How To Draw A Dolphin

It is strange. When started to I draw a dolphin I’ve got similar feeling like when I was drawing an elephant.

No doubt that both animals are highly intelligent. There is some special aura around them, even if you just draw them on a paper.

My guess is that this is caused by similarity in shapes of dorsal fin and pectoral fins (AKA: pectoral flippers)

If you could see only the tails of both; dolphin and shark, the difference would become clear immediately.

Shark’s tail fin (AKA: caudal fin) is shaped vertically while dolphin’s tail fin (AKA: tail fluke) is horizontal.

When shark swims below the water level you can easily see both dorsal and caudal fins at the same time.

Dolphins can show only dorsal fin if they swim right below the water level. Horizontal tail fluke remains under the water level.

Before you begin to draw this jumping dolphin take a little time and observe your object.

Do You Love Drawing Animals?

I picked this jumping bended body position purposely, to make the drawing process a little bit difficult and thus a good drawing exercise.

Hold your pencil loose or tilted and sketch the approximate outline contour of dolphin’s body.

Sketch the fins in the following order: Start with the dorsal fin if possible and sketch the pectoral flippers as last.

I recommend this sequence because it helps you to capture best total balance when you draw a dolphin.

Observe well the length of dolphin’s distinctive beak. Compare the length of the beak to the head.

Pay a little more attention to this important detail. We are drawing a bottlenose dolphin.

As every animal has its feature, what makes dolphin look like a dolphin is mainly its rounded head, distinctive beak and a smiling expression.

We can call it the dolphin’s face. If you work diligently on this one detail, the rest of the dolphin drawing will be very easy.

On the contrary, if you cannot capture well the face expression, your dolphin drawing despite your great effort will not resemble much to a dolphin.

It is perfectly OK if you practice drawing only the head on a separate paper first.

Do not mind about the extra little time it takes. If you are serious about to learn how to draw a dolphin, this will be a very good investment.

Draw sharper pencil line over the initial body contours marking out the finalized shape.

Draw clear pencil line but not too strong in case you need to make some corrections that you will probably do. Outline the mouth opening and draw the eye.

Pay special attention to capture good balance of eyes and mouth. Now you have your dolphin drawing virtually ready.

Hold your graphite pencil tilted and cover gently the body in grey. The opposite side pectoral flipper is dark (in the shade).

Mark out the blowhole on dolphin’s head. Keep that in mind when you draw a dolphin or whale, because these animals have blowholes.

You can use also grey colored pencil over the graphite pencil. It will create a good texture.

Finally you can also add some – only very little and gentle touch – blue color over the basic grey layer.

Make a color-mixing test first on a separate paper or on the margin of your drawing sheet.

Do You Love Drawing Animals?

Write your comment about this page

Do you like this drawing? Was it helpful? Let us know what you think about it. Write your own ideas and or impressions. We HIGHLY APPRECIATE your opinion. It helps us grow and get better.

What Other Visitors Have Said

cool kat verry good website

lg I like it! I have a little talent and am very interested in drawing. I have a question: What kind of pencils' did you use in the first picture? You must ...

dolphins i love dolphins i wish you had pics of snakes

LoveGirl:)6666 That was awesome. I drew a pic of me and a boy i like facing each other (as dolphins. on the sunset. THIS SITE IS AMAZING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!. I ...

The Help I want dolphins to go free and live a good life.That dolphin in DOLPHIN TALE.
her`s tale came off! She had to swim side to side which was hurting her ...

WOW! im only 12 and i was not ever that good at drawing dolfins but this time it felt easy and my family were amased so thanks. :)your drawing was gr8

great tutorial... great tutorial but what color should i make it??

Em thats cool u need a charcoal pencil for the first two pics and charcoal pencils can be hard to use but this is very helpful thanks so much!!!!!!!1

I tried IT CAME OUT BAD

dolphins yes i do liker this drawing who did it it looks good

:Kp\l wow that is so cool love it i love drawing them thank you so much

a bit hard i think that this dolphin was a bit hard to shape

lol i could not do it

geometric shapes =) i liked it, but you need to do the construction scheme you know? do the geometric shapes before and than do the artwork

Cool I wasn't interested in art before had had a go. Now I love it. Thank you

thanks this worked out get and my dolphin looks awesome

dolphin i think this page is really cool.

dolphine great!!!!!!!!!!

AWESOME thanks so much for teaching me how to draw a dolphin. It was so easy! it was extremely helpful.

davidco947@gmail.com thanks you very help me ;]

EASY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! it is soooooo easy to draw i am 10 years old and drew it pretty good but yours is amazing. i drew the dolphin jumping in the sunset!!!!!!!!!

DUDE!!!! It took me forever to finally fine a website that would actually help me draw a dolphin!! Thank You! My dolphin came out amazing

Lottie Park This particular method of drawing is good for all levels of artists, from beginners to the highly advanced. I use this method all the time, and most of ...

This is great I tried this drawing following all the steps.it didn't really work out at first but after drawing it a couple of times it actually looked like a dolphin...

My Comments It took me a while but after half an hour, I got a masterpiece. What a great way to learn how to draw.

:) helpful This drawing was very helpful for a poster I did in school!! I loved it and how it was so easy to follow. The product turned out to be a pretty masterpiece....

awesome the dolphin is awesome.it is unbelievable.it is soooooo cute.

YAY LUVZ IT GGGGCDTREYYXSXXRZINA AIH MACAEINA!!!!!!!!!

So Helpful! This is such an amazing drawing and I love that you go through the drawing process step-by-step; it makes it so much easier to follow! Thank you so much ...

Miss I thought it was gr8t 1st time drawing a dolphin and it was really easy at first I thought it isn't going to look right but my dolphins turned out ace ...

hearts i ? that they are AWSOME!

kylie thinks it was preety good but do beater then that dddddddooooooooollllllllppppppphhhhhhiiiinnnnn.

flowers u guys shuld put more option in choosing which sketch people wanna do.......... i reli like the dolphin odea but i hope to see more sketch of realistic ...

Dippy Dolphin I love this drawing! Its shaded so nicely!!!!!!!!

beauty beautiful!!

Dolphins The Dolphin Looks So Realistic!

AWSOME STEP TO STEP DRAWIGNS ON THIS SITE IM AMAZED WITH IT !!!! all i can say is omg this is great wow!!!

Hey! This was wonderful! I drew the best dolphin I have ever drawn before! Hey, your turn to shine!

Okay?? Well, where do I start. This drawing is wonerfull, congrats to the artist, but this series of drawings really don't show or tell or even give away much ...

jumping in the sunset this is a good website to show how to draw a dolphin

dolphin only da vinci can draw this dolphin! i hate it!

tayaabs answers i really like this drawing, because it has different shades in different corners. It was helpful, because if i want to become an artist i can use this ...

it was helpful I thought it was very helpful. It showed me step by step of how to give texture to a drawing. I like that it did little by little. It really helped me....