Introduction

Hello! My name is Pokefairy! I draw the webcomic What’s His Deal? over on Webtoon and Tapas. I love drawing chibis, because they’re cute and efficient! I’ll be showing you how to do two chibi variations: the classic anime chibi, and the stylized comic-specific chibi!

Types of Chibis

Technically, there aren’t multiple types of chibi, but I’ve noticed chibis can be broadly categorized into two variations. Chibis can be used to condense down the details of a character while maintaining complexity, or they can be used to reduce complexity while exaggerating emotion. That’s a lot of words, so I’ll just show you what I mean!

Both of these serve different purposes, but I’ll get into that later. Let’s just draw, right?

What We're Doing

We'll be taking this character (Adam, from my webcomic) and rendering him as the two types of chibis! This is the outfit, but the chibis will be rendered in full color rather than the way I did it here!

 

I wanted to start from a "complex" design, and this seemed like the perfect choice!

Classic Chibi

A lot of the chibis in this style are used for merch or banner purposes. This is a standalone chibi, the focus of the illustration generally. I’d recommend this style if you’re designing acrylic keychains or stickers (though I used the other style for stickers, myself). They usually have pretty static poses.

1. Draw an oval.

2. Add a little cheek.

Depending on the angle, you'll be able to see more or less cheek. More turned away = more cheek

3. Divide it into four sections

The horizontal line starts from where the cheek meets the oval, the vertical line would be along where the nose would be.

4. Rough in the eye sockets

 

5. Draw in the eyes!

The eyes are probably the most important feature on chibis. This character has funky ringed irises, and since this chibi focuses on character design, I retained the iris rings.

 

Draw eyebrows, lids, and lashes at this stage too.

6. Draw the other features: ears, mouth

The ear goes under the horizontal dividing line. You can add a nose if you want, it's not something that fits with my style so I didn't.

7. Draw a bean-shape for the body.

Go with your gut on this. Remember that the bean gets thicker at the waist. I tend to keep the torso short and the pelvis longer, but again, that's a choice I make!

 

The little underwear shape isn't necessary, I just wanted to indicate the pelvis.

8. Draw tubes for the limbs

Limbs are loose oval shapes. Tight oval shapes also work, so go ahead and do what feels right for you. You'll draw three ovals per limb:

 

-Legs: 1. Thigh, 2. Shins, 3. Feet

-Arms: 1. Upper arm, 2. Forearm, 3. Hand

 

If this seems complex, feel free to use a 3D model as a base!

 

Make sure your pose is somewhat static, so it's easy to draw in all the details! Don’t push the pose too much, keep it simple.

9. Add fingers and toes if you need them.

The fingers and toes are kind of paw-like in this style.

10. Draw in the clothes and hair.

11. Add details.

Make sure to add all the little details in your character design! Don't simplify any of them (well, unless you want to)!

12. Draw the lineart

Detail-focused lineart!!! Do the lineart the way you would for a regular character drawing, focusing on detail and aesthetic!

 

My lineart is always a little messy, but yours probably won't be :')

13. Flat colors.

I'm not going to go too in detail with the rendering, but you'd be going about it the same exact way you'd render a regular color illustration.

14. Render!!!

Color the chibi the way you would any colored character!

 

Points to note:

• Make the chibi blushy!!!

• Make the eyes sparkly!!!

• Use soft gradients for shading!!!

 

Those are the things that make chibis super appealing, so make sure you do those!

Classic Chibi Timelapse

Chibis For Comics

Now let’s talk about how to draw a chibi that’s specific to you! These kinds of chibis are used to just convey a character’s expression. They tend to be used in comics, though plushies and enamel pins of these would be cute, too! I made stickers of my chibis, and they’re adorable.

So, disclaimer: this should vary depending on your style, but the steps would be the same. You can find variations on this kind of chibi in Demon Slayer (Tanjiro makes the most delightful faces) and Fullmetal Alchemist (who knew you could chibi-fy a suit of armor?)

 

 

The first few steps will be roughly the same.

 

1. Draw an oval.

2. Add some cheeks!

3. Draw the body and limbs

Just draw tubes for all these parts, including the torso. You can ignore proportions completely! Just go for this chubby appeal, and push it as you will for comedic effect :)

4. Draw the hair, eyes and mouth!

In the previous design, the eyes were the focus, super-detailed. Here, the eyes are as simple as can be! I draw little lines, but dots, circles, whatever you want - they all work! Less is more! Exaggerate the expression as much as you want.

5. Draw clothes

Keep the shapes of the clothes, details don't matter here! I have completely forgone clothes in this style before, so honestly, it's up to you how much you want to detail it, from not at all to very!

6. Lineart!

The lineart focuses on retaining broad shapes instead of details, go fast with the lines!

7. Flat colors!

8. "Shading"

All I did was place a multiply layer over the flats and add small gradients at certain stress points! I went for joints and the hair roots, mostly!

9. Render!!!

This took me less than half the time it took to do the other version, and they're both equally cute!

Comic Chibi Examples

Comic Chibi Timelapse

Conclusion

Different chibis serve different purposes but we can all agree that… chibis are great! Go ham on your chibis, make their cheeks fat, their eyes sparkly (or not) and you’ll have nothing to worry about!