Miscellaneous
Eyebrows
Here is Knux in a bad mood. Notice how heavy his eyebrows are. They elongate his eye, and form an almost continual oval. After studying echidna expressions, I found that one of their features are the extremely heavy eyebrows. The eyebrows grow even heavier in a scowl. It also works pretty good on Sonic. One thing to keep in mind about Sonic is that his eyebrows are not nearly as thick as Knuckles's, and his face is much flatter. His nose is also higher up his muzzle, and tends to point upward. Even when not scowling, Knuckles's eyebrows are quite prominent. Notice that they go almost all the way around his eye, as compared to Sonic's, which remains up near the top of his eye.
Sad Eyebrows

 
Here is the tricky "sad" expression. See how the entire eyebrow comes forward? To do this, first sketch a normal shaped eye. Like this. Then over it, draw a curved line, as shown. (No, those aren't eyelashes.) This line is the inside of the eyebrow. Then come back and draw the outside of the eyebrow. It's a rough V-shape, and follows the contour of the inside line. The outer line usually vanishes into the dreadlocks. For a really dejected look, add a half-closed eyelid.
The Female Echidna face
Here is a basic female echidna. There are several features that differ between male and female echidna faces. 
  • First, a female's eyes are much bigger. Their shape is bigger, and their iris and pupil are bigger, usually with an enormous highlight. 
  • Female echidnas have little or no eyebrow.
  • The muzzle is much smaller and slimmer than a male's.
  • The dreadlocks are much thinner, usually with ornaments of some kind.
 The female eye is a soft triangle. Notice the eyelid and lashes as well. A female eye always has a little lid showing, for some reason. Unlike Sonic's eyes, an echidna's eyes are never connected. In the case of Julie-Su (above), we have loads of bangs (fringe), big eyes, and ornaments in her deadlocks. Female echidnas are always on the fancy side.
Dreadlocks
Dreadlocks are long ovals attached to the sides of Knux's head. When he's standing still, you can see their shape. But whenever he so much as blinks, they tend to flip around dynamically, or so most artists think. :-) Here the oval-shape has been outlined. See it now? When his dreadlocks flip around, they are always in some sort of an S-shape. They are at their thickest in the middle, not necessarily where they connect to his head. They always tend to hang over the sides of his muzzle, too.

 
Sonic's shoes and hands
Sonic's shoes in the Genesis games and cartoons. Quite simple red with white stripe. Not much detail. Sonic's shoes, upgraded for Sonic Adventure. Now he's got a golden buckle on the stripe (which has become a strap), a visible sole and air vents in the heels. Nifty. Sonic's soapshoes of Sonic Adventure 2. They're still red with a white strap, but now they have some gold on there (the arch of the grinding plate), and some dark gray (the shaded areas).

 
Sonic's gloves are obviously the kind with a lot of material on the wrist, so you can fold it forward and have a neat wrist-warmer. Draw lots of liberal folds whenever you draw Sonic's hands up close.

Also note that here he only has four fingers. A lot of cartoon characters only have four fingers, because it's simpler to draw.

 You can draw hands with five fingers, if you're aiming for a more realistic look. However, it's more complicated to draw. When you draw a hand, make sure you draw the palm, too. A good rule of thumb (ha ha) is to remember that the palm is about as long as the middle finger.
Some people tend to draw hands without any palms. This means that the fingers just sprout out of the wrist (as shown). It looks awkward, and I'll bet you the poor character feels awkward, too. This is the wrong way to draw hands. The part of your hand that you deck someone with is commonly known as the "heel" of your hand. You rest your chin on it, for instance. The heel of a hand will usually be visible in one way or another. When a person has their hands at their sides, the palms face inward, and the thumbs face forward. When a hand is lifted (for instance, curled around a gun) the thumb will point up. Thumbs never point away from the body unless the palm is facing up. If you need to know how a hand would look in a certain pose, you have two hands of your own you can probably talk into the job.
This art tutorial created for NetRaptor.org by NetRaptor and copyrighted by NetRaptor.