| Sketching Cats | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Drawing the Cat in Action | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Have you ever noticed how often cats are pictured sleeping? The only way they will be still for long enough to be drawn! A detailed drawing of a cat is best done from photographs, when you have plenty of time to observe the details. Cats are wonderful subjects to sketch, with their quick graceful movements equally suited to brisk energetic handling or to smooth, elegant line. To capture your cat in action, you'll need a quick eye and quicker hand. A felt-tip black artist's pen, such as used in this drawing at right, is ideal. |
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Sketching the Main Shapes With line drawing, the trick is to know what to put in and what to leave out. Because you have limited time, you must be bold and confident, and not worry too much about detail.
Begin by sketching in the main forms. These can change dramatically with a cat, due to their great flexibility. Rough in the oval of the ribcage/belly area, the shoulders, rump and head. Observe the cat in various poses, mentally simplifying the shapes - curling in a ball, stretching, arching. Note that the spine runs from the back of the neck to the tip of the tail, and while very flexible, won't form a sharp bend - this is a useful line to observe in sketching, helping you align the forms of the body. The tail is an important means of expression for the cat, and aids in balancing, so should always be included in the sketch where possible.
Take a look at the cat's head. Imagine a straight line down the center of the nose, and another line going across the top of the eyes. If the cat is looking straight at you, these two lines will form a right-angle. This angle will change depending on the position of the head. Compare the angle these lines make on your model with your drawing. This will help ensure the eyes look straight. The ears are three-dimensional, almost pyramid shapes - not flat triangles. Like the tail, ears are very expressive and can tell us a great deal about the cat's frame of mind. When drawing whiskers and hairs, keep the lines quick and light, to avoid them looking like bits of string.
When sketching with line, you can use directional marks to bring out the roundness of form or to give texture and movement, but generally it is best to ignore the cat's markings, as lines drawn to indicate a change in color can be confusing to the eye. Short, quick marks can be useful to indicate hair, but for a shorthair cat, a long sinuous line is generally preferable, to indicate the smooth graceful line of the cat's musculature.
~Helen South
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