Finally returning to the draw prompts to finish up those pics! :U

In my first draft of this art, I focused mostly on capturing the basic idea of a pouty fox kit and a hoard of stolen cookies. There wasn't a lot of context in the scribble. For example, WHY is she grumpily returning the cookies? Are they spoiled? Is she bored and wants to steal them again? <w<

The concept of having to return stolen cookies is rather abstract, indeed -- making it a great art study. Revisiting the piece, this time I tried to tell the story with more depth and intent!

I made the environment more like a den or cave than a castle dungeon. The smol foxxo didn't necessarily dig this herself, (actually she probably stole the cave too...) but it's a handy place to store a lifetime supply of cookies. An earthen den feels more likely to be inhabited by a cookie-thieving fox.

By making the foxxo smol and the den vast, it helps sell the idea of an excessive number of cookies. The cave tunneling into the background helps add some wonder and mystery. How many rooms of cookies ARE there? The cookies, boxes and cart tracks get smaller as they fade into the distance. So do the lines used to draw them.

Compositionally, the cookie piles generally slope down, pointing at the smol foxxo. The piles themselves are massive, so the full weight of the smol foxxo's crimes is bearing down on her. I used the negative space of the ground around her as a rest area to help frame her as important, and to trap her in her circumstance. The basket of cookies is a particularly dense pattern, helping attract your eye. The somewhat regular patterning of the cookie piles mixed with cookie boxes at odd angles adds visual interest while keeping the eye moving. I'm intending that your eye should move between the deep part of the cave, the sign board, and grumpy smol foxxo in a little triangle.

To add more depth, I included cues that show a passage of time. The smol foxxo is loading a mine cart at present, while a full cart is shown further up the tracks, implying she already loaded that one in the past. The full cart is spilling cookies, adding a sense of motion. The signboard and quantity of cookies implies the smol foxxo will still be busy loading cookies far in the future. The todo list says something about Vixel's plans for the even more distant future... <.<

Other storytelling tidbits include the boxes of cookies, nibbled and munched cookies, and the train signal pointing toward the exit to help define where the mine carts are going. The sign posts are pointed like spears to imply the Official Decree will be enforced, and the sign is bigger than the smol foxxo, implying it's stronger. But don't underestimate her - she stole ALL these cookies once, surely she can steal them again! >:E

Here's also a version with more cookies, some brights and darks, and a cavey blue color filter. The lighting got a little muddy, but it still adds some atmosphere. I'd like to clean it up later so it's not so splotchy, but first I want to wrap up the other draw prompt pieces!

I've been meaning to study this topic for ages! :O Finally finished some research and distilled my notes into a tutorial format so you can learn about it as well!

All artwork in this tutorial is transformed, attributed, and presented freely for educational purposes under Fair Use. If you see a picture you like, go check out the artist! <3

Digitigrade feet offer some fun design challenges in worlds where anthropomorphic animals wear human shoes!

Plantigrade critters walk on the sole of the foot.
Digitigrade critters walk on the digits (the toes).

Furry artists often blend feral animal legs onto regular human bodies. The blending helps differentiate animal species from humans, and helps emphasize that furry characters are wilder creatures. Clothing, and shoes in particular, must adapt to the major anatomy changes, especially around the heel, sole and toes.

Some artists carefully maintain a higher heel position and longer sole anatomy, consistent with animal legs.

It's possible to find fully digitigrade critters drawn with shoes, but it usually feels pretty natural for them to walk around bare-legged.

When shoes are added, the heel position often adjusts with the needs of each picture and shoe style, sliding up and down along the leg.

Sometimes artists rotate the footpaw so the heel is almost a human heel. This works even better if the art retains notable digitigrade cues, like animal toes and claws, or the heel rarely touching the ground.

Placing a character with covered legs next to a digitigrade with exposed legs can imply similar leg anatomy on the covered character. An artist might use such cues to design a world with more human-style clothing or shoes, while still convincing the audience that all characters are digitigrades.

By carefully choosing clothing style (such as a long dress) and tiptoe-friendly shoe styles (like "high heels"), an artist can mix human and digitigrade legs together in an appealing way.

It's possible to use anatomy that barely deviates from human legs. Here the tall boot design, small paw size, and feral-shaped toe impressions can help sell the idea of digitigrade legs.

Footware Form and Function

When designing shoes for digitigrades, form vs function can create some huge differences.

These shoes feel like a natural adaptation of real world sneakers. Practically speaking, the tread on the heel would rarely touch the ground. However, the emphasis on recognizable form creates an appealing aesthetic.

This fennec's shoes are entirely about function - keeping its pawpads from toasting on the hot sand. Shoes that only cover digitigrade toes are great for cute pics! But tiny shoes might lessen the impact of certain designs. What if we needed battle boots?

Here's what purely functional digitigrade sneakers look like. Very kawaii~! (endearingly cute and tiny)

Some shoe styles are naturally interchangeable with human or digitigrade legs, but these styles are rare.

The differences between human and animal leg anatomy can be further explored by adding interesting new shoe function, like the armor instep plates below.

Is there a "right way" to design?

When designing digitigrade shoes, there's no "one size fits all" approach. (badum tish)

How grounded in animal character an artist chooses to make their digitigrade legs, is up to artistic preference. That decision heavily influences shoe designs.

It's important for the artist to consider if the heel anatomy should always be the same, or if it can be adapted scene by scene. Keeping anatomy consistent from image to image can add a certain level of authenticity to the universe. Adaptive anatomy can be just as strong, so long as there's consistency expressed elsewhere.

Human apparel is designed for human needs, and digitigrade creatures may have different needs. Showing extra care in creating species-appropriate designs can add depth to worldbuilding.


These shoes feel sturdy, protective and rigid, with spiked steel toes for kick attacks.

These shoes have conforming no-slip insoles between the toes, and open-backed heels for fuller range of motion.

These shoes feel multipurpose, and leave toes exposed for natural use of claws.

Function-oriented design may occasionally create unrecognizable shoes. The audience still needs to recognize shoes as shoes, instead of accidentally seeing them as a new cybernetic body part.

But that said, as the audience becomes immersed in your world, they will soon learn the 'language' of your shoe designs. And function focused shoe designs can be pretty cool.

Form-oriented design creates more opportunities for recognizable, but impractical shoes. A great example being the earlier sneakers with traction heels that never touch down.

Either approach can work well, because believable and recognizable are both anchored in reality - it's up to the artist to determine which traits to emphasize.


Shoe designs might also be simplified more like socks, with materials being pliable or nondescript, to intentionally avoid any extreme designs.

One can also step back and ask the question: does a digitigrade world even need shoes? Consider that shoes with soles are covering animal pawpads, hooves or talons - which in the real world typically don't need additional coverings.

Going shoeless totally works because it's *also* anchored in reality (real world animal behavior). Personally, bare paws make more sense in an organic naturalistic environment, but less sense when characters will walk on abrasive surfaces like concrete; in situations where shoes would provide competitive advantage like metal floors in a sci fi war zone; or in extreme locations where animals normally wouldn't go, like lava flows. It's up to the artist, and the physics of their world.

To keep the characters from feeling half naked, cuffs and leg wraps can add ornamentation and help take the place of shoes.

Art style plays a role as well. Toonier and more symbolic drawings can get away with certain design choices, whereas realistic drawings must take care to avoid breaking audience immersion.

Believable shoe designs might incorporate traits that provide a competitive advantage or equalize the playing field. A warrior canine in a world of vicious gryphons might seek out shoes with shin armor and heel spurs to improve his chances of survival.

How do real animals use their paws, toes and heels? How do they bend and flex? Shoe designs shouldn't restrict that range of motion, unless restricting it is the goal. <.<

Over the holidays I started exploring a new technique using 3d models as a foundation for my 2d art! :O

Made a few images of this cute yeen boy for a Christmas art exchange on one of the fursites!

Many sculptors and architects start with a simple model, known as a "maquette", as a foundation for exploring and visualizing a design.

I copied this idea and made a virtual 3d maquette of this hyena character using Blender and Daz Studio!

First I used morph dials in Daz to shape the approximate body proportions. (Default human male shown for comparison.)

Then I exported the model into Blender, and did a custom sculpting pass, refining and stylizing the body.

Next I imported the model back into Daz Studio in a special way to preserve the rigging. This way, I could freely pose the body and attach clothing!

I composed some cute poses and mixed in a few props in Daz.

Then in Photoshop I did a rough rotoscope (loose trace) of each scene, choosing which shapes to keep, discard, emphasize.

Finally, I played with proportions in 2d, did detail stylizations like fur floof and painted in a few more props.

This '3d maquette' approach works great for nailing down tricky stuff like perspective, anatomy, and clothing. It's right in the middle of my other techniques for workflow efficiency and quality of results. Not as organic as sketching from imagination, and not as clunky as trying to cherrypick details from photo reference. If used to establish the base foundation for a pic, I'm can change whatever details and stylize to my heart's content once I have the rotoscope ready in Clip Studio or Photoshop.

Used this same technique on the pawplay artwork earlier this month, too! :O So it's feasible for ferals as well!

Still playing around with the workflow. Excited to see where this goes! :}}