How to turn photo into drawing: this may not be the most conventional way to do this, but it’s a valid one nevertheless! Using photo references to draw cartoons is something that every illustrator or cartoonist does to fast-track their character development.
Commuter flight: Sacred Ibis “Executives” Take to the Skies!
How do I turn photo into drawing?
The process is simple:
- trace and copy from various references to analyse and understand the anatomy of my subject, and then
- test my understanding of the relative shapes and positions of the body components.
For example, in the video below I started out with a close-up of the bird’s head. I traced it to get a feel for the size of its head versus the length of its beak and neck.
As I was planning a group of three birds crossing the tarmac to a small commuter plane, drawing them from memory several times produced enough variations to end up with three slightly different ‘characters’ in the frame.
Then it was time to work on the body anatomy:
- how long is the body relative to the legs?
- how do I get the body shape correct and how does the tail attach?
The way a bird’s legs bend offered some challenges. I also wanted to give the impression of each bird ‘marching to its own drumbeat’ rather than matching each other stride for stride, so I found several references in different positions.
Turn Photo into Drawing – Video Lesson
Watch the video lesson below to follow the entire process in Photoshop. You might want to copy my project, but you can also come up with one of your own. You can do it with pencil and (tracing) paper just as easily, I just use Photoshop because it makes recording so simple from my computer screen ?.
Next step?
If you have any questions, you know where to find me ?