Designing Characters

• Anime characters are drawn to look as realistic as possible. Body parts like hands, feet and heads are drawn larger than normal to help make movement and emotion more visible and detailed. Eyes are drawn big and glossy, and hair is drawn in unique, crazy styles and colors to tell one character from another. The color of the hair and the eyes are almost always the same. In fact, many characters have things like hair, eyes and dress unified around a single shade that contrasts with another part like skin tone. This is especially true with "magical warriors" and other supernatural characters.
  
  

Drawing Poses

• Almost all poses are drawn asymmetrical because it is more realistic and interesting to view. Standing characters will have the weight of their bodies on one leg. This leg will be completely straight, and the corresponding hip will be higher than the other; not only will the other hip be lower, but its leg will be bent or shifting away from the body. A sitting character will be leaning forward or backward, with the weight of this position being on the upper body. Action poses are drawn to show intensity and an "all-out" attitude. This includes kicking or pointing a gun with the limb at full extension, running with arms and legs extending out and stretching and diving to one side to avoid an attack.
  
  

Scenes

• Scenery is drawn in extreme detail to the point in which you could actually draw a blueprint of the scene beforehand to use as a guide for drawing it later. However, this detail should be drawn in light pencil shades, as opposed to the dark outlines you should finish drawing your characters and foreground pieces with. While characters are drawn with contrasting colors, background should be drawn in shades that blend together, like similar shades of blues and greens. This helps the foreground stand out from the background since you want the characters to be the center of attention.