How to Draw a Bear – Blancer.com Tutorials and projects

Final product image — What You’ll Be Creating

Of all the mammals, grizzly bears are one of the easiest to draw—they are big and plump, with thick fur concealing the silhouette, and they’re plantigrade, so their legs are similar to ours. Moreover, their characteristic face with tiny eyes and a huge muzzle makes it easy to keep the proportions right. So, even if you’re a complete beginner at drawing, you can safely try drawing a realistic bear with me!

This is going to be a very simple tutorial about drawing a bear in a single pose. If you want to learn more about drawing bears, their anatomy and species, try this tutorial instead:

Drawing

How to Draw Animals: Bears and Pandas, and Their Anatomy

Monika Zagrobelna

1. How to Start a Drawing of a Bear

Proportions are the key to a realistic drawing of an animal. If the legs are too short or the head too small, even the most elaborate details will not make it look good.

That’s why we should start every drawing with a rough sketch of the proportions before we invest any time in the details. Such a rough sketch can show us the whole silhouette in a simple way, so we can see the mistakes when they still can be fixed.

This rough sketch should be drawn lightly, with subtle lines that can be easily erased. Draw this way until I tell you to change the technique.

Step 1

Sketch an oval. It doesn’t need to be perfect or drawn with a continuous line. This will be the huge body of our bear.

Step 2

Divide the height of the oval into halves.

Step 3

Under the oval, mark a distance slightly shorter than half of the oval’s height. This will show us how high the body is over the ground and will create a proper proportion between the torso and legs.

Step 4

Draw a “perspective cross” under this line. This will show us the perspective of the scene and help place all the elements of the body accordingly. Without it, our bear would look flat and boring.

Step 5

Sketch the rhythm of the legs, placing the “paws” on the perspective cross. Draw the whole hind legs and the lower half of the forelegs.

Step 6

Sketch the huge arms and shoulders using a “6” shape.

Remember about the perspective!

Step 7

The length of the neck is one of the trickiest spots when it comes to drawing animal proportions. To keep the bear’s body correct, borrow the length of the neck from the length of the leg.

Step 8

Speaking of tricky spots, the size of the head is another one. Bears don’t really have round heads, but they seem to, so let’s draw this basic silhouette of it first.

Step 9

Let’s set the proportions of the face as well. First, mark the forehead and the eyebrow line. Remember that the head is not flat—you’re drawing in perspective!

Step 10

Draw the line of the nose and the nose itself on the end.

Step 11

Draw the eye sockets. Sketching them instead of the eyes at this point gives us a better picture of the whole face—we can imagine the eyes, the cheekbones, and the eyebrows without actually drawing them.

Step 12

Sketch the width of the nose bridge.

Step 13

Draw the muzzle using a teardrop shape.

Step 14

To better see the 3D form of the muzzle, sketch its flat front.

2. How to Draw a Bear’s Body

Your sketch should already look bear-like, even though it lacks so many details. Look at it closely and try to notice if anything looks amiss. It’s the last moment to fix the proportions! But if you’re happy with them, let’s add the big muscle and fur masses that give volume to the body.