Basics of Kawaii Drawing

I’ve always had an interest in drawing. I’m pretty good at it if I work on a piece for a while, but for the things I was drawing, it was too long of a time. That’s why I decided that for this project, I wanted to work on my art skills.

I chose my book, Manga for the Beginner Kawaii: How to Draw the Supercute Characters of Japanese Comics by Christopher Hart, based on two things. The style was similar to what I draw in my free time, and it’s for someone with little to no skills, like me. It’s really easy to understand, and it gives fool proof steps to drawing cute characters. “You’ll learn the specific techniques that will enable you to take an ordinary character and, with a few strokes of the pencil, totally transform it into a supercute character.” (Hart, 9)

It started off with talking about the basics of Kawaii figures, like how they’re made of really simple shapes, or how the colors are typically brighter and more unnatural. I learned that to be considered a “supercute character”, the figure has to have the right proportions, which are a large head, and short body. After learning this, it was time to start drawing.

First, I had to learn how to draw a head. To start off, the author recommended you draw a circle for the head, which was easy enough. The eyes had to be low and far apart, the mouth was small, and there was no nose. Then, you add the details, like the anthro-hat (animal hat), and hair. It wasn’t hard, but I didn’t expect it to be at first.

First head drawing

The book then went on to talk about the different variations of faces for Kawaii characters, like their eyes or their facial expressions. The main point of this style is that everything is simple and clean, so none of the variations are too over dramatic.

I decided that I just wanted to focus on the basics right now, so the last thing I did was read about and draw a full figure. I had to be able to put a lot of detail into a small sized character while still keeping things simple, which I thought might be pretty difficult. I was wrong. The steps the book took me through made it really easy. It was the exact same process as with the head, except there was just one extra part.

First full figure drawing

I’m really excited to continue learning about this style of drawing. I think it’ll be fun and not-at-all hard for me to do, especially with how much reassuring the author gave that anything too complex would take away from the overall final product.

Do you think this seems like a good entry style to drawing characters for anyone? Let me know what you think!