How to draw · Confident · about 25 minutes
Horse
You need: Paper, Pencil. Optional: Eraser, Brown, tan and dark brown crayons, colored pencils or markers.
Thick lines: draw these now. Thin gray: already drawn. Dashed: light guides you erase later.
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1. Draw two light circles the same size, side by side with a small gap: the chest circle on the right and the hip circle on the left.
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2. Draw a smaller circle up and to the right for the cheek and a little circle below it for the nose. Join the head to the chest with two light neck lines.
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3. Draw a light ground line below the body. Leave a gap about as tall as the body: a horse's legs are about as long as its body is deep.
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4. Draw the back: start at the top of the chest circle, dip a little in the middle, then curve over the hip circle. Draw the belly between the two circles.
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5. Draw the neck: a curved line from the back up to the head, then a throat line from under the head down to the front of the chest.
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6. Draw two pointed ears. Then draw the face: down the front to the nose, around the soft round nose and chin, and back under the jaw to the throat.
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7. Add an eye high up on the head, a curved nostril near the front of the nose and a short mouth line.
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8. Draw the near front leg. It is thick at the top, the knee sits about halfway down, and the hoof is a wide block that stands on the ground line.
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9. Draw the round rump and the near back leg. The back leg bends backward at the hock, the opposite way to the front knee.
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10. Draw the far legs behind the near legs. Stop each line where it meets a near leg, and set the far hooves a little higher: they are farther away.
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11. Draw the mane in wavy locks along the top of the neck. Add a small tuft of hair between the ears.
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12. Draw the long tail. It starts at the top of the rump, flows down and ends in a few soft points.
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13. Erase all the light guides: the circles, the neck lines and the ground line.
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14. Finish with shading and details. Light comes from above, so add short slanted lines under the belly. Draw a line across each hoof and a few hair lines in the mane and tail.
Practice here
Tip: Press very lightly for the circles and lines in the first three steps. They only show where the parts go.