MANGA TIPS FOR BEGINNERS

Workshops
Artist
Artist insight
insight
MANGA TIPS
FOR BEGINNERS
Joanna Zhou reveals 26 gems of wisdom
for creating art that’s unmistakably manga
anga is, without a doubt,
1 LEARNING FIGURATIVE
Bright or pastel colours are well suited
one of the fastest growing
M
PROPORTIONS
for chibis because they enhance the
art forms among young
In manga style, the human body is
dynamism and cuteness of
Joanna Zhou
people across the globe.
often used metaphorically to express
each character.
COUNTRY: UK
Most artists discover this hobby in
dramatic or comedic impact. Mastering
CLIENTS: Animexx eV,
their teens and face the challenge of
each proportion greatly enhances your
Raptor Publishing
self-directed learning alongside
flexibility as a visual storyteller. You
Joanna is a
school or university. I’ve never seen
may even end up adopting a certain
student at
Chelsea
manga as work, but a fun refuge from
body type as your signature style.
College of Art
the actual stresses of daily life.
Take a look at any manga comic and
and Design in
I hope that other aspiring mangakas
you’ll find a figurative fluctuation
London and works
will see it in the same light because
professionally as a
between body shapes – even of the
manga artist, producing
with this attitude, artistic improvement
same character.
work for magazines and
will become an enjoyable and effortless
television. She is also a
process. Don’t listen to people who say
2 SUPER
member of the well-
known UK manga group
that manga is a useless hobby. Any
DEFORMED STYLE
Sweatdrop Studios.
form of visual creativity is infinitely
When drawing chibis (in manga, a chibi
www.chocolatepixels.com
more productive and satisfying than
is basically a cute, small, child-like
many other pastimes that spring to
version of an anime or manga
mind. Despite its stylisation, manga
character), you should constantly
techniques incorporate solid
remind yourself to keep the torso, arms
proportion, perspective and colour
and legs as short as possible (erasing
theory which benefit a huge variety of
any excess if necessary). Because our
careers or life situations. Hopefully
sense of regular anatomy is so deeply
these tips will inspire and motivate you
ingrained, it’s all too easy to make the
to delve deeper into the fascinating
limbs longer than they need to be,
world of Japanese comic art.
resulting in a child rather than a chibi!
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Artist insight Manga tips
3 GUIDELINES
A single line in the right place
your characters apart. Each character
ARE VITAL
Use guidelines wherever
can project a sense of beauty and
should have significant differences in
hair, eyes, height and clothing (unless
possible! They only take a
power, whereas a mass of scratchy storyline dictates otherwise). Consider
second to draw and can
how colours, hairstyles and accessories
drastically reduce the
outlines only reflect hesitance
can be used to appropriately represent
amount of unnecessary
certain personality traits. Also, adding
mistakes such as eyes not
background, props or narrative creates
being level or hair not
a stronger context for your character.
following the shape of the
head. ‘Ball joint’ bodies
6 DIFFERENTIATION
enables you see at a glance
(ISN’T JUST A HORRIBLE
if certain limbs are the same
THING IN MATHS)
length. Guidelines can also
A more advanced technique of varying
be used to denote the ‘twist’
your characters is to draw different eye
of a body posture in a
shapes and facial outlines for each one.
dynamic scene.
This requires some practice but if done
correctly and consistently, it becomes
4 FROM ROUGH
a subtle yet very effective way of
TO DETAIL
differentiating characters.
Always work roughly to begin with and
gradually build up the level of detail in
7 360 DEGREES
your image (see the three rough
As you pra
p ctice, remember
sketches, left). If you start adding
to draw th
t e head from
intricate sparkles to an eye before even
different
en angles. Don’t fall
completing the face, you may discover
into
t a r
o a ut of always drawing
later that the whole eye is in the wrong
identified it, even if it entails a lot of
the s
h
ame tilted head facing
location and needs to be erased. Never
redrawing or digital editing! Guidelines
the same direction. A full-
leave a mistake if you’ve already
and rough sketches promote maximum
frontal face is actually quite
efficiency and accuracy when drawing.
challenging because you
You are also forced to think carefully
have to make sure that both
about the technical composition.
eyes are absolutely identical.
Especially if you hope to take
5 DESIGN MEMORABLE
manga drawing further, one
CHARACTERS
of the first things publishers
One of the most unnecessary mistakes
look for is the ability to draw
in comic drawing is to lose your
a face from many
reader’s interest because they can’t tell
perspectives.
8 CREATE ORDER
USING CHAOS
Exciting manga hairstyles
have thick and thin
strands arranged in a
seemingly random
manner, yet still form a
pleasant shape as a
whole. The same principle
applies towards clothing
folds. Practice drawing
‘randomly’ but with
enough critical judgement
so it doesn’t become a
mess. Hint: Curved lines
look best when they’re
drawn in one single
sweep. Holding your
breath could make your
hand momentarily
steadier! Try it…
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Workshops
9 BE CONFIDENT WITH MARK-MAKING
12 QUALITY OVER
Experiment
A good piece of advice I’ve had is to turn my
CONVENIENCE
scruffy pencil sketches into ‘a single beautiful
Sometimes it’s tempting to sit and
to challenge the
line’. A single line in the right place can project a
fidget over an image instead getting
stereotype of what
sense of beauty and power whereas a mass of
up to look for references. But at the
scratchy outlines only reflect hesitance. With
end of the day you’ve wasted more
people imagine
rare stylistic exceptions, good manga drawings
time trying to fix it yourself and
should always contain crisp, confident contours.
chances are it still looks worse off. It
manga should be
only takes a second to take a
photograph of your own hand or
16 FEMALE BODIES
yourself wearing a certain garment
Manga female body proportions are
with clothing folds. You will learn
usually very petite, reflecting the
much more by copying correctly,
beauty ideal of Japanese women.
than free-styling incorrectly.
Defined muscles or an Amazonian
build is less aesthetic and definitely less
13 THROUGH THE
mainstream. It’s common however to
LOOKING GLASS
add voluptuous breasts in order to
Holding your drawing up to a mirror is
differentiate women from girls.
an effective way of spotting mistakes.
The results are often quite sobering –
17 BUFF BISHONEN!
what looked perfect during sketching
Male bodies fluctuate
could have hideously asymmetrical
between heavy muscles to
eyes and other anatomical mistakes.
an almost androgynous
Keep correcting the image until you
beauty. Ironically, the latter
are happy with the reflection.
is more popular with female
artists. Bishonen (beautiful
14 IN YOUR FACE!
boy) style simplifies the male
The face is where you can make or break an
body into a slender form
emotional connection with the viewer. The
with graceful indications
face is a good place to express style. Maybe
of muscle and a notable lack
you have a certain way of drawing eyes or
of nipples or body hair.
mouths that will eventually become your
trademark. Think about how the mouth,
10 THE SECRET
RE T
T O
T
T
O
eyes, pupil size and eyebrow position express
ELEGANT LI
T L NE-ART
a certain emotion. If in doubt look at yourself
Always vary your
ou line-width when
in the mirror and notice which areas of your
inking to
g t c
o r
c e
r a
e t
a e an appealing, dynamic
face move. Practice making as many
image. Use thicker lines to emphasis
expressions as you can – just make sure no
contours (such as the face shape)
one’s watching…
and thinner lines to suggest distance
(billowing hair strands). Having the
same line-width everywhere creates
a static and slightly sloppy effect.
Manga art is traditionally inked using
a nib pen (as seen on this image
above). Fine-liners and digital inking
are viable alternatives as long as you
take care to alter the line-weight.
11 HOW DO I DRAW
HANDS?
15 THE PROFILE
As with the human body, you have to
Manga profiles are usually ‘bottom heavy’
be thoroughly familiar with their
with the nose and mouth jutting further
physical structure before being able to
outwards. Practice drawing an eye from the
create poses from scratch. Study and
side and remember to position it in line with
draw your own hand to understand
the ears and the ‘dip’ between nose and
digit length, how they bend and which
forehead. Males have a more pronounced
fingers tend to group together in
and angular jaw line than females. Body
certain positions. Manga hands place
proportion will also affect the profile of face,
emphasis on grace, so detailed nails
hair and eyes. Drawing the bald head first will
and wrinkly knuckles are usually
ensure a correct placement of hair.
blended out.
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Artist insight Manga tips
21 COMIC CONVENTIONS
(NOT THE SMELLY ONES)
There are many rules and icons specific
to manga style when it comes to
expressing certain moods or situations.
For example, speed-lines can be used
literally for movement or figuratively
for emotional shock. Study various
mangas to identify these narrative
devices and try to incorporate them
into your own work. Manga pages are
a lot more dynamic than the ‘box’
panelling of western comics. However
take care not to let a complicated
layout hinder reading flow.
22 THINK BIG, BUT
18 SPEED UP YOUR PROGRESS
DRAW SMALL
The fastest road to improvement is to know
Thumbnails provide a vital overview of
your own strengths and weaknesses, through
your page and enable fast editing of
critical self-analysis and constructive opinions
various elements (panel shape, speech
24 WORK IS PLAY
of others. Create a clear mental plan of areas
bubbles etc). Not only is this much
The only way to improve is to practice,
you need to tackle, as well as areas in which
more efficient than making large scale
and you can only practice a lot if you
you do well and can develop to your
corrections, it also ensures that your
enjoy it. Drawing is a therapeutic
advantage. Doing something simple well is
final comic sheet is subject to far less
hobby and you should do whatever
more morale boosting than always aiming
erasing and redrawing which could
makes you feel good. If you only draw
(and failing) at unrealistically difficult tasks.
affect the final image quality.
to ‘beat’ others then you’ll end up
Bright bubbly colours and chibi characters
Your thumbnails can be as rough or
frustrated if success doesn’t come.
can deftly hide the fact that an image (see
as detailed as you feel is appropriate.
the various postcard images above) does not
But they must show the panel
25 RULE BREAKING
require advanced knowledge of proportion
arrangement, speech bubble location
There are rules to manga, but you’re
or perspective.
and character shots.
not obliged to follow them. In manga
style, creativity is often forgotten in the
drive to draw things realistically or
19 THE JO
E J Y AN
O
D A
ND
Y AND GONY
23 NAR
NA RATE, AMUSE AND ENTERTAIN! learning to colour like a certain artist.
OF CL
F C O
CL T
O HING FOLDS
LDS
Manga st
ang
yle isn’t always about creating a glossy-
Copy
op i
y ng from fa
f shi
h o
i n magazines is a
eyed
eye pin-up. Try using character interaction to
26
2 DO YOUR OWN THING
G
N
gre
gr at way of training your eye to distil
cr
c eate a dynamic snapshot with one or many
Experim
i
ent wi
t
t
i h
t m
h
edi
d a a
i
nd technique
qu
the ‘important’ folds from insignificant
‘punch-lines’. This works well with chibi style but
to challenge the stereotype of what
crumples. You’ll get an inherent
can also be done with regular proportions for a
people imagine manga should be. This
understanding of how different
darker narrative. Imagine yourself as a manga
image is a Photoshop collage of a soft
garments drape over the body, which
journalist, and not a fashion photographer. The
pastel background and two manga
is a vital foundation for designing your
more detail and narration, the longer someone
characters. The effect is entirely unlike
own clothes using a variety of fabrics
will want to look at your image… and that can
the slick CG effect that we usually
and cuts. When in doubt it’s better to
only be a good thing!
associate with manga illustration.
have a few simplistic lines indicating
folds rather than a jumbled mass of
incorrect zig-zags.
20 DRAWING
OLD PEOPLE
The standard manga face
is poorly suited to adding
wrinkles. In order to create
a realistic older person you
have to alter the entire facial
outline to correspond with
the sagging and wrinkling
that occurs with the ageing
process. The eyes become
smaller and the distance to
the mouth increases.
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