Doodle Penance: "step by step how to draw funny easy tigers"

This week's "Doodle Penance" is a pretty specific request. Someone came to our site looking for "step by step how to draw funny easy tigers." Apparently a lot of people consult our site while they're playing Pictionary.

Seriously, people. We're good doodlers and everything, but the person you really want to consult about this kind of thing is Ed Emberley.

Nevertheless, I am always willing to provide a service to our reader(s). Let's see... What do tigers look like?



Okay. First step, as usual, is to make an S.



Then, make another, more different S.



Still with me? Add a consummate V and a couple of tipped-over Cs. (I said consummate!)



Perfect! Now all you have to do is draw the rest of the tiger!



After that, it would be a good idea to color your tiger. (Warning: images at that link are dangerously cute.)



No, no, no. Tigers don't come in grape flavor.



That's better. But it doesn't look like a very funny tiger, does it? Let me rethink this a little bit. I need a more funny tiger.



Okay, that's a better start. He sure looks funny. But remember: as I said a couple of weeks ago, spot blacks sell your drawing. (Mike implied the same thing quite a while back, too, now that I think of it.)



Now that's a funny tiger. If you don't recognize this fellow, you need to wean yourself off of that Disney pabulum and read yourself a book.

(Seriously, I could go on and on about differences between the Disney Pooh material and the Milne-Shepard books, but Tigger is one of the major differences. In the movies, he's a goofy, bouncy, older-brother figure, full of self-assurance and manic energy. In the books, he's the youngest creature in the Hundred-Acre Woods: so innocent of his own identity that he spends an entire story discovering what it is that tiggers prefer to eat. (The answer? Extract of malt, naturally.) When Tigger bounces someone in the books, it's with the sort of "I don't know why I acted out" energy that two-year-olds have, not with any sort of intentionality. But that's got nothing to do with how to draw him.)

Where was I? Oh, yes:




Mike? What have you got this week?

—Nothing as adorable as Tigger, I assure you! And I fear that what I came up with is more on the order of "step by step how to draw cute tabby cats" than "...funny easy tigers," so we'll have to let our would-be artists add the essentials to make the creature properly tigerish (more whiskers on the side of the face would help). However, I did at least avoid the temptation to pull a Bob Weber, Jr., as you did with step 4 up there (seriously: check out step 1 of Weber's "How to draw a cow" by clicking here. Step ONE, I tell you!!!). No, I offer genuine, nigh foolproof instructions on how to draw a recognizable striped feline out of eleven extremely basic shapes. You may want to click to enlarge the text, but I'm pretty sure the instructions are legible without the words:



PS: I'd never heard of Ed Emberley, but I seem to have adopted his method, more or less. Because I'm here to serve the people! Step by step! How to draw! Easy! I take the people at their word. (Unless the word is "funny." Or "tigers.")