How to Draw Franky from One Piece

Step 1

Step 01: Just a reminder to all of our mangakas that all of the blue and green lines you see in this tutorial are only construction lines and will be erased later on, so don’t press too hard on your pencil when drawing these lines. Our final lines you’ll see in black at the end of the tutorial. We’ll start with our head circle.

Pro tip 1: Start with a large circle for the head in the upper center of your paper. Go around a few times to get a nice outline of a circle, as it can be quite hard to draw a circle free hand. Then trace your head circle over the outline you have made.

Pro tip 2: Since we’re drawing Franky in profile we won’t have our standard center and eye lines. Instead, we’ll have to draw a nose line, an ear line and a chin line. In this first step we’re drawing the nose line. It cuts across the head circle at about 45 degrees and extends a little above and below the head circle.

Step 2

Step 02: Now we’re going to draw the chin line and the ear line. The ear line is in green, the chin line is the longer, vertical blue line with the notch at the bottom. The green line should intersect the nose line at 90 degrees but it shouldn’t pass through the center of the head circle. The chin line starts where the green ear line touches the head circle at the top and comes down vertically. The notch at the bottom of the chin line is for the chin and it’s about 2/3’s of a head circle down.

Step 3

Step 03: Time to draw an outline of Franky’s mouth and the top of his hair. Let’s start with the jaw line since we have the notch in place. We should draw a shark fin shape with the point just touching the notch on the chin line. The jaw should stop on the green ear line. For the hair outline on the top of the head we should draw another shark fin shape, only this time a little bit more “S” shaped. It is also larger than the jaw. Before moving on, we should add the eye line from the head circle to the chin line.

Step 4

Step 04: Let’s begin this step by drawing the block shape for Franky’s armored nose. It should finish on the head circle a smidge above the eye line. Then, we’ll draw the spoon like shape for his sideburns. The bottom of the sideburns will touch the head circle where the jaw line crosses the head circle. Then, on the ear line we’ll draw the “c” shape for the ear that we can see. Lastly, we’ll draw the neck lines. The upper neck line is fairly flat and starts on the head circle. The lower neck line has more of a curve to it and it starts on the jaw line well below the head circle. That’s one huge neck!

Step 5

Step 05: Continuing with our outline of features. The first thing to do in this step is to draw the small “<” shape on the top of the nose. This is actually for the lens of the sunglasses he’s wearing that we can’t completely see as most of it’s hidden behind the nose. Once you’ve got that lens in place redraw the forehead area so that it’s not as smooth. It should have a ridge and it will finish on the lens we have just drawn. Next, we can finish off the rest of the armored nose. When that’s in place, then we’ll draw the mouth line which as you can see is quite big. Pro tip: to get the 3D effect, make sure that the top and bottom of the mouth curve back in. Now we’ll move to the back of Franky’s head and draw the back of his hair. It’s a hair shape of four spikes starting at the back of the head where the nose line touches the head circle and finishing on the neck. To wrap up this step just draw the four lines on the neck. One of the lines makes up part of the last hair spike at the top of the neck, one is just under the jaw, and the other two make the irregular “v” shape.

Step 6

Step 06: We’ll go from top to bottom in this step, mangakas. Start by drawing the tear drop shape for the lens of his sunglasses on the eye line. Then, move into the inner ear and add the detail lines. You can also draw the hair segment that starts at the ear and ends on the neck line, forming two hair spikes. Then, we’ll move into the mouth and draw the top and bottom row of teeth. When you do the top row of teeth it’s important to start with the line that touches the mouth on the right, then add the “u” shaped line on the left that is below the first line. Then draw the bottom row. And, to top things off, we’ll add the dimples to Franky’s chin, to make a three pointed chin. The points should be rounded off though and not too pointy.

Step 7

Step 07: So we’ll break this step down into three areas: nose and glasses, mouth and chin, and hair.

Let’s start with the nose and glasses area. Now at the end of today’s tutorial we will want to fill in the lenses of the sunglasses in black but we also want some white reflection areas. So we’re going to mark those now. In the very small lens on the left, draw the “z” shaped line to mark the area we won’t fill. Then for the lens on the right we’ll add another line to the top of the lens creating a sliver of space that we want to leave white. We’ll also add the horizontal ellipse (wider than tall) for another reflection spot. Then we’ll draw the two lines that make up the arm of the glasses and stop on the ear. For the nose, we’ll draw the “X” and then add a line underneath it.

For Franky’s mouth and chin area you can begin by drawing the long arching line for the tongue. Then, add the lines to the rows of teeth to make separate teeth. There’s two lines in the chin area for wrinkle lines. And lastly, there’s the line connecting the jaw on the right with the lower neck line. This, again, is just to mark the area that we will fill in in black in later steps.

For the hair we need to add a few more hair spikes to the shark fin. At the top/back of the head we will add a few lines to connect the top hair segment with the mullet in the back. Before finishing up there’s another forked hair segment to draw starting at the bottom of the ear. When you’ve got that, we can move on.

Step 8

Step 08: Although this might look like a crazy step it’s actually not that bad. Just do your best to imitate the image you see above. Here are some things not to miss. In the nose, we should add the three small circles for the bolts in his metal nose. Then, in addition to the other lines on the face for wrinkles, we can’t forget the drop of sweat just under the arm of the sunglasses. In the hair we mostly need to just add lines of different length to give his hair some depth and layers. There are a few more wrinkle lines on the neck to add. And, lastly, the flower shapes to the right of the neck line for Franky’s Hawaiian shirt.

Step 9

Step 09: Take out your eraser and lighten all of the construction lines we’ve made so far. Then using your finishing pen, trace out your final drawing. Note: you can leave the flowers on the shirt untraced until the final step or trace them now. I made a little mistake and didn’t trace them in this step. But go ahead and trace them, it’s no problem. Don’t fill anything until you’ve got your complete outline. Then go back and you can fill in the glasses paying attention to the areas we want to keep empty for reflection spots. We can also fill in the area just to the right of the mouth on the neck following the line we drew in a previous step.

Step 10

Step 10: When your ink is completely dry, just use your eraser to completely erase any remaining construction lines you can see. Note: You should have the flowers on Franky’s shirt traced. This is my mistake ^_-.

Step 11

Step 11: We’ve got a great looking Franky. But I’m going to do a little shading in this step to make him even better looking. Using your pencil or a grey marker you can shade in some areas. For example, I’ve done: the bottom half and around his armored nose; the part inside his mouth that is not his teeth of tongue; the lower half of the back of his hair and half of his neck; inside the ear, the lower half of the side burns; lastly, I’ve added some zig zag lines to his hair in the top hair segment and on the sides. When your marker dries take a step back and have a look. You’ve just drawn the wickedly cool Franky from One Piece.

Always remember, if your goal is to become a great mangaka make sure to draw Franky again from memory. Then compare the final drawing with the original and correct any mistakes you might have made. Try once again from memory. This is the best way to build a huge library of shapes that you can use in the future for your own manga characters.

Draw with passion! -_^

Hiroshi