How to Draw a Cartoon Velociraptor

Compared to its bigger brothers, the velociraptor has a slender head. the arms are long and proportionate to its body (unlike the t-rex’s), and its often folded like a bird wing. Its tail is long (slightly longer than the trunk) and is stiff. The non-flexibility of the tail helps it to balance its weight. the neck is comparatively longer than a t-rex’s. just like most dinosaurs of this kind, its body is leaned forward when it stands to even out its weight.

• Draw an oval for the base of the body, and then a smaller oval for the head.

Use simple straight lines for lengths and folds of the legs, tail and arms. The legs should have three folds, from thigh to knee and from heel to toes. The arms also have three folds, from shoulder to elbow and wrist to fingers. Take note that a raptor is in a slightly crouched position.

• Start defining the thickness of the legs and the arms.

Just follow the folds of the lines you drew earlier so you’ll know when to change thickness. The calves of the legs are rounded and a bit muscular but the thighs should obviously be thicker. The toes of a raptor are thick and spread apart from each other. the arms are fairly slender.

• Complete the outlines of the raptor by drawing the upper portions.

Add more thickness to the head and the facial features. the oval base (for the head) should only occupy the muzzle and the eyes (with the side of the lower curve as the jaw line). The neck is thinner from the shoulder then widens as it connects to the head. the tail is pointed and stiff. And then add the sharp claws of the feet.

• Erase the base (ovals and first line marks) so you’d be left with only a clean outline of the dinosaur’s shape.

• Add the feathers of the raptor.

Put some feather lining to the top of the head and below the tail. Make some layers of feathers sticking out from the back of the arm. They should only be short and few (not an entire wing).

• Once you are done with the pencil outlines, start re-tracing them with pen or a marker. Start with the main shape of the raptor using thick/solid lines, and then use fine lines for inking the feathers.

• Add some more feathery texture.

Now we are going to create the body prints differently since the raptor is feathered. To portray this kind of texture, you would need to make the print outlines with thin continual lines also known as “hatches” in drawing. Short thin lines that are tightly close to one another and changes in angle to make a turn. Just simply start with a row of horizontal lines and the gradually turn the line horizontally as you get closer to the edge. These hatches would replace the fine outlines for the body marks/prints.

When you are finally done with the inking, apply the darkest tone of the main color to the edges of the outlines. Remember the division of each areas carefully, this could be a little tricky since they are divided differently.

• When you are done applying the dark tone of the main color to the edges, fill these respective areas with a brighter tone of the same color.

Now we are going to use two tone of the same color once again. This time, it would be for the color of the legs (from knee to toe). I would also apply this second color to the belly area of the raptor.

• Apply thee dark tone of the second color to the side edges of the legs’ outlines and also at the sides of the belly.

• Now fill these areas with the second color’s brighter tone. They should be the middle areas of the legs and the upper portion of the belly.

The area of the belly is almost hidden by the feathers of the arms, be careful not to exceed from the outline.

• Choose a third color and apply them on two parts of the body prints. You can also choose different colors on each if you like. I wanted mine to have one color for each paired areas of the bordered sections.

Just continue the coloring process for the body prints on a same manner. Choose a pair of areas and apply the colors.

• Apply your third chosen color to another pair of the bordered sections. Take note that when you are coloring areas that are bordered by hatches(continuous thin short lines)  then you should also apply colors to the borders as well because they have little gaps in between the short lines.

• Finally, finish the coloring by applying your fourth chosen color (for the last pair of bordered sections and for the feathers of the raptor. Just simply color the long curved claws with dark gray and you’re done.

You can put some background to your drawing if you wish, as long as your main drawing is completely colored already.

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