It’s no wonder why dogs are called a person’s best friend; they’re smart, lovable, loyal, and super cuddly! Did you know dogs and humans have been cohabitating for over
30,000 years? It’s incredible to think that we’ve had dogs by our sides for that long!
If your little artist loves dogs and wants to learn how to draw one, you’ve come to the right place! Dogs may seem a little tricky to draw, but if you follow our step-by-step guide, you’ll be drawing the cutest little puppy in no time! You may even learn a few fun facts as you draw!
Before you get started, pull up How to Draw: Dog on the Caribu app. Your budding artist can draw alone or call up their aunt and ask them to draw along!
Step 1 – Head
The first step in drawing your dog is to draw a circle for the head. The circle should be closer to the top of the page. Think about how big you want your dog to be, and use the circle size as the guide for the rest of your drawing.
Step 2 – Body
Step two is drawing the body. The body is oval in shape. The oval should overlap the bottom of the head by about a quarter. These basic shapes will be your guide to add more details to the puppy. You’ll erase some of the lines in step 11.
Step 3 – Ears
Next come the ears. Dogs can have big floppy ears or smaller pointy ears. For our drawing, let’s give our puppy floppy ears. To make these, we’re going to make two triangles. The top point of the triangle should start right about 10 o’clock on the left side and 2 o’clock on the right. The triangle should go all the way down to the top of the body (oval).
Step 4 – Front Paws
Now it’s time to draw the front paws. To make your puppy’s paws, all you need to do is draw a small oval underneath the oval for the body. The paws should be horizontal, instead of vertical like the body. After you draw the paws, it should look like the body is balancing on top of the paws.
Step 5 – Front Legs
You can’t have paws without legs, so let’s get to them! To draw the front ones, we’ll draw ovals again. Good thing you’re an expert shape drawer! Starting a little higher than halfway up the body, draw your oval going down vertically. The bottom of the oval should overlap the front paw a bit. Are you starting to see your puppy take shape?
Step 6 – Back Paws
Step six is to draw the back paws. These paws are drawn just like the front, with small horizontal ovals. To place your back paws, use right about where the front paw and front leg start to overlap as your guide. Once you find that spot, draw your oval going away from your dog on each side. It should be about the same size as the front paw.
Step 7 – Back Legs
What do the back paws need? They need legs, of course! To draw the back legs, you’ll draw an…you guessed it…oval! The back legs will be slightly smaller than the front legs. For the back legs, it’s easier to start at the back paw and work your way up.
On the left paw, starting slightly right of center, draw a diagonal oval going up. This oval will overlap the body and the front legs. Stop just before the top of the front leg.
Now, do the same for the right side. Starting slightly left of center, draw a diagonal oval going up. This oval will overlap the body and the front legs. Stop just before the top of the front leg, using the left leg as your guide. You’ll want both legs to stop about the same spot on both sides.
Step 8 – Tail
Our next step is to draw your dog’s tail. There are many different shapes and sizes of dog tails. Some are short, some long, and some bushy. Tails are important for dogs because they can help them balance. They can also be used as a rudder when they swim. A rudder helps them steer underwater.
Tails can also show your dog’s emotions. A tail that points down may mean your dog is nervous or sad. A tail that points up usually means that they’re happy. If it’s up and wagging, you have one excited dog!
Let’s draw a happy tail. The shape of the tail is going to be a thin half of an oval. Starting on the left side, start the tail at the middle of the back leg. You can curve the tail a little towards the puppy so that it looks like it’s wagging a bit.
Step 9 – Face
Step nine is all about that cute doggy face! Before you get started, draw guidelines to help you keep everything centered. First, draw a vertical line down the center of the head. Next, draw a horizontal line just under the center of the head. The two lines should cross over just under the center point.
Once you have your guidelines drawn, it’s time to draw puppy eyes. To make the eyes, draw two small horizontal diamond shapes just above the horizontal line, on either side of the vertical line. Then, draw a small circle in each eye. Great job!
Next comes the nose. Did you know that each dog has a unique nose pattern? The nose pattern on a dog is just like our fingerprints! To draw your dog’s nose, all you need to do is draw a triangle. The top of the triangle should be a straight line right on the horizontal line. The point of the triangle should face down, and meet at the vertical line.
To finish the face, we need to draw the mouth and tongue. For the mouth, start at the center of the nose and draw a U shape going to the left. Draw another U-shaped line going to the right. To make the tongue, make a small U shape right under the nose to connect the two mouth lines.
Step 10 – Details
At this point, you’ve drawn your dog! Now, all you need to do is add in some details to bring your puppy to life. Since you used a lot of simple shapes, all you need to do now is smooth out the harsh lines.
First, let’s work on the ears. Using the triangles as your guide, curve the lines to make them look more like a natural dog ear shape.
Next, you can slim out the face a bit so it doesn’t look like a perfect circle. You can do this by taking in the sides of the circle.
For the body, make the sides a little less round. Using the front legs as your guide, bring the body line from the top of the front leg to the neck, staying just inside of the body oval.
Finally, it’s time for the paws. At the bottom of each paw, draw a wavy line with three bumps. This shows their little fingers.
Step 11 – Erase Guide Lines
Now that you have your details drawn, make sure the lines you want to keep are drawn darker. Any line that you don’t want to keep, it’s time to erase them! You’ll end up erasing nearly all of the guides you had.
Step 13 – Spots
Look at your adorable little doggy! Now it’s time to add some spots. Here is the point where you can let your own imagination shine! You can add big spots, small spots, stripes, rainbow spots, or just leave them solid.
Step 14 – Color
The final step is to color your drawing! We colored our dog tan and brown, but you can use whatever colors you want. You can have a pink dog with green stripes, a black and white dog, a blue dog with green stripes, or anything in between. Have fun making your dog your very own!
Conclusion
Isn’t it incredible what you can create out of a few simple shapes? Using triangles, circles, and ovals, you can create the cutest little dog ever!
We can’t always be together, but that doesn’t mean we can build connections with our loved ones! At Caribu, we love building connections through playing together, reading together, doing crafts like making playdough, and even drawing together over video-calls.
Sources:
Tail – Pieces & Parts of a Dog – Best of Friends: Kids and Dogs | University of Illinois Extension
Study on the Viability of Canine Nose Pattern as a Unique Biometric Marker | PubMed