Uploaded January 2024 | Updated September 2026, 2 weeks ago
So you want to draw hands for your character illustrations and... Dang! It's hard. But there are easy ways to look at a difficult problem.
Creating characters is not about accurate life drawing as a serious Artist - (capital A!).
Many characters only ever need one or two hand-shapes for a whole book or series. Practice those hands and you can soon be drawing them easily. Even more complicated characters only ever need a small library of hand positions, so concentrate on learning those.
@rashidrafsan6117 has asked me - "can you make a video about drawing hands and heads.. I really love your art style.. I am struggling to come up with new character ideas and drawing hands."
Hands are notoriously difficult to draw. They are so versatile, can take up an infinite number of positions and can be viewed from every angle too.
You really need to study hands and draw lots of them, but take heart. Characters are not primarily about art but about telling a story. Make that compelling and you can "get away" with learning to draw only a few hand positions and then learn new ones if you absolutely have to.
In this video I discuss hands drawn by great children's book illustrators and then show basic hand construction and how you can learn draw your own hands quite quickly. There are amazon links to the books below. I get an affiliate fee, but you pay no more.
Subscribe to this channel on YouTube for lots more drawing video ➡️ bit.ly/Sub2Shoo
Website shoorayner.com
music by youtube.com/cleffernotes
Everyone asks about the tools I use. Here's a video to show you what and how I use them. youtu.be/QJwjV1FKdyg
Rotring Tikky Graphic Pen
amzn.to/2hLNgQo in the UK
amzn.to/2zRyH4y in the USA
amzn.to/2E3qL08 in Canada
00:00:00 How great illustrators draw hands
00:01:11 Little Horrors amzn.to/3Hjt0Oq
00:01:30 Literary Life amzn.to/47CUcm2
00:02:01 Julius Baby of the World amzn.to/3vGyEaQ
00:02:28 Cat in the hat amzn.to/3tV00JK
00:03:20 Dorothy’s Dream. amzn.to/3HndJvV
00:03:44 The Man who wore all his clothes. amzn.to/3TYxj9n
00:04:12 Eat your Peas. amzn.to/3U4kJFM
00:04:45 The house that Jack built amzn.to/3U43DaR
00:06:06 Flower Fairies. amzn.to/47CtgCL
00:07:12 Drawing Hands - construction
00:09:31 Drawing Hands - style
00:11:33 Conclusions - hands for characters
So you want to draw hands for your character illustrations and... Dang! It's hard. But there are easy ways to look at a difficult problem.
Creating characters is not about accurate life drawing as a serious Artist - (capital A!).
Many characters only ever need one or two hand-shapes for a whole book or series. Practice those hands and you can soon be drawing them easily. Even more complicated characters only ever need a small library of hand positions, so concentrate on learning those.
@rashidrafsan6117 has asked me - "can you make a video about drawing hands and heads.. I really love your art style.. I am struggling to come up with new character ideas and drawing hands."
Hands are notoriously difficult to draw. They are so versatile, can take up an infinite number of positions and can be viewed from every angle too.
You really need to study hands and draw lots of them, but take heart. Characters are not primarily about art but about telling a story. Make that compelling and you can "get away" with learning to draw only a few hand positions and then learn new ones if you absolutely have to.
In this video I discuss hands drawn by great children's book illustrators and then show basic hand construction and how you can learn draw your own hands quite quickly. There are amazon links to the books below. I get an affiliate fee, but you pay no more.
Subscribe to this channel on YouTube for lots more drawing video ➡️ bit.ly/Sub2Shoo
Website shoorayner.com
music by youtube.com/cleffernotes
Everyone asks about the tools I use. Here's a video to show you what and how I use them. youtu.be/QJwjV1FKdyg
Rotring Tikky Graphic Pen
amzn.to/2hLNgQo in the UK
amzn.to/2zRyH4y in the USA
amzn.to/2E3qL08 in Canada
00:00:00 How great illustrators draw hands
00:01:11 Little Horrors amzn.to/3Hjt0Oq
00:01:30 Literary Life amzn.to/47CUcm2
00:02:01 Julius Baby of the World amzn.to/3vGyEaQ
00:02:28 Cat in the hat amzn.to/3tV00JK
00:03:20 Dorothy’s Dream. amzn.to/3HndJvV
00:03:44 The Man who wore all his clothes. amzn.to/3TYxj9n
00:04:12 Eat your Peas. amzn.to/3U4kJFM
00:04:45 The house that Jack built amzn.to/3U43DaR
00:06:06 Flower Fairies. amzn.to/47CtgCL
00:07:12 Drawing Hands - construction
00:09:31 Drawing Hands - style
00:11:33 Conclusions - hands for characters
