knuckle to wrist and tip of finger is same length

3 - Check that if looking at palm of the hand, the palm is longer than the fingers

4 - Is the base of the thumb to the tip of the index finger too long or short?

5 - Can you divide a finger from the knuckle to the tip in half evenly?

6 - Check how you draw fingernails because that could make or break the perspective you’re going for

 

 

^ Some quick hand sketches. When I’m practicing hands now, I like to draw the upper torso (or at least the upper arm) and head too.

The end

I hope this was helpful in any way if you have any questions let me know. If you are a complete beginner I recommend practicing the chunking method before moving on to the whole hand. Best of luck! :D