Space Gal!

As I mentioned before, Shane Glines is the hands-down best for cartoon women.  His "space gal" design is a winner in my book.

When we start drawing, it's a good idea to emphasize her hour-glass shape:

The distance from ankle to waist is so much longer than waste to shoulders. 

Then we build up:

Start with your basic shapes.  Work on getting the angles and proportions just right.  Believe it or not, this one is a clean up copy of many squiggles. When beginning a drawing it's hard to get your proportions just right.

We add all our basic details including the shape of the hair and the suggestion of gloves and boots.  Gotta love gloves and boots on a Space Gal!

Add the final features

And viola! you have your basic Space Gal.

In Glines' picture she unfortunately is bouncing a beach-ball sized eyeball in her outstretched hand.  Hey, you find strange things in space!

Glines' drawing is a study in flowing, logical lines and beautifully rendered shapes and spaces.  There is so much to be learned from this character.  To start with, let's look at the overall proportions:

We can see where the emphasis is: from the bottom of the feet to the waist is longer than from the waist to the top of the head.  The upper torso and head are compact and, in Glines' example, beautifully proportioned.

You can only describe her shape as voluptuous.  The flaring of the hips and the emphasized breasts certainly tell us she's all woman.  Solid without an ounce of fat.  The tiny waist emphasizes that ... but take another look.  As much as the waist, the shoulders also say "solidly built."

Do you see how the shoulders can emphasize compactness and solidity and indicate voluptuousness just as much as the waist or the hips?!  That's a new one to me... and this is turning into a real learning experience.

This one is not hard to draw but very tough to draw well.  Practice it and have fun with it.