Drawing Horses Made Simple-
Finish the Steps by Adding Details


When drawing horses, details are what give the the horse it’s “life” and realistic qualities.


  • You may want to click on "tutorial beginning" if you just joined in and missed how we got to this point. That way you can get started correctly. Don't worry you'll be back here at just the right time.

If you have been following along you are now on step five where the outline will be finished and you'll finish your details and drawing.




Step 5: Upper Body, Face Details, and Begin Mane and Tail


(i) Start by drawing and finishing the outline of the upper half of the body.


  • Notice the withers gently slope into the horse's back. This comes from the top of your biggest body circle.


(ii) Next some face details


  • You'll keep it simple for starting the eye by following the shape seen in the picture above.
  • The nose or nostril is a simple curved line using the front of the outline of the face as the border
  • The mouth is a simple line


(iii) You’ll start the outline for the mane and tail


  • Draw a slightly curved line above the neck where the tresses will be.

The hair here is free flowing. A running horse's tresses will blow in the wind above their back as they move just like ours does.


  • Next outline the tail.

Horses will naturally lift their tail bone a bit when they are running or excited. That makes the hair a look a bit narrower at the top. That along with the wind catching the hair will send it flowing out behind them.




Step 6: Eye, Finish Mane and Tail, Muscle Definition, Erase Starting Shapes


(i) Fill in the eye with lines to darken it


Since you are doing a side view you won't see the other eye.


(ii) A couple of facial lines to create depth


As you can see there is a thin line drawn from around the eye down to the nostril. This will make your drawing more realistic by adding dimension to the face by indicating the bone beneath.


(iii) Erase the parts of the shapes you don't need that you used to block out the body and legs


For this drawing it will include the body and face circles, some of the triangles, and the leg join shapes.


(iv) Now finish the details of the hair


Here comes the fun part! Who doesn’t love drawing a long tail held proud and flowing in the wind?


  • Use a series of thin pencil strokes using your outline as a guide to finish the locks.



(v) For more definition sketch muscle detail on the neck and barrel


  • Follow the indications above including on the neck, shoulder, elbow, and flank.


This helps show the horses running action and gives more detail.


(vi) It doesn't show it here, but you can now add any more landscaping you'd like such as grass


  • Use your horizontal line as a guide


See, drawing horses isn't so hard is it? You finished this one! How did it turn out? If you are interested in trying some different tutorials go here.





Leave drawing horses to discover more great tutorials for drawing, pages about riding and working with horses