how to draw female comic characters (according to Wizard)...

[ratcreature]

brown_betty asked for examples "to illustrate the exactly how and why female comic characters are illustrated differently than the male." And I thought, really, what's better to illustrate these things than the books teaching the style in the first place?

A while ago I posted some scans from Wizard How To Draw series on drawing female superheroes (here and here), and I thought I'd post a bunch more from the first book of the series on "How To Draw: Heroic Anatomy".


As everything, it starts with the basics, i.e. proportions. First the male superhero


The female example is similar, but slightly different, notice how he stands firm and straight, wheras she stands with her hips cocked a little and the leg thrust forward?


Also notice in the direct torso comparison below, how the male one is ramrod straight, but she curves and leans just a little bit in the same pose?


Now onwards to the chapter "Sultry Women". It even cautions you against overposing! Yes, it's not as if Wizard wasn't aware of the problems! (Their definition and mine of which poses are already overposed might differ slightly though, heh.)





Next, Michael Turner explains "Sex Appeal". (Or what he thinks sex appeal is.) Incidentally it also illustrates the meaning of "overposed" that was brought up in the previous chapter very effectively...





Finally for compare and contrast purpuses the chapters on "Superheroic Men" and "Superheroic Women". For the male superhero it is all about more or less ridiculously enlarged muscles as we learn:





Female superheroes don't have it that easy, they need to worry about tilting their shoulder, nipple and pubic lines attractively at all times, not to mention legs, breast size, eye make-up and hair:

Comments

Re: Comic Books are FICTION!

[(Anonymous)]

i am also using an anonymous account cos i'm not a livejournal user. in fact i thought you'd have to have a paid membership to post here, until i read this particular post. i'm a red-blooded 21 year old straight guy. i came to this page after googling pages on how to draw comic book characters. i have a doodle or two during boring classes that weren't half bad for someone with no training (or that's what i was told) and i was forced to look up 'tips' on how to get better. i'll admit that i found turner's drawing rather nice (other than the 'getting wet' one which seemed 'overposed' - irony). initially i read the posts and i was thinking 'jeez it's the bra burners' convention out here' but the more i read the more i thought that you guys are right. yeah they are kinda overdone stereotypes, aren't they? yeah sure that's how comic characters are expected to look, but as their buyers we have the right to get offended if they are offensive, just as, i suppose, they have the right to draw women however they want. they'll just lose a customer or two, and gain a few million others every year. oh well...