Are you a fashionista but hesitate to join a fashion course because of your weak drawing skills? You must love drawing clothes but are unsure of how to do it properly. This illustration offers you proper guide on how to draw clothes with easy steps. In fact, it’s a guide on drawing different kinds of fabric, including their basics and approaches.

How to proceed with drawing clothes

Various types and factors influence the drawing of folds and wrinkles. You can only understand basics of drapery with continuing study of folds, as there is no uniform rule. Going through more and more reference can help you draw wrinkles in a more realistic way.  Learn some common principles and draw more stylized drapery easily.

Materials

Drawing the folds and deciding on how diffused the shadows will be depend on the materials and their textures.

• The folds of thicker materials are wider and less visible.
• Soft and thin ones have most folds.
• Stiffer materials have more folds at the seams or the bending area. The type of the material and its heaviness decides the amount of folds. The folds in heavy fabric are of different volume and width.

You should have an idea and fundamental knowledge of common placements of the clothes seams. Folds are very much visible in the prominent seams. The transition between seams of a suit are noticeable. Sweaters have much lower arm seams. Tight cut clothes follow the body shape, while baggy clothes have many droopy folds.

More folds in too tight to too loose clothes look less elegant.

Worn-out fabrics crease more than well-maintained or new ones.

You should consider the character’s personality before drawing clothes.

External Factors

Wind and water affect the folds of the clothes. It gets stick to the body. Water makes a light material heavier and the thin fabric can be seen through.

Body movement while drawing clothes

The fabric is expected to get dragged down by gravity when the body rests. The lighter and wider the fabric is, more prominent the droopy folds will be. When the character bents, the fabric creates hollow shapes of various sizes. Wide materials squish together with lesser folds, and narrow materials have more bumps. Folds follow the twist and the material adapts to the movement of the form.  Arms dictate the pulling areas most, and the folds emerge there.

Pants

Pants are wider at the waistline and then starts narrowing down as it comes to the knees, while adjusting themselves to the legs’ bone structure. Creases are visible at the knees of narrow pants. Show the origin and volume of the bumps while drawing bumps. Imagine the folds in a 3D space to create a visual difference. The knee becomes the key pulling area when the leg is lifted.

Shadows

The shadows appearing around the wrinkles vary according to the thickness of the material. Combining soft and hard edges while shading folds is a nice idea.

It’s useful to consider the smoothness and softness of the material while drawing clothes. Smoother clothes reflect more light and have brighter highlights. Materials that are rougher and have more textures diffuse the light.

Also read:

• Painting with a Twist: How Breaking the Rules on Canvas Keeps Art Alive
• Fun 10 things to draw when bored: Beginner-Friendly Instant Inspiration
• A Beginner’s Guide to the loomis method – Creating Lifelike Faces
• lippan art design and Its Evolution: A Heritage of Reflection and Creativity
• Modern texture paint designs: The Fusion of Art and Innovation

The shading also varies between highlights or soft edges. Ultimately, it all depends on the material and that’s why try to familiarize yourself more and more with different materials before drawing clothes.