This tutorial shows you how to draw a tiger in a tattoo style, with a pencil and color pencils. With just a bit of patience, you can do it yourself. If you’re a beginner, you can check out our "How to Draw Animals" session of tutorials and specifically check out the one to do with drawing big cats. Pencils to the ready… let’s start!
Tools You’ll Require
- Mechanical pencil
- 2B pencil leads
- Faber Castell Classic Color Pencils No: 318 (Red), 314 (Orange), 383 (Saffron,) 380 (Taupe), 376 (Coffee), 378 (Umber).
- Ball point pen – 1mm
- Eraser
- Paper: any type
Although I am using Faber Castell color pencils, you can use your own branded pencils. I’ve mentioned the colors I’ll be using through out the coloring portion of this tutorial.
1. Outline Your Tiger
Step 1
Draw the half of circle. After that, draw two basic ears line on top of the head. I want to draw the tiger in profile view so I will make the base line of the nose and the rest of the half circle.
The sketching stage should always be drawn with light lines to make it easier to remove, so avoid pressing too firmly on the pencil.
Step 2
Draw the curves, waving lines for the back of the tiger. The line where it’s swollen will used as the shoulder of the tiger later. The line’s length of the back will four times longer than the diameter of the head.
Step 3
Draw basic lines of the stomach, two front legs. We will draw the tiger look strong and as if it’s hunting, so we will draw one leg is straight compare to other leg which is bent, as if he’s about to pounce.
Step 4
Now to draw the tail. The tail is going to be curved so it looks as if it’s in motion.
Step 5
Add the back leg for him and we are almost done for the basic form of the tiger.
Step 6
We will add the eyebrow, nose and mouth for it. The eyebrow is drawn narrowed to make it look serious. We also add lines for the front leg.
Step 7
Now we will work on the other front leg.
2. Add Stripes to Your Tiger
Step 1
Let’s start adding stripes to one of the front legs. I also add the eye basic line and ear.
Step 2
Draw the crumpled lines under the eyes of the tiger to make him look serious.
Add the lines above the mouth where we will add his whiskers later.
Step 3
Draw a lot of little spot follow the lines we’ve draw just now above his mouth. Those spot will look like pores later when we finish. Start to work on the facial strip too.
Step 4
More strip lines are added to his face. Also, don’t forget to add stripe lines around his mouth too,
Step 5
Add the last stripes to the head. I also make the line on the head bolder so it won’t make the head base line mix with stripes I’ll draw on the body.
Step 6
We will work on the body’s stripes.
Add the single lines to the place you want to stripe first. Then add parallel lines to those initial stripes to carry on the pattern.
Step 7
Add the claws to our tiger.
Step 8
Repeat the same step for the rest of the tiger’s body for the stripes. I also made the outline of the back leg bolder.
Step 9
Draw the strips and claws for the back leg. Erase all the sketch lines and keep the main lines.
Step 10
Let’s finish the stripes for the tail.
Step 11
Now we will start to work on the stripes to thicken them. Let’s add parallel lines with the base stripes drawn before and join them at the end to close them. I start to work on the tail first.
Also add the curve line behind the back leg to show the fourth limb.
Step 12
Let’s close the lines for the stripes on the head, around the neck and front legs. Also, make the lines of the front leg bolder and erase the sketchy lines.
Step 13
Let’s work on closing the stripes for the body.
Step 14
After completing the stripes, I noticed there are wide gaps between the stripes. So I’ve added more to fill this out.
The stripes don’t have to be the same thickness throughout. In fact it would be more natural if they varied.
Step 15
Add more lines on the tiger’s face.
3. Color Your Tiger
Step 1
Let’s start to shade the stripes. Fill the stripes with hatch lines. Use your normal pencil to do this as we’ll add color to them later.
Step 2
Add a base color of 378 (Umber) to his face.
Step 3
Continue to add the pencil shading to the stripes of the front leg and the neck.
On the leg of the tiger, the strip shade should be lighter on top and darker below. This is to give the impression of light coming from on top of the tiger.
Step 4
Use the color 378 (Umber) to add color at the leg and around the neck. It will be the lightest color we use for this tiger so fill this color in the lightest areas of the tiger.
Step 5
Add the color 376 (Coffee) to his face and neck. Add this color to the shading of the stripes and around the stripe areas.
Step 6
Again we will use color 376 (Coffee) on his leg. At dark area such as between legs and body, applied few layers of this color instead of one only.
Never press hard on pencils, especially when coloring. Build up layers of color to increase the intensity. If you press too hard, the area you’re working on will become shiny and it may distort the paper.
Step 7
Apply the pencil shading for the body of the tiger so we can continue to color his body.
Step 8
Now it’s time for using ball point pen to touch up a few parts of the tiger to add contrast. For example: a bit of his mouth, paws, tail, a very few strips on the tail, dark area such as between the legs and body, under the ear, etc.
Step 9
The skin part under the front leg seems it doesn’t have enough contrast, so I will use the ball point pen to apply one shading layer on it.
Step 10
Use the color 378 (Umber) to add a base color to the tiger. At contrast area as we mention above, apply few layers instead of one until it looks as balanced in color as the head.
Step 11
Repeat the previous step for the rest of the tiger. For the contours of the muscles and body, you’ll need to add extra layers of 378 (Umber) as shown below.
Step 12
Add 376 (Coffee) in the darker areas and blend that color out a bit around shading area.
Step 13
Add 383 (Saffron) for whole body but only in small areas where we know the tiger has white fur such as paws, under the ear and a bit at the mouth.
Step 14
Use colored pencil 380 (Taupe) to color the feet of the tiger.
Use 314 (Orange) apply a very light layer on the leg and shoulder area after it.
Step 15
Use 318 (Red) for the nose
Step 16
Use 314 (Orange) almost all over the whole head since the head still looks a bit unbalance to the rest of the bodies coloring.
Step 17
Use 383 (Saffron) to fill up any part you feel is unbalance and not blended well. This color can be used as a blending color for this tiger.
Awesome Work, You’re Now Done!
And now we are done! I hope you’ve enjoyed this exercise in creating a tiger in a tattoo style. Colored pencils are a fantastic medium to work with. Check out more of my tutorials to find more exercises with colored pencils.