Drawing Superheroes 1: First Things First

We're going to start with the human figure first. I'll go over the different stages just to give you an idea of how I do it. There are various approaches so don't worry if you're used to doing it another way.

Construction
I've used the basic-shape construction in the sketch below. You use boxes, cylinders, spheres -all 3-dimensional shapes to construct your body. Think of it like the little art manikins you can get. Now, when drawing human anatomy there are a few basic rules of proportion. I'll mention one or two here: the elbow is at the same height of the navel; the chest is in line with the bottom of the shoulders; the wrist is in line with bottom of the groin. And each body section is measured against the length of the "head".

Usually I don't do construction lines this dark or this extensively, but I have here so you can see the lines and how they go.