Clobbering Time: Thing Tutorial Part 1

[Bruce Lee]

DRAWING THING'S HEAD

One of the most difficult superhero characters to draw is Ben Grimm, AKA the Thing. A lot of artists struggle with this character because Ben has so many distinct characteristics that make up his physical appearance. My goal with this multi-part tutorial is to shed some light on of the unique physical aspects that make up the form of Aunt Petunia's favorite superhero. Along the way, I hope that these brief tutorials will help you, the artist, draw a better looking Thing. Naturally there is always room for every artist to exercise their own voice when drawing any comic character, but I hope the instruction given in these tutorials prove beneficial to everyone who has struggled with this character in the past. So without further delay let's take a look at drawing Ben Grimm's lovable visage:

1.1: THE THING'S HEAD AT A GLANCE

I specialize in drawing a "classic" Thing, so I'm going to focus on two different head types. The "lightbulb" shaped head is reminiscent of the sort of head Jack Kirby drew back in the 1960s (my personal favorite), and the "mushroom" shaped head is more the style of Ben's head in the 1970s and early 1980s before John Byrne slightly modified and streamlined the look. Presented below are both head shapes that can be used as a foundation on which to build a nice looking Thing head. I have included several notes regarding Ben's facial features. These are points of observation that help Ben have the identifiable monstrous look that we are all familiar with today. While I refer to the head's I've drawn as being "classic", I believe that the facial characteristics I'm pointing out here are actually timeless to a large extent, and are valuable tags necessary to convey the familiar look of the character. Below the image is a link to a higher resolution version (150dpi) of the image that is more suitable for downloading and printing. You may or may not have to reduce the image down a smidgeon to fit your printer:



Print version: http://www.lostonwallace.com/thingheads150a.jpg

1.2: THINGS TO AVOID

Below is a sheet of Thing heads that depict things to avoid when drawing the head. Three of these deal with head shape, and the rest deal with common facial feature placement mistakes, poor proportion situations, or some other commonplace aspect where an artist might veering away from Ben's familiar, classic design.



Print Version: http://www.lostonwallace.com/thingheads2150.jpg

1.3: THREE-QUARTER HEADSHOT--STEP-BY-STEP



Print Version: http://www.lostonwallace.com/thing3quarter150.jpg

[Bruce Lee]

Reserved space for tutorial

[Bruce Lee]

Reserved space for tutorial 2

[Bruce Lee]

Reserved space for tutorial 3

[Bruce Lee]

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[Bruce Lee]

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[Bruce Lee]

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[Bruce Lee]

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[Bruce Lee]

My apologies to all who posted in this thread before today.In an effort to make space for future updates for this tutorial, I accidentally deleted your comments while trying to reserve some space for the tut. You are welcome to repost them or post new ones.

Thanks for understanding.

Loston

[Ugga Bugga]

personally, I blame Ugga.