The anime character, on whose face there is absolutely no emotion, looks pretty boring. But it’s worth a little to change the line of the mouth, and together with the character you yourself can begin to smile. And to learn to draw anime emotions is not difficult at all, you only need a pencil, a sheet of paper and a little practice.
Face painting
Before you start drawing emotions, you need to draw the face of your character. There are many ways to draw a face to an anime character, but let’s dwell on the simplest one:
- Draw a circle with a pencil. It does not have to be in perfect shape.
- Draw a vertical line in the middle of the circle.
- Divide it into three equal parts by horizontal lines. The upper part is for the hair, the central part is for the forehead and the lower part is for the eyes.
- From the third horizontal line down, draw a rectangle whose height is 2/3 of the circle.
- Draw a horizontal line in the center of the rectangle, and then divide the bottom of the rectangle in half with another horizontal line.
- Connect the top corners of the rectangle with the bottom center point to form a triangle.
- Now we draw the character eyes, nose and mouth along the auxiliary lines, as shown in the picture.
- Draw the cheeks and jaw of the character.
- Next, draw the ears (their height is equal to the height of the eyes), hair and draw on the eyes pupils and highlights.
Positive emotions
We conventionally divide the emotions of anime characters into positive, negative and neutral. Positive ones will include smile, joy, laughter and love.
How to draw anime emotions? When drawing, pay attention to the position of the eyebrows, the shape of the mouth and eyes. In a calm state, the character's mouth is depicted by a straight line or in the form of a dashed line. Now, let's look at how to gradually draw anime emotions with a pencil for beginners:
- We draw the character's face, and in the place of the mouth we make a slightly curved line. So you make a smile.
- If you want your character to smile more or rejoice, draw a mouth a little open, looking like an inverted letter D, and the lower eyelids of the eyes slightly raised and covering the iris.
- To portray laughter, we draw our mouths even more open, and our eyes closed and resembling two arcs.
- Tears of joy are depicted with drooping eyebrows, a mouth in the shape of the letter D, droplets of tears in the corners of the eyes and additional highlights on the eyes.
- When falling in love with a character, hearts appear instead of eyes, and the mouth resembles the number 3.
Neutral emotions
Neutral feelings include surprise, confusion, fatigue, indifference, and actions such as showing the tongue, sleeping, and winking.
How to draw neutral anime emotions? When drawing such emotions, the eyes almost always change, the position of the eyebrows and mouth changes.
To depict the puzzled anime emotion in stages, draw one eyebrow lowered and the other raised up. The eyes of the character should look sideways or up. We make the mouth small and look like the letter L.
The surprise on the character's face is depicted with his eyebrows raised high, his mouth and eyes wide open. The pupils are drawn small.
If you want to draw a very strong surprise, then remove the eyebrows from the character, and instead of the eyes, draw two large circles with dots inside. At the same time, the mouth is opened so wide that it merges with the chin.
We draw the tired character with the eyebrows and upper eyelids in straight lines, and the eyes are represented by two points. We make strokes under the eyes and draw the mouth in an arc.
To portray a character showing a tongue, draw eyebrows in a wave, eyes in the form of two inverted letters V, a mouth in a slanted line, and the tongue in an arch.
The sleeping hero has slightly bent eyes, his eyes are closed, and his mouth is open and looks like a small oval.
If you are portraying boredom, the eyebrows should be straight and slanted, the upper eyelids are drawn with straight lines, and the eyes with small semicircles. The mouth is open and inclined, in shape resembles an uneven oval.
To depict a wink, draw eyebrows with raised eyes, one eye closed and one mouth with a slight smile.
Negative emotions
Negative emotions: anger, sadness, tears, fear and shock.
How to draw an anime emotion of sadness? To begin, draw raised eyebrows, then add some glare to the eyes and make your mouth an arc. Tears are drawn to the character in the form of two trickles from the eyes. Eyes can be opened and look down or completely closed.
To portray sobbing, draw closed eyes, from which tears flow in streams in different directions. In this case, the mouth is open so that the teeth are visible, which are represented by an additional strip slightly uneven at the edges.
In a frightened character, the eyebrows are inclined, the eyes are wide open, and the iris is reduced. Near the lower eyelid, three vertical stripes are drawn. The mouth is depicted open, in shape resembling the number 8.
The shock is depicted with raised eyebrows, eyes in the form of small circles with strokes underneath and a wide-open mouth merging with the chin.
How to draw an anime emotion of anger in stages? If you want to draw a displeased character, then this is done with the help of frowning eyebrows and lowered corners of the mouth. To make the character's face seem even more irritated, wrinkles need to be drawn between the eyebrows and the mouth drawn with gritted teeth. To do this, draw a slightly uneven oval and a dashed line in the middle.
The character's rage opens his mouth even more and his teeth become visible. Eyebrows bend even more, and the irises are reduced.
Emotional Symbols
A feature of anime and manga was the use of characters to display certain emotions. There are a lot of such symbols, but let us dwell on some of them. For example, a drop in a character’s temple can mean stupor or overwork, and many drops symbolize nervousness and embarrassment.
Another famous symbol is the veins or cross. It can be painted on the head, cheek or clenched fist of the character. This sign indicates that the character is very annoyed.
A sigh is represented by a small cloud next to the character's mouth. If the hero has spirals instead of eyes, this means that he is dizzy.
The spark that flashed in the character’s eye symbolizes his irritation or rage, and rhombuses - a predatory shine.
Eyes without pupils are drawn by very angry characters or who have lost control of themselves. The absence of a nose indicates resentment or discontent of the hero.
The flame in the eyes is a symbol of anger or determination, and small crosses mean that the character has lost consciousness.