In this tutorial, I will teach you how to draw Link, Nintendo’s main icon in the popular video game series the Legend of Zelda. This easy to follow, step by step tutorial will guide you through the whole process of creating an impressive and believable rendition of the well-known protagonist in the action-adventure game world. We will start by drawing a dummy that will serve as a base over which we will draw our final sketch.
So, how to draw Link?
If you want to draw Link from the Legend of Zelda, you should follow these simple 7 steps:
• Step 1: Drawing the torso and the hips
• Step 2: Drawing the legs
• Step 3: Drawing the arms
• Step 4: Drawing the head
• Step 5: Drawing the weapons
• Step 6: Drawing the final line art on top of your dummy
• Step 7: Coloring
Step 1: Drawing the Torso and the Hips
I always start withdrawing the torso. Once the torso has been outlined, drawing the hips, arms and legs becomes a lot easier. The torso will be divided into two parts using a vertical line drawn from the base of the neck to the slightly curved line where the abdominal area meets the hips. Because of the drawing is from a 3/4 view, the line will pass through the centre of the torso. The nearer side of the drawing, which is on the left from the viewer’s perspective will be larger than the right side which is further from view.
Next, I will also draw a curve line across the centre of the torso. The line divides the torso into upper the lower areas. The upper area represents the character’s ribcage while the lower area indicates the abdominal area, the space separating the torso from the hips. On top of the torso, I will also draw another curve line, this one defines where the clavicle will be. Just above the clavicle, I will draw an ellipse to indicate where the neck will be situated. Another ellipse on the character’s right side will also indicate where the right arm will be drawn.
Afterwards, I will draw the hips of our character. I usually draw the to hips to look as if the character was wearing a male underwear. It makes it easier to draw out the lower parts of the body.
Step 2: Drawing the Legs
Our character will be drawn standing. But it is not just any stance. The link will be posted fully alert and ready. The right leg is slightly extended forward to give the viewer a full frontal view. The left leg remains behind leaving only a 3/4 angle in the viewer’s perspective.
• The thighs
The thighs will be drawn as huge tubes. The wider part is where the legs are connected to the hips while the thinner part is where the thighs meet the knees.
• The knees
The kneecaps will be drawn as ellipses on the joint. Link will be adorned on her full armour so the ellipses will give you a good idea of where to place the kneepads. While the right knee pad will be placed in the centre because of the frontal view, the left kneecap will be more sideways and narrower
• The calves and shins
The calf of the right leg is not visible because of the frontal view of the right leg. The calves are visible on the left leg and will be drawn as a short curve with a long line descending to the ankle. The shin on the right leg will be drawn as a concave curve while the right leg will be drawn as a straight line from the knee to the ankle.
• The feet
Our character’s feet will be represented using distinctive geometric shapes. Because of Link’s pose, the right foot is in full view, however, we will only draw and 3/4 angle view of the characters left foot. Drawing the toes will be totally unnecessary as Link will be in full armour which will hide the toes.
Step 3: Drawing the Arms
The next chapter on our journey will be to draw the arms of our character. The right arm is bent at a 90 degrees angle at the elbow while the left arm is just held out beside the body. I usually draw the shoulders as egg-shaped spheres. However, because of the 3/4 view, the left shoulder not fully visible so we will just connect a curve line to the torso where the shoulder is supposed to be.
• The biceps and triceps
For the biceps and triceps, we will draw two tubes for each arm. The tubes start out thick at the point of connection to the shoulder gradually thinning out as the approach where they are connected to the elbows. The biceps and triceps are visible on both arms and will be drawn accordingly.
• The Forearms
The right elbow will be aligned with where the floating ribs are situated on the torso. The left elbow is placed just a bit lower on the other side of the body. Both forearms are in view and will be drawn as tubes which become thinner as they get closer the wrist where they are connected to the hand. The right forearm will be drawn horizontally because it is bent at an angle at the elbow. As such, the right wrist and hand will be placed on the hips. The left forearm is simply extended out beside the body so it will just be drawn vertically with the wrist aligned with the crotch.
• The hands
Both hands appear to be folded in, but not in a clenching manner. For the right hand, the back of the hand and the folded fingers are still visible. The back of the hand will be drawn as a trapezoid and the fingers as rectangles. The back of the left hand is not visible, what is in the viewer’s perspective is the side view of a folded hand showing a folded in the thumb and some fingers which will be represented with rectangles.
Step 4: Drawing the Head
If you are having trouble drawing the human body, let me recommend you our tutorial on “How to draw the Human Body”. This tutorial will guide you step by step and will teach you how to draw properly the human body.
Step 5: Drawing the Weapons
Link will be drawn fully armoured for war and that being said, the next element we are going to draw will be the weapons; a protective shield and a Master sword (a powerful magical sword wielded only by Link). Our character holds the shield on the right arm which fully covers the forearms and leaving the biceps and triceps barely visible. The sword is on the left hand facing downwards at a slant angle. Regarding the drawing of the weapons, you will just draw the shield over the forearms and part of the biceps, but pay attention to how you draw the sword as the fingers are wrapped around the hilt.
Step 6: Drawing the Final line Art on Top of Your Dummy
Now we are going to dress up Link in full armor as seen on the Legend of Zelda. Just so you know, this is where the fun starts. My recommendation would be to partially erase parts of the dummy so that the underlying structure does not interfere with your drawing.
• The torso and hips
Our character wears a tunic which covers the torso and extends over the hips. The tunic has short sleeves which cover the biceps and the triceps. We will also draw a gorget, a piece of armour worn around the throat. Link also wears a leather belt around the waist and another leather belt which is strapped across the torso and over the shoulders to hold the back pack.
• The shield
We will draw markings and shapes on the shield using simple geometric patterns.
• The
In this case, we will draw a vambrace over our character’s left forearm, the only visible forearm. We will draw the vambrace using geometric shapes like rectangles and trapezoids.
• The legs
Here, we will focus on Link’s footwear. The feet are covered in a simple boot while the calves and shins are enclosed in a metal protective covering which extend from the knees to the feet.
• The head
To draw the face, we will have to consider the unique facial features that will make our character easily recognizable in the Legend of Zelda video game series. Below are four distinctive facial pictures we will be putting into consideration;
I. Link has a head full of hair which cover a large part of his forehead and hangs out behind the ears.
II. Our character has a signature headwear – the Phrygian hat, a type of soft and long pointy cap.
III. Our character has pointy ears which give him a somewhat elf-like look.
. Link is the only character in the Legend of Zelda series who can wield the Master
Drawing faces can be sometimes a challenging task. If you wanna learn How to Draw Faces properly feel free to check our tutorial.
Step 7: Coloring
Colouring its the last step in our drawing of Link. Just pick out the colours as shown in the picture above and paint over each area. I like to leave the eyes uncoloured using the white of the paper as the base colour, I recommend using this style as well. Ensure that your colors are not too saturated, this way you will not have any problems if you decide to add more vibrancy to the drawing with your colors.
Conclusion
We have come to the end of our step by step tutorial on how to draw Link, the Legend of Zelda’s main protagonist. Now it is your turn to create your own rendition. You should not have a problem with the drawing as long as you follow the steps closely. Try to draw it as many times as you can until you achieve results similar to mine. Feel free to try out different poses in your own drawings. I hope you find this tutorial very useful and if you have any questions please leave it in the comment section, this will encourage me to keep working
Author: Eseandre
Drawings and coloring: Mafer Baruta. Mafer is a young and talented artist from El Tigre, Venezuela. You can follow her on Artstation clicking here.
