How to draw Skitty step by step.

Today we'll be drawing that sassy feline Pokemon Skitty as we continue our Pokemon series. Skitty looks and plays just like a real little kitten, chasing anything that moves and scampering about. But looks can be deceiving. When she pops out of her tree hole and looks around untrustingly you better be on her good side because that tail of hers can really do a lot of damage.

Step 01: Well, let's jump right in, shall we? As you can see in the picture above I'm using the red lines to guide the edges of the ovals and ellipses we'll be drawing to make up Skitty. You can too, by drawing something like a tic-tac-toe board with the middle being bigger than the top or bottom. But we won't be keeping these lines, they are just a visual guide, so make sure not to draw them too hard if you use them. You can always use the edge of another piece of paper to guide you as well.

We'll begin with a large squashed circle for her head. It should be slightly wider than high as above. Next for the body we'll use an oval shape under the head. The lower body oval should be a little more than half of the height of the head and the left side of the head and the body should be aligned. Next we'll start with Skitty's attack tail. Draw another ellipse on the left, nearly as high as the head with the bottom aligned with the bottom of the head and top of the body. Lastly, connect the body to the tail oval with a curved line that touches the body at the half way mark.
 

Step 02: Now, here's an easy step. Just draw two construction lines that look like two antennae sticking out from Skitty's head for her ears.

Step 03: Next, we'll connect the tips of her ears to her head. In the end they should look like leaves or if you are a poker player then they should look like spades :)

Step 04: This step is a two-parter. First, we'll begin by lightening the construction lines we've drawn so far. If you're using pencil and paper, then just take your kneedable eraser and lighten the construction lines a little bit. And if you're using Photoshop or another drawing software just adjust the transparency of the layer you're currently working in and create a new layer above in which to continue. Later on we'll be erasing all the construction lines so remember not to press too hard on the paper you're using.

For the second part of this step we'll add the center line and the eye line construction lines for the head and a couple of details to the ears. First, let's start with the eye line which should start at the point where the ear on the right touches the head and curves down to the left. It should hit the left side of the head line a little less than a third of the way up. Then, we'll draw the center line starting right in the middle of the head and curving to the left a bit. Lastly, we'll add some little wedge sprouts to her ears, two on each side of each ear.

Step 05: Ok, now it's time to give Skitty some legs to get around on. We're going to draw three legs that look like little acorns on the bottom of Skitty. The two on the right are front legs and the one on the left is her hind leg. She does have another leg, only it's hidden so we don't have to draw it ^_^ Make sure that the middle leg overlaps the body line a little bit giving her that 3d look we're aiming for.

Step 06: We're going to be moving on to some details now and giving Skitty a little more shape and some curves. We'll start simply with the tail by drawing three circles above the tail and connecting them with  straight lines to the tail. The line connecting the middle ball to the tail should overlap the tail construction line following our overlapping 3d principle to make it look more 3 dimensional.

Step 07: Here, we'll add Skitty's neck lines by connecting the head to the body. The neck line on the right should connect seamlessly with the leg line on the right that we drew in Step 5.

Step 08: Again, take a moment to lighten all the construction lines we've made so far using your kneedable eraser or Photoshop. And then we'll concentrate on Skitty's face. Skitty's eyes are squinted so it shouldn't be too hard to draw, just be careful of the position and length of her features. Begin by drawing the eyes with the one on the right a little wider and slightly further away from the center line than the one on the left and both touching the eye line.

A simple dot on the center line below the eye line will mark her nose. And her mouth is a simple line a little longer on the right side and more or less the same length as the distance between her eyes.

Step 09: Ok, moving right along. This step is a tad tricky as we're going to do Skitty's face mark/mask. Unfortunately, it's not centered on the center line. I think it was designed this way on purpose as Manga can be really stylized sometimes so it doesn't always follow the rules. The mark should look like a crescent moon when finished. It might be easiest to start with a single large circle and then cut out a half circle at the top to make the shape. Give it a try and don't worry if you have to do it a few times before you get it.

Step 10: Not too long to go. You're doing great so far. Now that we have Skitty's mask let's do his ears. At the tips of her ears we'll add another wedge shape in the middle. Notice that the middle wedge for the ear on the right overlapps the left wedge and is behind the right wedge and the right wedge overlaps the middle one. This is how we generate our 3d effect. Next add a knife blade shape inside the ear on the left. And for the ear on the right, start with an “S” shaped line and then draw the line inside curved upward a little bit making it look indented. In the end we have a nice 3d object.

Step 11: Great job with the ears. Just a little more and we're done. We need to draw the wave line that marks his belly and two more lines at the bottom of the body shape. The two lines should look like one line that is passing behind the front leg on the left (our middle foot in the picture above) and overlapping the edges of the other two legs.

Step 12: A little detail on the tail in this step. Begin by drawing 3 overlapping  “U” shapes at the bottom of the tail. Then, give her two lines around the construction line that connects the tail to the body.

Step 13: So now we've got everything we need and we're just going to lighten all the construction lines we've made so far before doing our final outline in black. When using pencil and paper just take your kneedable eraser and lighten all the blue lines until they are soft and just clear enough to outline. If you're using Photoshop or another drawing program the easiest way is to just create a new layer on top of the blue line construction layer and do all of copying in the new layer in black and then simply make the underlying layer transparent so you can't see it.

Step 14: Here we are, we made it! Our final step is to go over all of our final lines in black. Just trace over the construction lines and when you're finished and the ink is dry go over it one more time with your kneedable eraser to erase any lingering blue lines. In Photoshop, just make the underlying layer transparent after you've traced your final sketch in a new layer. And we're there!

As always make sure to try to draw Skitty again from memory as this will help you remember all the shapes and techniques and will enable you to design your own manga characters in the future. Try it several times till you are confident that you've got a hold of it and then try to draw him in different poses ^_^.