How To Draw Anime: 50+ Free Step-By-Step Tutorials On The Anime & Manga Art Style
If you love anime & manga then of course you’d wanna draw it.
Naruto’s storyline was terrific; One Piece has incredible fight scenes and Studio Ghibli tugs at your heartstrings harder than Hollywood’s ‘The Notebook’.
Don’t get confused by the terminology though.
Simply put, manga is the comic book and anime is the actual animated content(learn more about the differences here). For artists looking to learn the style there is no major difference.
Manga characters have very unique features unlike any other cartoon.
The eyes and head are enlarged, the facial features are simplified, and the backgrounds are often highly detailed. If you’ve watched enough anime or read enough manga the style should be ingrained into your memory.
In the past we covered a series of tutorials on chibi drawing but this comprehensive list of videos will teach you how to draw in the manga art style from beginning to end—even if you have zero drawing experience.
To get the most out of each video I suggest watching it through once(I watch at 1.5x speed) and then going back to the start and drawing along.
When it comes to drawing practice really does make perfect. So bookmark this page because you are going to need it later! It takes anywhere from a few days to a few years to master the anime art style so just keep practicing and never give up!
Draw Manga: Where to Start
Welcome to drawing manga and welcome to drawing in general!
This is the beginning of a YouTube series where the artist takes you through the basics of drawing anime.
Starting at the very beginning, this is a quick ‘where to start’ walkthrough that will cover the basics of learning to draw this unique Japanese art style. It sets a good foundation for the rest of your learning so be sure to give it a quick watch.
6 Tips to Get Started With Manga
Are you wondering how to start sharing your stories with the world?
This video will quickly clear up all your questions and get you excited to start your own manga!
The artist takes you on her personal journey and shows you how to publish a manga of your own. Throughout the video she creates a single manga page from start to finish, clearing up some of your more complicated ‘how’ questions.
I think this could pair really well with some of our recommended manga books—especially for beginners.
Common Mistakes Young Anime Artists Make
When you start out drawing manga there are a few pitfalls and lazy ‘tricks’ that almost everyone is guilty of doing.
If you’re starting out then learn what they are and how to avoid them. These mistakes are so common then nearly every great anime artist was guilty of doing at least one of them when they were learning!
Remember: You’re still gaining knowledge and growing. It’s not about the end product you create, but rather what you learned in the process.
Manga Anatomy Quick Tips
Get your pencils out because this video is perfect to draw along with and practice your anatomy skills.
The artist teaches some neat tricks to keep the anatomy of manga characters looking proportional.
Quick and easy to follow, drawing out each lesson will help solidify the theory in your mind and train your hand to make the right strokes.
And if you’re struggling with human anatomy definitely take a peek at these online courses touching on all the bones, muscle groups, and structures that artists need to know.
How To Draw A Manga Girl
Nice and slow with easy instructions, you can comfortably watch this tutorial while you draw your own version.
With no voice-over it’s easy to concentrate on getting the features of the female anime characters face right. But it may be harder to follow if you’re used to instruction.
If you’d prefer to watch the video with a voiceover you can view a similar version by the same artist here.
Male Anime Face
The male head is similar in many ways to the female one, but there are a few fundamental differences that set it apart(hint: it’s not just the hair length).
This 24-minute tutorial teaches you the basic proportional differences step-by-step in real time.
With a guiding voiceover you’ll end up with a basic male anime head that can fit with all of your work.
Male Manga Characters From Basic Shapes
The cheerful tea-loving narrator makes this tutorial easy to follow and fun to watch. You’ll learn how to draw both a muscular man and a skinny teenage boy standing at different angles.
Even though the video is comprehensive and detailed it only takes 22-minutes to watch.
If you want to cram in a little extra practice, the artist shows how to dress the characters and shade them accurately.
Draw Lips for Manga & Anime
Do anime characters even have lips?
Of course they do!
Lips are often simplified down to a line, but some styles or characters are blessed with a little more shape.
This 40-minute video takes you through a detailed lesson on the anatomy of anime lips and how to draw them. From pouts to smiles, this artist covers it all.
How I Draw Anime Characters
Instead of a voiceover with this video you’ll find loads of useful text on screen.
You’ll learn how the artist develops a unique manga character from start to finish and how they make various styling decisions.
By drawing the same character from many different angles you’ll find the secret behind keeping your character’s features and personalities consistent.
How To Start in Manga with Cheap Tools
Prepare to be taught by a real manga artist with professional experience in drawing and selling manga.
He shares all his tips and tricks on a wide array of topics, from which ink you might use to how to avoid crinkled pages.
Short and to the point, this video is loaded with useful information that’ll hook you up with the right supplies to create your own original manga pages.
We covered some recommended supplies before but I think this video does a better job explaining how they work in the anime style.
4 Ways to Draw Manga Female Poses
Get your sketchbook out because this artist wants you to draw along with her!
With a chatty and friendly voice she explains how she comes up with poses and reiterates the age-old lesson of ‘practice, practice, practice.’
Each of these 4 tips is bound to improve your female gestures.
Mapping A Face for Anime & Manga
Learning the proportions of the face is a difficult task.
This tutorial helps you lock down your facial constructions with a series of easily repeatable steps. If you follow along you’ll end up with three perfectly constructed female faces looking at different angles on your page.
We suggest you take it a step further and draw another three on your own to solidify your new found knowledge.
Manga Eyes for the Absolute Beginner
Have you ever heard the saying “the eyes are the window to the soul”?
Manga artists rely on the eyes of their characters to communicate unspoken feelings and stories. Eyes are expressive features that help viewers tell the difference between characters, convey emotion, and suggest personality.
This video takes you through some of the many ways to draw manga eyes in a helpful step-by-step fashion.
Manga Girl Eyes(3 Ways)
Here’s a similar video to the one above just covering slightly different topics.
Learn how to draw the eyes of three different characters in this quick video that takes you from start to finish, discussing the various shapes and what they mean.
Draw A Manga Mouth
From smiling to screaming, a simplified manga mouth is both simple and incredibly tricky.
Pick up some tips in this video like “when the mouth is open, always show at least one row of teeth” to take your manga art to the next level.
Draw Manga Hair(6 Ways)
This artist covers curly hair, straight hair, long hair, and hair tied up in various fashions.
With no narration you can get your pencils out and get some practice in. But you’ll have to be a self-starter because it’s not that easy to follow without advice.
By the end you’ll know how anime hair reacts to styling and the most common ways it is stylized. And keep coming back to this even if you struggle on the first run through. It gets easier with practice.
How to Draw 3/4 Views
By now you should be familiar with using guidelines and sticking to general rules when constructing a face.
This tutorial builds on your previous knowledge and gives you a bit more freedom, encouraging fewer guidelines and more creativity.
Follow along and you’ll have one female and one male head in a ¾ view in just 20 minutes.
Manga: Clothing Folds
Clothes are affected by many forces causing folds that make them difficult to draw.
Gravity, cloth weight, and body position are a few of the lessons you’ll learn in this video covering the basics.
20 Ways Drawing Manga Eyes
If you are struggling to understand how different styles of eyes match different characters, this video will clear up all your questions.
Over a time-lapse video the artist narrates what makes each eye unique while drawing the eyes of 20 characters from popular anime. Yes, twenty!
If you are following along be prepared to pause often. This 11-minute video is fast-paced and packed to the brim with useful knowledge.
Male Manga Character Tutorial
Art anatomy is hard. No denying that.
Luckily manga art has a set of tips and tricks to get you going. Starting with the head and ending at the bottom of the torso, this tutorial gives you smart shortcuts to help you accurately construct a make manga character.
If you’ve never heard of the thunderbolt technique then you’ll really enjoy picking that up and adding it to your repertoire.
Manga Body for Beginners
Learn how to draw a classic manga girl body in this basic tutorial for beginners.
With no voiceover the artist gently takes you through her process, clearly highlighting the critical construction lines she makes.
If you follow along you’ll end up with a cute manga schoolgirl and a lot more knowledge about quickly constructing the body in a simple anime style.
Manga Studio 5 Tutorial(Multipart)
Have you ever heard of the Manga Studio software(now Clip Studio)?
It’s software like Photoshop but dedicated to manga & anime drawing.
Using manga studio in this guide you will learn which tools to use and how to ink a pencil drawing digitally. If you want to learn how to add color then watch part 2 of the video.
Comics In Clip Studio Paint
This video is a must-watch if you want to make your own manga or anime comic.
It’s an in-depth, information-packed webinar that’s almost an hour long. Don’t let the length scare you away though. After watching the video you’ll know exactly how to use Manga Studio to create your own manga pages from scratch.
The artist takes you through the full process of creating a comic book page from start to finish.
By the end you’ll know how to import your pencil sketches, set up the right sized document, make panels and ink your rough sketches.
Corel Painter Anime Tutorial Part 1
Drawing is complicated but it’s only the first step in learning.
The other is understanding how to translate ideas, fill in color, and work with software if you’re going digital.
In this video you’ll learn to create a full-color anime scene in Corel Painter. Over a time-lapse the artist talks you through his process, revealing how he paints backgrounds and introduces shading into his artwork.
Although the final image is complicated, this tutorial is packed well and spread out over two parts. By the end you should have a basic idea of how to use color when painting anime-style art.
How to Draw Manga Noses
In the manga style everything is simplified.
Unexpressive features like the nose are often stylized into a simple line or dot. This tutorial goes through the various ways to draw a nose from the simplest line to a more complicated nasal shape.
Draw along for practice and by the end of the tutorial you’ll understand how to draw a manga-style nose from both the front view and a ¾ view.
Color Anime Skin in Photoshop
When coloring an anime character it’s essential to get the skin right.
Choose uncomplimentary colors or place the shadows in the wrong place and your character will look waxy and out of place.
This tutorial goes over how to choose your skin tone and shows you a few traditional techniques to use when shading.
Coloring, Shading & Highlighting Manga
Continuing with learning how to shade skin, this short and sweet tutorial builds on what you already know.
The artist teaches you how to think about shadow placement and shows a simple but effective way to pick better shadows and highlights for your base skin tone.
Digital Lineart Tutorial
Photoshop is an industry standard when it comes to digital art.
You can use it for digital paintings in the anime style, or in your own style, and it’s versatile enough to give manga/anime artists everything they need.
This tutorial will teach you a new outlining technique for Photoshop that leaves thick, solid lines on top of your artwork.
Anime Boy Fighting Pose
Pick up a gesture photo set and break out your drawing pad ‘cause it’s time for some pose practice!
The most popular animes in the world are fighting shows and it makes sense to learn to draw dynamic action poses to match.
Draw along with the artist and you’ll learn how to conceptualize fighting poses while keeping your characters in proportion.
Long Hair for Anime
Drawing crazy long hair with a mind of its own is always fun.
Using this video you can unleash your love for long flowing lines and learn how to supercharge your hair drawing skills.
The artist draws two characters from start to finish explaining in detail how he constructs the hair and what outside factors he considers.
Bangs, Fringe & Curly Hair
Getting hair to fall naturally is no easy feat. When drawing manga it’s standard practice to simplify the hair into large clumps called ‘bangs.’
In this tutorial you’ll learn how to form the curve of the bangs accurately and how to add extra detail.
The artist takes it a step further by discussing how pigtails influence the shape of the hair and the best way to construct them. Lots of info here for anime hair lovers.
Foreshorten Hands, Arms & Legs
By adding dramatic perspective to your drawings you can create dynamic action poses full of energy.
Once you know how to construct the basic human body(with foreshortening) that knowledge will take your manga art to the next level.
Covering four different poses, you’ll finish this tutorial with a solid understanding of how to use foreshortening to your advantage.
How to Draw Arms for Anime
Did you know that the arm is the same length as the torso?
What about other tidbits of advice like “the forearm is the same length as the upper arm” and “the elbow is always at the belly button”?
This tutorial is packed full of memorable information teaching you how to draw the arm—muscles and all—in many different poses while sticking to the anime style.
How to Draw Anime Neck & Shoulders
Skipping out on the shoulder muscles is one of the biggest beginner mistakes you can make.
These frame the torso and make a big impact on the final design.
This tutorial teaches you all about the muscles in the neck and how they connect to the shoulders. Once finished, you’ll understand how to connect the head to the body in any pose or angle you desire.
Choosing Your Anime Drawing Style
Not all anime is in the same style.
Some anime is super detailed while others simplify things down for comic effect.
Many different decades even have a significant impact on the style of anime.
From the realism of Ghost in the Shell to the hyper-simplified faces of Dragon Ball Z, this video shows you the options available and how to choose the right style to suit your preferences.
Manga Sitting Poses
If you’ve been working your way through this list you will have a solid understanding of how to construct a standing human body. Or at least you’re well on your way.
But this tutorial takes it a step further teaching you how to construct a sitting body in a specific style.
All of the proportions stay the same—you just need to learn is how to manipulate them.
Anime Girl Step-by-Step
Drawing anime doesn’t have to be complicated.
Pull out your sketchbook, grab a pencil, and follow along with this simple tutorial on how to draw a cute anime girl!
This quick tutorial is an excellent warm-up for your hand teaching you to make broad, loose pencil movements.
One Character, Six Manga Styles
Have you been planning to create your own manga but just feel discouraged?
You’ll need to pick a style to work in, organize a story, and master the art style. It takes a while but this video can help.
A good way to solidify your style is to draw your character in multiple other manga styles. Follow along with this tutorial and try to adapt your character to all six different styles.
How to Draw Anime Head & Face
Are you still struggling to get you anime faces right even though you’ve been practicing for a while?
Get back to basics with this clear step-by-step tutorial that teaches you every construction trick in the book.
If you practice the techniques in this video your anime faces are guaranteed to improve.
Teenager to Kid Body Proportions
Body proportions change with age. A toddler’s head tend to be almost as big as their bodies while fully grown adults are about eight heads tall.
This tutorial quickly teaches you how to draw age groups accurately and which proportions to change.
How to Draw Relaxed Hands(5 Ways)
Natural looking hands are notoriously tricky to get right.
The proportions are difficult to remember and the placement of the fingers feels almost impossible to get. You could study other examples but the best way to learn is through practice.
This comprehensive tutorial shows you how to draw relaxed hands using a clear set of construction tips and guidelines.
Follow along with each drawing and then apply the lessons you learned to your own drawings after the tutorial.
Draw Simple Manga Hands
Hands are the most difficult human body part to draw(relatively).
Learn the foolproof way to get them looking right with the handy ‘french fry’ visualization trick this artist teaches in their video.
If you follow along you’ll learn how to draw a hand from the top, from the bottom, and in a closed fist.
Did you know you can apply similar rules to drawing feet too? You’ll also learn a basic trick that helps you use what you learned about hands when you draw feet. An excellent video for getting anime appendages just right.
Draw Simple Manga Feet
Anatomy is any manga artist’s bread and butter.
This comprehensive tutorial distills the complicated anatomy of a foot and teaches you simple construction techniques to keep your drawings accurate.
Practice makes perfect so follow along in your sketchbook and take down any important details that jump out. You could even do this digitally and follow along with the video in another window.
Manga Girl “Sketchy” Style
You’ve learned how to create clean, stylized manga artwork. You may not have mastered anything but you’ve got some ideas.
But did you know that manga can be sketchy too?
Grab some watercolors or colored pencils and get ready to paint outside the lines!
This video teaches valuable lessons about style and how to go about creating that classic “romance manga” look.
Draw a Manga Witch
Consolidate all the knowledge you’ve gained so far and learn to draw a full-body manga witch in this handy video.
Undeniably cute, you’ll have a chance to practice your proportions, poses, hands, feet, and even get into the nitty-gritty of drawing patterned clothes.
As usual, following along on paper(or a tablet) is highly recommended.
Simple Manga Female Body
You can build on your knowledge of proportions all day long.
But when tackling difficult concepts like foreshortening you should take a step back and focus on the fundamentals.
This tutorial is a perfect refresher on the proportions of the human body and how to draw using clear measurements.
As you follow along you can even take it a step further by adding clothes and coloring with Copic Markers.
Tips for Drawing A Manga Face
Drawing a manga face correctly takes time and practice. But these few tips can help speed up your learning timeline.
Learn about the importance of line weight, where to put eyes, and exactly how thick to make the neck along with many other great tips.
Paint Realistic Manga Portraits
Just because anime and manga have simplified color and bold linework doesn’t mean you can’t change the style. Plenty of anime styles use more realistic designs.
This tutorial shows you how to start a loose sketch and move into adding swathes of color, all the while blending and keeping color harmony.
When trying to paint realistic versions of anime characters it’s best to use a picture as a reference. Maybe even grab a sleek anime art book of your favorite series and use that concept art as a reference.
Just pick out a character and get painting!
How To Draw Manga Backgrounds
Backgrounds can be simple or crazy complicated, but all of them require some knowledge of perspective.
In this walkthrough the manga artist shows you what to consider and introduces you to the art of backgrounds.
While sharing his knowledge he inks the background of an interior scene explaining the complex perspective calculations and adding final detailed touches.
Let’s Paint: Anime Evening Scene
This video is a silent time-lapse where the artist reveals their brushes, color techniques, and general blocking out strategies to paint a background.
Anime backgrounds are very technical so this can be a huge benefit to anyone just getting into this style.
Learn how to integrate clouds into a dusk-type setting and discover a quick yet effective way to paint the silhouette of trees.
Two Faces(Speedpaint)
Have you heard of speedpainting?
It’s where an artist paints fast to create a finished piece in the least amount of time possible. Little planning, all creativity.
In this speedpaint we get an inside look at the artist’s process creating two anime characters in a unique setting. It’s a lengthy video detailing the early concepts all the way to the finishing touches.
If you can keep up with the video you’ll take away some valuable lessons about workflow and how to quickly conceptualize, ink, and color your own anime art.
Catching Smiles(Speedpaint)
This video comes from the same artist as above, yet here she uses a significantly different method to conceptualize the pose.
Using the popular art program Paint Tool SAI the artist creates lineart drawn freehand and adjusts everything on the fly.
Learn how to apply this into your own work with techniques you can gather along the way. The coloring of the lineart is very detailed and clearly enhances the overall feel of the finished piece.
If you can keep up with speedpaints these two videos are worth bookmarking.
Author: Claire Heginbotham
Claire is a traveling creative living in Osaka, Japan. She spends her days writing things, learning things and eating ungodly amounts of sushi. Read about her adventures here or secretly stalk her on Instagram and Twitter.
