your art is absolutely GORGEOUS omg,, I love the colours and poses and the style. do you have any advice on how to draw wings better? I really struggle with drawing them in more dynamic poses and also closed/half closed, so any help would be much appreciated ^^
Oh absolutely! And ur too sweet for this world, seriously, ur giving me an ego #- -# ur amazing <3
Drawing wings is natural for me, and it’s hard to explain to someone who doesn’t exactly see it that way, so bear with me - -*
If we’re starting with anatomy, I would start with bird and bat wing studies, wing shapes and different wing purposes, most if the time
I HEAVILY recommend studying these three studies from YouTube
This is how I learned the basic anatomy and purpose of wings, and what exactly a wing needs to be realistic, because in order to stylize, you need to understand the full picture, just like any other body part.
I recommend thinking of all wings as something to bend, keep all your lines loose and flowy, less jagged. Keep movement in every part of the wing, including the armpit, the elbow, the fingers and the feathers, nothing should have a purely straight line
Make sure the flow line in your wings is as clear as possible, even in flight wings are not ramrod straight, they move with their environment and position, the wind pressures them into new shapes, keep that in mind for when you draw them, they should never be fully stagnant, especially in flight. Feathers and skin bend to the wind, the shape around their bodies, they aren’t flat, they are 3d, keep that in mind
Bird wings are almost always curved, or posed in a curved shape, both on the top and bottom of the wings. Make sure to curve them with the body, make them make sense with the rest of the pose, wings are limbs, they weigh a lot, make sure the pose is balanced with their weight, and with the rest of the body.
Wing shapes are a lot to take in account, make sure to keep each wing shape and purpose in mind in designing the size, length, and width of your wings for your characters, if they are a slow or fast flier, or if they use their wings much at all. This is overwhelming, but I promise it’s worth it to keep in mind.
Of course there are always exceptions to some of these rules, and especially wing shapes, with birds like owls and hummingbirds having especially customized wings to fit their flying style, but most of the time drawing wings will fall into all of these categories.
Once you are able to do a lot of this well, you can post them in lovely shapes!
I love drawing wings, but I’m not the best at explaining my mentality when drawing them, so this is probably entirely convoluted - -*, sorry if this didn’t help at all, but please be honest if it didn’t, I just hope some of the recommended videos can help! Thank you for asking this lovely question! Feel free to ask anything else! I’d I didnt answer your question in a way that is helpful, please ask! I would love to elaborate! Of course, I highly recommend researching this for yourself, they might be a hell of a lot better at helping you than I will be, but I hope some of it translated? - -* I dunno, I suppose we’ll see! Please just ask if you have more questions, I promise I won’t be mad or ignore you! <3
