(Part 2) Top products from r/FurryArtSchool

If you're talking about the Christopher Hart ones (they guy who does all the "How to draw manga" books), then yea, they are pretty bad. They are so dumbed-down, and not in the good way like to make it easy for beginners, but to the point where they are flawed. They're OK if you want references for designs and ideas, but don't get them for instructions. And as for specifically drawing hyenas, I seriously doubt you'll find one that specifically shows that.

I'd recommend anything by Burne Hogarth (the details can be a little intimidating, but he's spectacular with teaching form and composition) for learning basics of anatomy and how the body works. Here's a link to his blog for a list of his books: http://burnehogarth.com/blog/books
If you're looking specifically for animal instructions though, there's one book I have that has helped, by Jack Hamm. It's not quite in the way of step-by-step, but it is good for hints on what to look for in finding the distinguishing details in animal anatomy. This one here: http://www.amazon.com/Draw-Animals-Perigee-Jack-Hamm/dp/0399508023

Without being dismissive about it though, really the best thing you can do is to practice and practice and practice. Looking to instruction books and "how to" books is OK for introduction and familiarizing yourself with a genre, but it's far too easy to get locked into bad methodology. Either because the instructions are actually bad (again as in the case of Christopher Hart), or because what works for one person doesn't necessarily work for another, and you don't want to stick yourself into a way of working that's not right for you just because you're "following instructions." Everyone has a process that works best for them, and it's best to find how you work.

If you have access to it, I think watching streams would be a good idea. Drawing is a process, so seeing a process is a good way to get into the swing of things. Again, just remember that their way doesn't have to be your way. Give what they do a try, but make yourself comfortable.

Some universal rules that I think are helpful:

• Remember that everything has form. What that means is that everything is made up of shapes. It feels like a throwback to kindergarden to turn triangles and circles into detailed pictures, but it's really true. Find the large shapes in everything.
  
  
• Work big-to-small. Big shapes first, then small shapes. Whole form, then parts. No one part of your image should be significantly more detailed than another.
  
  
• If you're working digitally, you have the advantage of being able to easily flip your image to check for balance. If you're working with pencil and paper though, it can be a little tougher; hold up your paper backward to a light source so you can see the mirror-image of your drawing, or use a mirror. Some things look right one way, but when you reverse it will look completely wrong. If this happens, fix the reverse side to make it look good before flipping it back the right way. Keep doing this back and forth until you like both the forward and reversed versions equally. That means your image is properly balanced.
  
  
• This is probably a little advanced for this stage, but will come in useful anyhow; again if you're working digitally, check your image by lowering the saturation slider to look at the picture in black-and-white. This will show you if your color scheme is too flat (you won't be able to tell the difference between differently-colored areas), and will make sure your areas of focus are noticeable. There really isn't a way to do this if working pencil and paper, unless you take a B&W photo of the picture to check. Also important, when shading, put about 50%-60% of your image in some sort of shadow (this is more for realistic styles though, so disregard if you're doing a simple flat-color cartoony style). Doesn't have to be super dark, but having prominent shadows helps lend a 3D effect to your shapes and adds a lot of depth.
  
  
• This is something I still struggle with; don't worry about a design looking "right." What this means is, don't get too caught up in anatomy and correctness. Artists take liberties with form all the time, and not to mention you're creating a creature that doesn't actually exist, so you're going to have to wing it a little bit. Worry more about the image being what you want it to be, that you have a piece you're happy with, not one that's perfect.
  
  
• And in the same vein as the last note, make sure you know what style you want to draw in. Do you like a more cartoony style, or do you want it to be more realistic? Study and reference art in the style you're going for. And don't be afraid of trying other styles, even ones you don't like. You never know what may end up working.
  
  
• Don't force yourself. Just starting out can be a hard thing, and a quick way to make it worse is to stress about it and try to force your way past it. If you find you're having a tough time, take a break. Go do something else for a little while, let your brain recharge, take a nap, and then come back to it with fresh eyes.
  
  Most importantly, and you've heard it a million times, PRACTICE. No one becomes an expert overnight. For many of us it takes years to get into our own style and even then, it will continue to change. Don't worry about what you're doing wrong, especially at the beginning, but retain what you do that you like. Look to others for inspiration, but in the end, make it your own.

Sure thing, glad I could help! You should post it again if you rework it, I'd be interested in seeing it after the changes.

As for resources:

The Loomis books are good, and free to boot: Figure Drawing for All It's Worth would be good for both anatomy and shading.

Gurney's Form Principle is great to know for shading, and his book color and light is an excellent resource for learning lighting, shading, and general color theory.

If you want to learn anatomy in more depth, something like Netter's anatomy coloring book might be good- I've been going through and copying the pages to learn the names of everything. Burne Hogarth and Bridgeman are also really good.

I also really liked ctrl+paint's Basic Photoshop Rendering for learning shading.

There's no substitute for practice, but there is one book that was highly recommended to me. It's called The Natural Way To Draw, and its focus is on gesture drawing. I'm sure you've done gesture drawing in the past, but perhaps this book can provide some new insight into the process?

My second recommendation is to keep track of cartoonists online. There's a whole community out there of blogs and tumblrs that circulate tutorials, student films, book recommendations, and other things that catch their eye. Some of my favorites include Izzy's Scribbles, The Living Lines Library, and The Pencil Test Depot.

There's so much more out there, covering not only animation, but character design, storyboarding, layout, etc., but part of the fun is tracking down these resources, so I'll leave you to find the rest. You should always be on the lookout for more reference both online and offline, and make sure your intake is balanced. Going outside of your comfort zone may provide that one insight or edge you need to land that job!

Happy drawing!

This is definitely a great approach! I wish more artists in this community would step back to study fundamental things like this.

I suggest looking at your references as you draw, and don't worry about memorizing it. That part will come with time. As you draw you'll become more and more familiar with the subject and won't need to use references as much.

Also I highly recommend the book Animal Drawing: Anatomy and Action for Artists. It's a collection of essays and detailed anatomical drawings of various species and has a ton of really helpful information. I go back to it any time I feel like brushing up on a species I haven't drawn in a while.

Example 1

Here is my red line, the legs was what I think could be improved on. I just put the legs in perspective and fixed it up.

Example 2

Here is the version showing the shapes to think about. Think about shapes and how they wrap around the body.

Another example showing the perspective.

Example 3

I would recommend is to practice drawing form. Here is a video explaining it.

The Basics: what they mean

Also read some books on animal anatomy I recommend :

Animal Anatomy for Artists: The Elements of Form

Science of Creature Design: understanding animal anatomy

Also here is a book about perspective:

Perspective Made Easy (Dover Art Instruction)

I hope it helps :)

Get the largest Wacom model you can find for the price and don't be afraid to look for used ones, because in your price range you will be forced to resign to small models and people tend to upgrade from them after a while, so such investment isn't particularly wise. Avoid anything with touch interface, it's widely regarded as useless, go for non-touch versions and save some money.

The closest competitors to Wacom are Monoprice tablets, but they have all sorts of driver and build quality issues. Huion is another leading competitor, offering a particularly attractive Huion H610PRO tablet for a very affordable price. That would definitely be a good alternative to Wacom products, but make damn well sure to test it before paying or at least make sure you have a very good return policy. I had to return mine, because it couldn't draw straight diagonal lines and it's not exactly an uncommon issue. But if you get a working model, for the price it can't be beat.

All non-Wacom products tend to have severe compatibility issues with Windows 10, so keep that in mind if you're running that.

Well, first thing would be using a scanner not based on SCSI ports, or using a cellphone from the early 2000s to take the picture. >3

There really isn't much to say beyond the tired "learn anatomy" line. You've got to look into things like Gray's Anatomy, or the Atlas of Human Anatomy for the Artist, or apps like Mara3D (iOS and Android available). Alternatively, go outside with a sketchbook and just... Draw people. Sitting on the bus for a while? Try to draw someone across from you. Waiting forever at a checkout in a food store? Draw the person in front of you (get their basic form sketched out quickly and then use them as a reference to fill out that form). Draw classmates over lunch, or colleagues at work, which ever is applicable. The more real things you draw, the better you'll get at drawing imaginary things.

The important thing though is to keep drawing. Filling sketchbooks with bad drawings will only help you improve. Just start from the inside out. You'll find that, like building, having a solid foundation to build a character on will make drawing easier. Make a simple stick figure skeleton with the correct proportions, learn your muscle groups, and the rest of the drawing falls into place.

Well that mostly comes from practice, you do something enough (like sketching furries) and it becomes almost second nature to do it right on the first time.

You'll find the more you draw and the more you get used to your own style then you'll sketch a lot quicker and with a lot less lines. You don't need to actively try to draw with less lines, you'll just find yourself doing it after some time.

I know a lot of artists that paint and just draw a big blob as their first sketch and kinda chisel it down into a beautiful form and it leaves me so confused! But keep working and trying new things and your artwork will do wonders.

Also if you like drawing dragons then I'd recommend this book. I have a copy and when I wanted to draw some nice and unique dragons it really helped.

Figure Drawing for alls it's Worth is pretty much my bible. I'm also pretty fond of Dynamic Figure Drawing by Burne Hogarth. I've learned quite a bit from opening either book to a random page a just drawing what I see.

Looks pretty good!

In the future, I'd suggest that you try to think structurally, building up basic forms before you try to solidify your contours. A professor I had in school used to repeat to us, "Earn your edges." What that means is that you should understand the forms that are in your image, and then define your contours based on those. What's a sphere? A cube? A cylinder? A combination of any of those? A distortion of those? Where is the cheekbone? The eye sockets? What can you break the shape of the bridge of the nose down to?

Obviously, you're not really going to know any of that just by default! That's when you bring in reference as you need it! Whenever you attempt to draw something, look references up for it. If you're drawing an ocelot, try looking at photos of them from various angles. See if you can discern what forms make up their heads. If you're not squeamish, you might even consider finding pictures of their skulls to really understand the underlying structure. Draw them as close to the references as you can! Start your sketch lightly and decide "This is a cube. I can take this cube and remove chunks to make the head shape. Here's a wedge shape. It fits here." After you've got this lightly drawn in, move on to darker pencils and start refining your edges. You can use those forms you defined to start deciding where light will go and how it'll behave on your drawing!

If you haven't already, I suggest you pick up copies of George Bridgman's Constructive Anatomy and Louise Gordon's How to Draw The Human Figure: An Anatomical Approach. Both of these books are chock full of information about breaking things down into simpler shapes and understanding what goes on under the skin of a figure, which is very applicable to anthro art!

Not necessarily accessible online, but here's an excellent book for drawing north American mammals:
http://www.amazon.com/Drawing-Wildlife-J-C-Amberlyn/dp/0823023796

And you might as well label me "weird": taxidermy catalogs. You can get a feel for the musculature of the species you are trying to depict.

Other than that, browse DA or FA.

I would say, if you really want to make fast progress, yes, art classes would help you tremendously! But of course, you could also very much manage on your own via resources like books (Artistic Anatomy helped me a bunch with male torsos)and online tutorials. The problem with that is that, sometimes it can be difficult to figure out what you’re doing wrong when you don’t have someone who knows art more than you to tell you what to fix.

I can also recommend one artist on YouTube who is both an online art teacher and does extremely in-depth tutorials; I learned so much from her it’s honestly ridiculous. She’s not a furry artist in the slightest; however, she specializes in character design and portraiture so a lot of concepts she’s taught in her videos I have applied to my own furry drawings. She, (Instebrak) does do online private tutoring though I’ve never participated.

The Art of Animal Drawing:... https://www.amazon.com/dp/0486274268?ref=yo_pop_ma_swf
This is a book on drawing motion and emotion of non human characters and its also pretty useful to have and study. It will teach you to make an artistic goal for an image.

Too true, so many tutorials and guides seem to focus too heavily on the technical skills and not enough on the proper artistic mindset. As someone to whom art did not come naturally, this book and its early chapters focusing on getting in the proper mindset of an artist has been more valuable than most anything else I've seen. I'd love to see more of that, not just here but in tutorials in general.

Looks like smallest Intuos Pro fits that bill.

I have an older version Intuos that I like a lot.

I really don't wanna pay for wireless and the battery and color idenitfyers when I'm never going to use it... what about something like this or this ?

Here are two books I'd recommend, https://www.amazon.ca/Animal-Anatomy-Artists-Elements-Form/dp/0195142144

And

https://www.amazon.com/Anatomy-Sculptors-Understanding-Human-Form/dp/0990341100