Help fix these Chibis!

[CheeryMoya]

Hey, not very artistically-gifted person here. The only thing I can do with my terrible skills are editing or tracing pre-existing images, and even then the results range from terrible to mediocre.

So I recently got my hands on SAI, and I decided to go derp around with it a little. Needless to say, my eyes kinda got burned out after churning out these two fellas.

Failing at Chibis OTL.png

Now if you look closely, you'll notice that their eyes, blush, mouth, and pose are exactly the same. Yes, I just took the guy on the right, color swapped and drew new hair+clothes, and called that a new chibi. I want to mass produce this style and the easiest way to make a set of these is to just take an old one and go from there. That's not what I'm asking for advice on though: I need some pointers on how to fix those damn legs. There's no denying that they're really bad looking and make the whole thing look out of place, but I'm at my wit's end as to how to fix them.

So, all you talented and experienced artists out there, can you help a poor gal out? It'd really help if you could just point out what wrong with the legs, and possibly give me a better way to draw shoes. For reference, I'm using SAI and a mouse to draw these.

[LateWhiteRabbit]

So, all you talented and experienced artists out there, can you help a poor gal out? It'd really help if you could just point out what wrong with the legs, and possibly give me a better way to draw shoes. For reference, I'm using SAI and a mouse to draw these.

Ouch - mouse, huh? Sounds rough. Anyway, what's wrong with the legs is that they don't taper - chibi limbs usually taper to be smaller on the ends. But the main thing wrong with them is that the head and chest are turned at a 3/4s angle while the legs are facing straight on toward the viewer.

If you want help drawing chibis, professional manga artist Mark Crilley walks you through it here in video form:
Drawing Chibis (Set it to 240p for sound.)
20 Ways to Draw Chibi Emotions

Have fun and mind your wrists!

[Morishita]

I went ahead and did a redline, of a pose that might help, over the file. I hope you don't mind, I don't mean to offended at all by drawing over your work but here is one idea that could work with the feet placement. I usually base poses off of how the characters personality is so I'm not sure if this pose will fit your characters personality but since it is a chibi I don't think doing major detail in the foot arrangement is always needed. Something simple usually helps to get the point across.
Anyways I hope that helped your question on the foot placement ^^;
P.S.
Almost forgot to say what I changed. I went ahead and drew his waist pushed to the side and his pelvis pushing outward alittle and drew him placing more pressure on one foot than the other to help give a some what stable standing pose *I probably worded that wrong TT.TT* I also made his body a little smaller and gave him a neck to help a little with the poses. It looked a little odd to leave his neck out, of course that is my opinion, everyone has there own style ^^. Okay that's all.

Also please forgive the messiness of the lines, it's really late and I'm a little tired from working on background art ^^;

[CheeryMoya]

Ouch - mouse, huh? Sounds rough. Anyway, what's wrong with the legs is that they don't taper - chibi limbs usually taper to be smaller on the ends. But the main thing wrong with them is that the head and chest are turned at a 3/4s angle while the legs are facing straight on toward the viewer.

I know mouse art isn't good on the wrists, but my sister thought it'd be a good idea to return the tablet her friend gave her because she's "going to college and won't have time to learn how to draw via tablet." Logic at its best, amirite? Anyways, I just knew that the angle of the upper body versus the legs were the offending criminals. Now if only I could use that knowledge into practice... ;n;

I hope you don't mind, I don't mean to offended at all by drawing over your work but here is one idea that could work with the feet placement. I usually base poses off of how the characters personality is so I'm not sure if this pose will fit your characters personality but since it is a chibi I don't think doing major detail in the foot arrangement is always needed. Something simple usually helps to get the point across.

Oh no, the lines actually helped a lot! I didn't want to redraw the whole thing, so I just did the legs following your pose.

Failing at Chibis OTL Part 2.PNG

I think I tapered them this time... T_T Answer the poor guy's question.

[MaiMai]

It looks like your chibi is in ten layers of clothing as opposed to a normal amount. If you followed Morishita's red line a bit closer (and yes this may require redrawing which you shouldn't be afraid of if you're trying to fix your chibi style) then it shouldn't look as inflated. Also add a neck like in the redlines.

[Reikun]

It looks like your chibi is in ten layers of clothing as opposed to a normal amount. If you followed Morishita's red line a bit closer (and yes this may require redrawing which you shouldn't be afraid of if you're trying to fix your chibi style) then it shouldn't look as inflated. Also add a neck like in the redlines.

I have to disagree with this piece of advice. Sure, if CheeryMoya followed Morishita's redlines closely, then the chibi would turn out looking more like a "chibi," but then it would also look like Morishita's chibis since no one draws chibis the same.

I think that CheeryMoya's second version with only the legs changed is actually a big improvement given she's drawing with a mouse and is not a self-proclaimed artist. I think it's fine that it has no neck and that the body isn't super tiny/skinny. This could develop into a unique chibi style and I think it just needs to be refined with practice (which will require drawing more chibis!)

Redlines should ultimately be used as a guide only, especially with something as stylized as a chibi.
Here are a bunch of different chibis that all scream "chibi style" but are all different.
Chibi with no neck
Chibis with really tiny necks
Chibi with a neck

All of these are acceptable and very chibi. All of these have different takes on how big the head should be compared to the body. The Sailor Moon chibis are closer to being as anatomically correct a chibi can be, while the first one's body is much smaller than the head.

[CheeryMoya]

It looks like your chibi is in ten layers of clothing as opposed to a normal amount. If you followed Morishita's red line a bit closer (and yes this may require redrawing which you shouldn't be afraid of if you're trying to fix your chibi style) then it shouldn't look as inflated. Also add a neck like in the redlines.

Alfonse (blond dude) might be, but the other guy is only wearing a T-shirt and a jacket The reason why I kinda don't want to redraw the whole design is because
a) using the mouse to draw is hard
b) I like this style
c) I'm too lazy
And to be honest, I based off this drawing by the same sister who thought it'd be a good idea not to learn how to use a tablet. I took off the neck for my chibis because I thought it looked like an awkwardly jutting chin. I also need to learn how to change the poses sometime soon like here, but I need to get those legs down right. Notice how both pictures were cut at the waist; she drew the first pair of legs on the first drawing, and she hates drawing legs.

I think that CheeryMoya's second version with only the legs changed is actually a big improvement given she's drawing with a mouse and is not a self-proclaimed artist. I think it's fine that it has no neck and that the body isn't super tiny/skinny. This could develop into a unique chibi style and I think it just needs to be refined with practice (which will require drawing more chibis!)

Thanks C: I've been poking those legs and editing the design for a girl chibi, and this is the result at the end of the day.

Failing at Chibi OTL Part 3.png

Something will continue to bother me about that right foot, but I'm proud(er) of the girls. They're based off Deji's picture of Ibuki (blue hair) and Ichiko (brunette) from Funnyguts' Madoka Magica fangame, and though that ribbon on the uniform irks me, I like Ibuki's hair ribbons.

That said, how are the legs now? It's going to be painful for both me and the chibis if I have to keep amputating and reattaching legs ;n;

[MaiMai]

I suppose there could be an improvement overall if you tightened the lineart a bit more. You mentioned you were using SAI with a mouse right? Have you been using the vector layers for lineart? Hell I think the chibis do look cute the way they are, they just need more neatness and tightening which I understand is difficult using a mouse. The other point I would like to make about the clothing is that it would help if they were proportional to the chibi in question. The girl chibis you based off of Deji's picture from are wearing pretty short skirts, but your chibis look as if the skirts are knee length.

That said, the blonde guy's legs are looking better.

[Asterisk]

You've improved from your first try! ^^
Everyone draws chibis differently, but maybe you can look over the proportions?
The girls body seems a bit too long with the amount of leg showing ratio. Since your chibis seem pretty balanced (in comparison to ones with really huge head/really small body etc), here's a quick reference on a balanced chibi.


Keep it up, you'll only get better and better at drawing 'em ^^

[CheeryMoya]

I suppose there could be an improvement overall if you tightened the lineart a bit more. You mentioned you were using SAI with a mouse right? Have you been using the vector layers for lineart?

Yes, and they've been incredibly helpful to me. Fact of the matter, I went back and redrew the frame of the chibi, this time making it face profile view and much thinner, with both shoulders sloped and added a neck (kinda, not really). It was actually less painful than I thought it would be too! Here, take a look.

Getting better at Chibis.png

This is based off of Ris' character, Kari Kimura. She told me that she'd like something cutesy for her LemmaTV module, and I said I can do chibis for her. Don't mind the clothes/clothing colors, as she didn't specify what Kari wore and I had to put something on her. Tell me what you think of the re-positioning of the facial elements, pose, hair, maybe the legs, and anything else you can point out. Once I get the base done, I can streamline the designs of other chibis and fill the world with these MWAHAHAHA easily.

[Reikun]

Regarding the chibi you did for Kari Kimura, you may want to consider moving the crotch up to make the legs longer. The legs are generally longer than the torso (though this can be stretched in stylized art).


In this image, you can compare the length of the torso (ending at the crotch) to the length of the legs (beginning at the crotch).

You'll notice in different kinds of chibis, the leg-torso ratio varies quite a bit, but still follows the general anatomy of the human body.

ProdigyBombay's chibis have torso slightly longer than legs
This Guy Cecil chibi has legs longer than torso
And this chibi had legs and torso roughly equal.

If you want to make a good base for chibis, you should consider using the basic shape method that's shown in the last chibi I have linked above. See how the artist used circles, lines, and half-circles to draw the major parts of the body? This will help you proportion the body before drawing the flesh around the skeleton and also help you with different poses (in the future) if you know the basic shapes of the human body.

Hope this helped :O

[Tetiel]

I don't know how much I can help since I draw chibis with extremely high detail in comparison to what you want. I really hope you don't mind my using one of my own as an example. It's not an attempt to say that I draw them correctly, but just to explain what I mean. Two examples here (lol please forgive anatomy mistakes):
http://fav.me/d3ehmxz
http://fav.me/d3bwnjx

One thing I've noticed with yours is that I think there is too much chin in your chibis. The faces are a touch too high up and the actual chin isn't defined enough. It's very round. Chibis tend to have smooshy faces like little babies. In anime the older the character is, the longer the face, the smaller the eyes in comparison. Humans get that, too, though anime exaggerates that fact a LOT. So imagine drawing a regular anime character's face, take the jawline and flatten it by a significant amount. I'll sketch up a quick example of what I mean:

K, so the big things I want to point out... Slightly larger eye size. Slightly closer together eyes as a result. Smooshy chin, but short chin. Not nearly as sharp, but still has definition. Shoulders much thinner, slightly wider than the bald head. Wider neck in comparison to shoulders. Oh, and uhh... features are usually more round and pudgy so notice the difference between the shoulders where the non-chibi shows definition of the arm sockets. Does this make sense? I hope this makes sense, but it's so difficult to explain!

As Asterisk said, everyone does chibis differently and I'm certainly not trying to say that you're wrong in the style that you're using. The styles range so much! I really do hope this helps even just a little bit. Chibis do have anatomy, but you can't really use an adult anatomy model for it. It's much more helpful if you look at the anatomy of a toddler or baby.