How To Draw A Horse

There are lots of articles, videos and tutorials available online that claim to show you how to draw a horse, but what they are actually doing is showing you how someone else draws a horse!

That's like watching a trapeze artist, and being told you'll be able to do it yourself!

You're here because you want to learn how to draw a horse, and I will show you how.

I will show you how anyone can learn to draw a horse, without any experience of drawing whatsoever. My methods for teaching people how to draw really work, and in record time too!

All it takes is some time and practice.

Horses are beautiful creatures, and are perfect subjects for drawings and paintings. They're romantic and majestic, gentle and gracefull, yet strong.

In a certain light, a horse can look so muscular and powerful. Or another picture of a horse can be soft and serene. Whatever the mood you want to convey, you will soon be able to bring your horse to life in a drawing.

I will keep adding more information periodically, including diagrams and videos, so stay tuned! And remember to scroll down the page for more information!

All the best

Gemma X

There are two things you need to know before you start to draw a horse - or anything, and that is how it appears in 2D. This may seem obvious, but a picture, photo, drawing or painting of a horse is in 2D as opposed to 3D which is how you view it in real life (if you have two eyes!)

People often don't realise that their brains compensate for what they are seeing, by what they already know.

What do I mean by that? Well, let's say you were trying to forge a signature (and I would never recommend you do that of course, I'm just using an example of how your brain compensates)

So when you try to copy someone else's signature, you want to do it quickly so it doesn't look like it's copied, but the signature is quite a legible one, so you can tell what each letter is. But your brain already knows how to write, or ‘draw' these letters, because you have been doing it for years. So then your own experience of writing the letters clouds your ability to write like someone else.

However, if you were to turn the signature upsidedown, it may not resemble any letters to you, and you could probably copy the signature much better, because you do not have a preconceived idea of what you should be writing.

I am not suggesting you turn a photo or a picture of a horse upsidedown and copy it, but we all have a preconceived idea of what a horse looks like. We are familiar with its shape, but that does not mean we can draw one. Only when we can ‘see' in 2D can we begin to understand exactly what it looks like.

You will soon be able to produce beautiful drawings of horses.

Stay tuned!

All the Best

Gemma X

If you're feeling confident you may want to draw a horse directly, but you may find it difficult simply because the animal keeps moving. So in order to work from a stationary template, use either an ornamental horse, or if you want to work in 2D, which your drawing will be, use a photograph.

I draw horses from photographs of them standing in front of me but mostly of them moving. Some of the most popular images of horses are action drawings and paintings. Use natural light, and fill the frame with the horse if possible, so that it is big enough to produce a quality image. Most cameras have auto focus, so focusing should only be a problem if the horse is moving very fast, but if it's a bright day, there should be enough light to get a sharp action photo.

It's actually possible to draw from a less than perfectly sharp photo if there is enough information in the image regarding the shape.

Then when you've downloaded the photos, pick the best one, that you think would make a nice drawing.

If possible make a Black and White image of your photo, then you can print it out using black ink on cheap non photographic paper, to save your expensive paper and cartridges. Now you have your template.

It you cannot get a printout as good as the image on your computer screen, then copy from the screen.

Before You Start Drawing

Look at your photograph for several minutes. First look at the shapes. Regardless of what shape you know the horse is, what shapes are in this particular photo?

What are some standard shapes?

Circle, square, rectangle, triangle, oval, rombus or diamond. They will do to begin with.

There are probably shapes in your photograph that come anywhere close to one of these standard shapes listed

Maybe you've spotted a moon crescent shape, or a moon crescent shape with a hammerhead attached! Or maybe an unequal triangle with one of the corners curved upwards?

If you spend a few minutes, just studying these shapes, and forgetting exactly what it is a photograph of, then you will be able to draw your horse with ease.

Next, look at the highlights, and the shadows - the light areas, and the dark areas. Then very lightly draw the outline shape, but only where the outline is dark. Leave out the parts that are light.

I hope to show you this technique with a video very soon.

When you come to putting pencil or charcoal to paper, it's best to start lightly, and only in the dark areas. You can even shade very lightly the shadow areas, just to outline the shapes you noticed earlier.

We start off lightly because we can always add more on top, but can't take it away.

Comparing Shades

Next, we need to compare which areas are darker and lighter than others.

Let's imagine you had four different shades of grey paint. On your B&W printout of your photo, number the areas 1 - 5. You only imagine 4 shades of paint because white does not need any!

The areas on your printout numbered 1 are darkest, and the areas numbered 5 are the lightest. They will probably be white, and have no ink on the paper. The darkest areas shouldn't quite be black if you lightened the image.

If they are black, then compare them with the original photo. Is there detail in the fur that you cannot see in the printout? You need to be able to see detail everywhere on your image.

til next time

Gemma X