Name: Drawing Muscles: What You Need to Know
Uploaded: 2015-09-27T08:30:16.000Z
Duration: 4 min 48 s
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Adverbs of manner

Hello, welcome to Proko! My name is Stan Prokopenko. We’re finally at the part of the course

you’ve all been waiting for. Muscles! In this video, we’ll go over what you need

to learn for each muscle, some general muscle anatomy, and the types of muscles.

There’s a basic checklist of things we will learn about each muscle. This includes the

muscle name, origin, insertion, function, antagonist, and form.

The name of the muscle is the least important thing to know about the muscle. Many artists

you ask will say you don’t need to know the names at all. That’s partially true.

It depends on how deep you want to learn anatomy. I got away without knowing the muscles until

But, knowing the name does have some benefits. Knowing the muscle name allows us to talk

about anatomy. I’ll give you tricks to help remember muscle names whenever I can. There’s

usually some logic to the name that hints at the muscle’s location, function, or form.

For example, the “Extensor digitorum muscle.” This is the muscle in your hand that extends,

Where the muscle attaches is important to know as well. It helps us precisely and confidently

map out the muscle. It also hints at the muscle’s function, as we’ll see in a minute. There’s

two areas of attachment. The Origin is the attachment on the skeleton that is more stationary

and closer to the center. The Insertion is the attachment on the farther and more moveable

You should also know the function, or what action each muscle is responsible for. Fortunately,

functions are pretty easy, because muscles can only do one thing... Contract. When you

flex a muscle, it contracts, and pulls the insertion closer to the origin.

muscles work in pairs. When one muscle contracts, its antagonist is stretched out. The bicep

flexes the arm and the tricep extends the arm. In your drawings, try to exaggerate the

hardness of the active muscle, and let the relaxed muscle conform to gravity. Being aware

of the muscle’s function is essential for invented poses, so you know which muscles

to flex and which to relax. It gets you away from drawing a “noun” and back to drawing

a “verb,” and your poses will have greater animation and impact because of it. If you

want to draw constipated superheros, then you can ignore what I just said.

A muscle’s name, attachments, and function can be summed up with just a few words. We’re

artists. What we really need to study is the Shape and Form of the muscles. We have to

understand the muscle in three dimensions, so we can draw its shape from all angles.

This includes variations like stretched, relaxed, or flexed, and different body types. We’ll

study the plane changes, the simplified forms, and other detailed awesomeness about the forms.

It will help you invent figures from your imagination and make them anatomically accurate

Types of muscle… available in the premium section. If you’d like to learn about the

8 types of muscles found throughout the body, head on over to proko.com/anatomy. Get the

premium anatomy course for access to the extended videos, 3d models, and more drawing demonstrations.

If you’re enjoying this course, share it with your friends. And if you want to be updated

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If you’re on Periscope, follow me to catch my broadcasts. watch me sketch live and ask