Butterflies, with their delicate wings and vibrant colors, are a captivating subject for artists of all levels. If you’re looking to learn How To Draw A Butterfly in Procreate, this step-by-step tutorial is perfect for you. We’ll guide you through the process of creating a beautiful monarch butterfly with a pink color scheme, utilizing Procreate’s features to make your artwork stunning and symmetrical. Whether you’re a beginner or looking to refine your digital art skills, this guide will provide clear instructions and helpful tips to bring your butterfly drawing to life. Let’s get started and unleash your creativity!
To begin, we will set up our digital workspace in Procreate and prepare for the sketching phase. We will be utilizing a few fundamental brushes available within Procreate, making this tutorial accessible to everyone. Don’t worry if you feel like you’re falling behind at any point; feel free to pause, rewind, and practice each step at your own pace. Remember to save this tutorial so you can revisit it whenever you want to practice your butterfly drawing skills.
Gathering Your Digital Tools: Brushes and Canvas Setup
For this drawing tutorial, we will be using only standard Procreate brushes, ensuring that you can easily follow along without needing to import any custom brushes. Using built-in brushes keeps the process simple and accessible for all users.
If you’d like to work with the exact color palette used in this tutorial, a free palette is available for download via a link in the description. Importing palettes in Procreate is a straightforward process that can enhance your workflow and ensure color consistency in your artwork.
Let’s prepare our canvas. For this tutorial, we’ll create a canvas size of 4000 by 4000 pixels with a resolution of 300 dpi and sRGB color profile. These settings are ideal for digital art, providing a high-quality image suitable for screen display and potential printing.
Now, select a black color – the exact shade isn’t crucial for sketching. Navigate to your brushes panel, and within the ‘Sketching’ category, choose the ‘6B Pencil’. This brush is excellent for sketching due to its texture and responsiveness to pressure. Adjust the brush size to around 50% and ensure opacity is at 100%. This setup will give us a clear, visible sketch to work over.
Utilizing the Drawing Assist for Symmetrical Sketching
A unique feature we’ll use for this butterfly drawing is Procreate’s Drawing Assist, specifically the Symmetry option. This tool is incredibly helpful for creating symmetrical drawings like butterflies, ensuring both sides mirror each other perfectly.
To activate Drawing Assist, tap the ‘Wrench’ icon to open the Actions menu, go to ‘Canvas,’ and toggle on ‘Drawing Guide.’ Then, tap ‘Edit Drawing Guide’ to access guide customization options. In the Drawing Guide settings, you’ll see options like 2D Grid, Isometric, Perspective, and Symmetry. Select ‘Symmetry.’
Within the Symmetry options, ensure ‘Vertical’ is checked. This will create a vertical line of symmetry down the center of your canvas. Set the ‘Opacity’ of the symmetry line to around 25% and ‘Thickness’ to 50% – these settings control the visibility of the guide lines, making them helpful without being too distracting. Most importantly, make sure ‘Assisted Drawing’ is toggled on. Tap ‘Done’ to apply these settings.
Now, any layer you create will have ‘Assisted’ drawing enabled. You can verify this by looking at the layer name in the Layers panel, which will now indicate ‘Assisted.’ With Drawing Assist active, anything you draw on one side of the vertical symmetry line will be mirrored on the other side, making it ideal for sketching our butterfly.
Sketching the Butterfly Body and Wings
Let’s begin sketching the basic shape of our butterfly. Start with the body, drawing a small circle for the head, followed by an elongated sausage-like shape for the abdomen. The body will be positioned vertically in the center of your canvas, along the symmetry line.
Next, sketch the wings. Starting from the thorax (the middle part of the body), draw the top wing extending outwards and slightly upwards. Because of the symmetry assist, you’ll see the wing mirrored on the other side. Then, draw the lower wing, starting again from the thorax and extending downwards and outwards.
Feel free to experiment with the shapes of the wings. You can make them more rounded or angular depending on your preference. The sketch is just a guide, so don’t worry about perfection at this stage. Adjust the size and position using the ‘Transform’ tool (arrow icon) if needed to center the sketch on your canvas. Reduce the opacity of your sketch layer to around 25% to make it less prominent as we begin inking.
Inking the Butterfly Outline with Dry Ink Brush
Create a new layer above your sketch layer. Select a charcoal color for inking – a dark grey provides a softer look than pure black. Choose the ‘Dry Ink’ brush from the ‘Inking’ category. This brush is excellent for creating textured outlines, giving a slightly hand-drawn feel to your digital artwork.
Set the brush size to around 10% and opacity to 100%. Begin inking over your sketch lines, starting with the butterfly’s body and then moving to the wings. Vary the pressure on your Apple Pencil as you ink to create lines of varying thickness. This technique adds dynamism and visual interest to your line art.
For the wing outlines, you might choose to make them slightly irregular rather than perfectly smooth. This artistic choice enhances the organic feel of the butterfly. Since we are aiming for a slightly painterly effect, we will intentionally deviate from perfect symmetry in the inking and coloring stages, even though we used symmetry for the initial sketch. This blend of symmetry and slight irregularity makes the final drawing more visually appealing and less digitally sterile.
Adding Intricate Wing Patterns
Now, let’s add patterns to the butterfly’s wings. Return to your sketch layer and increase its opacity temporarily so you can see it clearly. Using the 6B Pencil again, sketch patterns within the wing outlines. Butterfly wing patterns are incredibly diverse, so this is a chance to get creative. You can draw circles, lines, spots, or more complex shapes.
Remember, with the symmetry assist still active on the sketch layer, you only need to draw the patterns on one side of the wings, and they will automatically mirror on the other side. This significantly speeds up the process and ensures symmetrical patterns. Don’t hesitate to use reference images of real monarch butterflies or other butterfly species for pattern inspiration. Observing nature is a fantastic way to enhance the realism and beauty of your art.
Once you are satisfied with your sketched patterns, reduce the opacity of the sketch layer again. Return to your inking layer, and with the Dry Ink brush and charcoal color still selected, carefully ink over the sketched patterns. Adjust the brush size as needed for finer details within the patterns.
Coloring the Butterfly Wings with Texture
Create a new layer below your inking layer. Fill the wing areas with white as a base color. You can do this quickly by selecting the ‘Studio Pen’ brush from the ‘Inking’ category, drawing a closed shape around each wing area, and then dragging the white color swatch into the enclosed areas to fill them. This creates a solid white base for our colors to sit on.
Next, create a new layer above the white base layer. Tap on this new layer and select ‘Clipping Mask.’ A clipping mask ensures that any color you apply on this layer will only be visible within the boundaries of the layer beneath it (in this case, the white wings). This is essential for keeping our coloring neat and within the wing outlines.
Select a mid-tone pink from your palette. Choose the ‘Fresco’ brush from the ‘Painting’ category. This brush has a lovely texture that will add depth to the butterfly’s wings. Set the brush size to maximum but use very light pressure as you apply the pink color. You can build up the color gradually with multiple light strokes to achieve a soft, textured effect. Alternatively, you can reduce the brush size and use heavier pressure – experiment to find your preferred technique.
Now, select a darker pink shade. Reduce the Fresco brush size to around 40%. Add darker pink patterns or shading to the wings to create dimension and visual interest. Focus on areas where shadows might naturally fall, such as near the body or along the inner edges of the wings. Continue to layer colors, alternating between lighter and darker pinks, and even touches of white for highlights, to create a rich and nuanced color palette on the wings.
For finer details, reduce the brush size further, perhaps to around 5%. Add small dots, lines, or subtle texture variations within the pink areas. The goal is to create a balance between uniformity and slight imperfections, giving the wings a hand-painted, organic appearance rather than a perfectly smooth, digital look.
Adding White Details and Finishing Touches
To enhance the details further, especially on the darker inked outlines, create a new layer above the inking layer. Select white color and switch back to the ‘Dry Ink’ brush. Reduce the brush size to around 15%.
Add small white flecks or dashes along the black wing outlines and within the wing patterns. These white details will create highlights and add a delicate, decorative touch to the butterfly. Focus on areas where light might catch the edges of the wings or the raised parts of the patterns. These small highlights can make a significant difference in bringing the drawing to life and adding a sense of depth.
For the butterfly’s body, you can choose to fill it with a solid black color for contrast. Create a new layer above the white detail layer, and using a larger brush size with the Studio Pen or Dry Ink brush, color in the body completely black. Alternatively, you could add subtle shading or textural details to the body as well, if you prefer a less stark look.
Finally, take a step back and review your artwork. Make any final adjustments to lines, colors, or details as needed. You might want to refine some outlines, add more highlights, or deepen certain shadows to enhance the overall impact of your drawing.
Congratulations! Your Butterfly is Complete
Congratulations on completing this how to draw a butterfly tutorial in Procreate! You’ve successfully created a beautiful digital butterfly with textured wings and intricate details. By following these steps, you’ve learned how to utilize Procreate’s symmetry features, brushes, and layering techniques to create stunning digital art.
We hope you found this tutorial enjoyable and informative. Remember, practice is key to improving your artistic skills. Don’t hesitate to try drawing more butterflies, experimenting with different colors, patterns, and brush techniques.
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