How to draw a fox
How to draw a fox
How to Draw a Fox
This article was co-authored by Rebecca Schweiger and by wikiHow staff writer, Christopher M. Osborne, PhD. Rebecca Schweiger is a Professional Artist, Published Author, and the Founder of The Art Studio NY, New York City’s #1-rated art school and global online art studio. Celebrated by TV networks, press, and celebrities including NBC, ABC, E!, Time Out New York, The Kardashians, and Big Bang Theory’s Jim Parsons, Rebecca specializes in creating abstract artwork and teaching studio art classes. Her art studios provide 100+ weekly, beginner-friendly drawing and painting art classes to people around the globe. With more than 22 years of art experience, she is the author of Release Your Creativity: Discover Your Inner Artist with 15 Simple Painting Projects, and her artwork has been exhibited in more than 50 museums and galleries around the world. Rebecca holds a BFA in Painting from Boston University’s School for the Arts and has participated in acclaimed artist residencies worldwide.
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Foxes are distinctive, easily-recognizable animals that make a good subject for drawing. Whether you’d like to draw a fox in a cartoon style or a more realistic fashion, start by sketching a pencil outline made of various circles and ovals. Then, fill in the finer details and enhance your initial outline with a pen or marker. Finish off your fox drawing by adding a splash of color, then try your hand at some more cute animals!
How to Draw Animals: Foxes
Foxes are beautiful animals that some of us would gladly keep as pets. Their distinctive look make them quite easy to draw, especially that they’re similar to dogs in many aspects. But what differs the various fox species? And how to create your own species without making it looking odd? Keep reading and I’ll show you!
1. How Do You Characterize a Fox?
It may seem a weird question, but it’s important to answer it in order to draw a fox instead of a dog. Foxes belong to the same family as dogs (the Canidae) and they share a lot of traits, like the overall shape of the body, eyes, paws, ears, nose, muzzle and tail. Actually, they’re so similar that you can successfully use my tutorial about dogs to draw these parts. However, you need to keep in mind following differences:
Let’s take a look at the main differences between the dog and the fox body. You should have no problem with recognizing who is who, even though I made them in the same size for easier comparison.
A difference between a dog and a fox
The illustration below shows many features characteristic for a fox. Not all of them need to be met, especially when you’re not drawing a true fox. The features that need to be drawn mandatory are:
Optional features that you can use when creating your own fox species are:
2. Draw the Red Fox
Body Features
The most popular species is the red fox. You can use it as a template for every other species, keeping in mind the differences between them.
Color
Head Proportions
3. Draw the Gray Fox
Body Features
Although the gray fox isn’t a true fox, its popularity provided it a place in this tutorial.
Color
When observing foxes from distance, you can easily distinguish it from the red fox by noticing the colors:
Head Proportions
Keep in mind the gray fox head is smaller, with shorter muzzle, it also looks more puppy-like.
4. Draw the Arctic Fox
Body Features
The arctic fox is easily recognizable, fluffy animal from tundra. Its winter form is the most popular:
When summer comes, the winter coat becomes redundant, and our arctic fox passes into its less impressive form:
Color
Head Proportions
Fluffy head of an arctic fox may bring a polar bear cub to mind.
The fur changes proportions of the head, so keep it in mind in the last phase of sketching.
5. Draw the Kit Fox
Body Features
The kit fox looks similar to a coyote, but it’s still a true fox.
Color
Head Proportions
To avoid a resemblance to the fennec fox, make the face longer, and the ears pretty pointy.
6. Draw the Fennec Fox
Body Features
The fennec fox is surely the cutest of them all, and, surprisingly, still belongs to true foxes family. These small foxes live in groups and are very social, what makes them easy to tame.
Color
Head Proportions
A fennec fox head is small, with short muzzle, huge eyes and ears and small nose.
Congratulations!
Now you can draw any fox keeping the characteristic features of every species. You can even create your own species, keeping it anatomically accurate! If you like other animals too, take a look at whole How to Draw Animals series.
How to Draw a Fox – Step by Step Fox Drawing Tutorial
Simply follow this easy how to draw a fox step by step tutorial and you will have your fox drawing finsihed in no time. It’s super easy and kid and begginer friendly.
In this tutorial will learn how to draw a cute easy cartoon fox, that is easy enough for kids in kindergarten and cute enough for older ones (and you) to love too.
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Fall is the best time of the year to start learning all about forest animals, and drawing them, as well as other animals too. This fox drawing tutorial is one of the many step by step drawing tutorials that are super easy to master and will have you or your kids drawing good drawings in no time..
We aim to make our tutorials as simple as possible so they are great for young kids.
How to Draw a Fox Tutorial
Step by Step Fox Drawing Instructions
Step 1
Start by drawing an “valley” with a slightly triangular feel to it.
Step 2
Draw an arch. This completes the shape of the fox’s head.
Step 3
Draw to arches withing the head.
Step 4
Draw ears and facial features – eyes and nose/snout. Keep the shapes simple.
Step 5
Draw the shape bellow the head – almost like you would draw a heart, just without the top.
Step 6
Step 7
Continue with drawing the body.
Step 8
Next comes the tail.
Step 9
And the last touch, the details to the tail.
All done – you have just learned how to draw a fox.
Step 10
Optional but always fun: color in your fox drawing.
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SketchBook Original: How to Draw Foxes
This post has been originally commissioned for SketchBook Blog in 2016. After the site’s migration, the original is no longer available, but you can still access the content here. Enjoy!
I have shown you How to Draw Wolves. I have shown you How to Draw Cats. Now it’s time to learn how to draw a wolf with a spirit of a cat — the fox. Of course, there are many species of foxes, but with my tips you’ll be able to draw every existing (and imaginary) fox species.
Basic Fox Anatomy
As always, let’s take a look at the skeleton of a fox first to see its proportions better. Because foxes are so similar to wolves, correct proportions are the key for a true fox look. You can remember it this way: A fox has long legs of a wolf attached to an elongated body of a cat.
Try to sketch the skeleton a few times to get a good grasp of the proportions.
Can you see how similar it is to a wolf skeleton?
You don’t need to know every muscle of a fox body, but just the forms they create. Let’s build the body now, step by step, in a simplified way to remember it easier. You don’t need to use exactly the same steps to draw a fox. Instead, learn from my method to create your own, personal way.
First, the elongated, narrow main body. Divide it into fourths to keep the proportions correct.
Add the volume to the forequarters and the hindquarters. They’re not very thick.
Add the “hands” and “feet” with paws. Defining the heels may help you add the calves later. The paws should be quite small, fitting the slender legs.
Finish the limbs.
Add the neck, the tail, the chest details, and the stretchy skin between the limbs and the body. It’s not always necessary to draw them all, but make sure you know that they are here.
This was the anatomical view of a fox body. Depending on the species, age, and season, foxes may have this slender outline of the body covered with fluffy fur. In extreme cases, the fox may look like a fluffy sausage with legs!
Here’s the whole simplified muscles diagram if you want to use it as a reference:
How to Draw a Fox Head
The body is one thing, but the head requires more of our attention. Here the proportions are even more important, so don’t just copy the process I’ll be showing you—analyze the steps and try to find the relations between the elements, something you can remember later. Of course, you don’t need to repeat the steps in exactly this order every time you draw a fox. Once you know what the goal is, you can skip the steps, rearrange them, or do a few of them at the same time.
Start by defining the position of the eyebrow and the direction of the muzzle. Keep perspective in mind!
Define the length of the front of the muzzle. It’s quite short in foxes.
Outline the skull keeping the muzzle slightly pointed.
Add the teardrop shape of a muzzle. Keep it narrow.
Put some upside-down “glasses” on the top of the muzzle—this is the eye socket area.
Define the flat front of the muzzle. This is more helpful than it looks!
Draw lines across the nose towards the forehead.
Draw the eyes in the center of the eye sockets.
Outline the nose and the lower eyelid.
This will be the whiskers area, an important part of a fox muzzle—it creates that cunning fox smile!
The lips go quite far, almost to the eye level.
Time for the ears. Foxes have them huge! (some species bigger than others)
Once you have all the guidelines in place, you can draw the details of a fox face. The eyes have a typical canine look, with clear dark outline. Surprisingly, the pupils of foxes are slit, like in cats.
Notice that the fur-dots over the eyes are smaller than in wolves. Usually they’re not distinctively colored.
Foxes have characteristic small noses at the end of their pointed muzzles. They may be slightly protruding up.
Don’t forget about the whiskers and fur!
How to Draw Fox Paws
Fox paws look a bit like a cross between wolf and cat paws. They have non-retractable claws (pink or lightly brown), but they’re quite compact and rounded. To start, imagine you’re creating a wire sculpture of a quadrupedal animal and that you want it to stand surely on its wiry legs. Narrow loops bent flat on the ground should do the job.
“Extrude” the flat paws to add volume to them.
Add volume to the wrists/ankles to define the width of the limbs.
Connect the paws with the wrist/ankle. That bridge between them must have a 3D volume as well. Don’t forget abut the dew claw on the inner side of the front paws.
Create a flat hump on top of each paw. This will add detail to each toe.
Finish each toe with a rounded tip and a claw.
Finally, add the final lines over the guidelines. Don’t forget about the wrist pads (not visible in this view).
How to Draw True Foxes Species
There are many species of foxes, so you need to learn some more details if you want to be more realistic in your drawings. I will show you a few things about popular species, but make sure you study them thoroughly from photos to get a more complete picture.
Red Fox
The most popular species, almost synonymous with the name “fox” is the red fox. You can treat it as a default species for a fox, with a typical head and body you can then reshape to create some other species. The muzzle is long, tapered, with the whiskers area quite far from the eye. The eyes are usually orange or light brown in color.
The body will have a different perceived shape depending on the season, so keep it in mind when studying the photos.
Fennec Fox
Fennec fox is the chihuahua of foxes. It has a tiny body with a disproportionately big head. The ears are huge, and so are the eyes. The muzzle is short, very pointed, with a tiny nose. The eyes are dark brown, so dark that the pupils are usually not visible. They’re still slit, though!
Arctic Fox
Most foxes change their coat for winter, but this species takes it to extreme. It’s dark brown in summer, and pure white in winter. The length of fur changes drastically as well, so these two forms of the same fox may look like two different species! Other than that, the arctic fox looks very similar to the red fox, with slightly sturdier muzzle and smaller ears, often made visually smaller by the fur. The eyes are yellow or brown.
Corsac Fox
This fox looks like a smaller version of the red fox. It has big eyes, a slightly shorter muzzle, and has a kind of puppy look to its body. The eyes can be bright yellow or brown, and the pupils are round, which is unique among foxes.
Kit Fox
This fox looks like a grown up pup, with its big eyes and ears. It has a slender, but very small body, with beautifully elongated skull. Their eyes are dark brown, though not as dark as in fennecs.
Tibetan Fox
This fox got famous by its characteristic wide cheek-mane, making its face look square. It’s not the only characteristic feature of these foxes, though—to draw one, keeps its head disproportionately big. Make the eyes small, narrow, yellow in color.
How to Draw “False” Foxes Species
These were so called “true foxes,” foxes from vulpes family. But there are also other canids called foxes because of their appearance, though they’re not so closely related to any of the vulpes, or to each other. I included them in this tutorial, because they are fox-like enough to draw them using the same methods.
Gray Fox
You can see right from the proportions of the head the difference between a gray fox and true foxes. Its muzzle is short, and the eyes are big and dark. The head seems slightly too small for the body. This is the only fox that can climb trees!
Bat-Eared Fox
As the name implies, this animal has huge ears, comparable to fennec foxes. It has smaller eyes than fennecs, though, and the muzzle is longer. The legs are not as fluffy as the main body, so they may look very thin in comparison. The eyes are dark brown.
Crab-Eating Fox
This fox shares some visual similarities with a weasel, so you must be very careful not to use too many vulpes features in its head. The body is slender with almost streamline head and neck. The eyes are brown, but not very dark.
How to Draw a Fox Step by Step
Enough theory! Now we’re going to draw a few foxes step by step using all the knowledge from the previous part. I want you to draw with me, but in a special way: Don’t copy the lines I draw, but instead use the tutorial to achieve the same results. This way you’ll learn how to draw a fox from imagination, not from copying someone else’s drawing.
Step 1
Sketch the skeleton quickly and loosely. It doesn’t need to be detailed, but make sure the proportions are roughly correct, and that you know what kind of perspective you’re going for. If you know how to draw a simplified skeleton of a fox from imagination, but you can’t come up with any natural pose, take some time to sketch various poses from photos.
Step 2
Draw the main body, dividing it into fourths to create the shoulders, the thighs, and the body in between.
Step 3
Draw a line from the body until you reach the “ground.” Then draw the perspective of the ground to make it a point of reference for the body.
Step 4
Draw the basic shape of the skull and attach it to the neck.
Step 5
Draw the legs of each fox, finishing them with the wiry structure of the paws.
Step 6
Add the volume to each part of the body.
Step 7
You now have enough guidelines to create the final drawing. Don’t worry if at this point your fox doesn’t resemble the species you were going for. The pattern of fur, especially the dark stripes between the eye and the whisker area, are a crucial part of the species look.
Step 8
Color the drawing, if you wish, or at least darken the crucial parts of the pattern.
That’s All!
The tutorial is finished, but this guide is just a beginning—now it’s time for you to work on your own. Remember: The best way to learn how to draw foxes is to draw them! Your first drawings may be bad, but don’t let it stop you from practicing. Sketch a lot, actively search for mistakes and solutions for them, and you’ll see yourself getting better with every drawing. And don’t shy away from references—use them as long as necessary to understand foxes completely.
How to Draw a Fox Step By Step – For Kids & Beginners
Welcome to the tutorial on how to draw a Fox, step by step, for kids and beginners. Fox are wild animals with more than 40 species all over the world. They are the most cunning, wily animal, used in many phrases as a stone-cold fox, fox trap, fox sleep. They are similar to dogs as well as cats but have much more abilities than them.
Foxes can dig underground and climb trees.
Russians started domesticated silver species of red fox. Their looks, floppy ears, their color coloration, body spots are similar to a dog. We have encoded few characteristics of foxes below.
By following this step by step tutorial you can draw fox without any difficulty. Use your drawing utilities like paper, pencil, eraser, to start your drawing. Follow each step by step automatically you will render your fox. You can draw other wild animals wolves, elephants, giraffes also.
How to draw a realistic Fox:
Step 1: For drawing fox firstly draw a circle with a mark inside it for the head and an oval for the body.
Step 2: At the back draw 2 curvy lines and form a tail by joining them at the end.
Step 3: Draw 2 pointed ears on both sides of the top of the head. Add 4 lines for the guidelines.
Step 4: From the center of the head draw a snout for fox and define the former leg with other simple lines.
Step 5: From the end of the left ear extend an extra line from beneath the snout draw a curvy line and bring it to the former legs.
Step 6: Add outline for eyes and mouth of the fox in the head, draw the second front let.
Step 7: Define the eyes and ears, shapeup the legs and the toes.
Step 8: Draw fur all over the body, follow the body line especially. for the fur, you can use the hatching technique or simple lines as in the image below.
Step 9: Erase all the extra lines and define the intense eyes, nose and other details.
How to draw a cartoon fox for kids:
Step 1: Start your drawing with head, depit it with a circle.
Step 2: Draw a U shape extending towards the outline of circle and 2 small circles both side, for the eyes.
Step 3: Draw 2 ears with upright triangular shape.
Step 4: Draw the body with long curve.
Step 5: Below the body time to draw legs, as it is sitiing.
Step 6: From the top of body draw another legs.
Step 7: From the back of the body draw a long furry brush tail.
Step 8: Give your fox a background, draw mountain, cloud, and sun.
Step 9: Color your fox with shades of brown and black, and rest drawing with your choice of colors.