Aw, thank you so much! I try my best with him! He’s a REALLY fun guy to draw; heck, all of them are! <3

And sure, I could try to give some tip! Granted, I’m not a professional and am still learning a lot myself. But, this is how I do things! (DO NOTE: I, in particular, don’t alter my pen’s opacity. My lines here with seem jumbled, yet I’m always able to make them out. Though, I hope it can still make sense for you! <:’D);

It helps a lot to get a sense of what/who you wanna draw, and especially how each character may look (pose, gesture, etc.)

First thing’s first, I always start off with a ‘line of action’:

The name itself practically defines what this is. Granted when one actually finishes a piece, of course, it is an ‘imaginary’ line that shows the ‘flow’ your character may be following. It helps when planning how ‘extreme’ or ‘dramatic’ you plan to make your character. The more exaggerated, the better! For this particular line here, I’ll just use a pig as our… well, guinea pig, today!

Next up, you start to add shapes of the body/head:

As you may notice, the line of action happens to go straight through the middle of the body, and even had a bit of perspective to it. Given I’m making this pic stand at a 3/4th view, you will want this look. In my opinion, more times than not, it is usually best to have your line of action go, quite literally, through the middle of the character, as a whole. Since I am using a pic here, I made the look of the body somewhat ‘bulky’, maybe even ‘chubby’. But if your character is even bigger or smaller, do not be afraid to edit the look around to your benefit.

After this comes more lines; this time, for the arms and legs (and head guidelines):

This can be the most challenging part at times, since you want to keep balance over anatomy (yes, even in more toony styles!) while still keeping your line of action in check. First things first, at this point, you should really set out how and where you want the face to face. I simply kept it facing the same way at the body; a 3/4th angle.

Here you notice that there are tiny little circles in the middle of the arms and legs. These are where your elbows/knees will be. To be honest, I don’t study anatomy enough to give good tips on this part. More so, I simply use my best judgement and think about how far down does an arm usually hand, whenever you’re not lifting it. Same with when you rest your hand on your hip, I think about how far/long your muscles come out to be. ‘If I let this arm hang down, would it look too long and awkward?’ ‘If I had this arm raised, would it appear too short?’ Etc, etc.

This can especially be difficult to plan out if your character is supposed to have long or short arms/legs. Overall, I would say studying your own body can help immensely, and simply using your better judgement can help your get a better grasp over your own art… Buuut still, study anatomy if you can (actual human models, tutorials from professional artists, photographs, so on), and don’t necessarily take after me (assuming you actually ready through/understood all that). ^^; 

Anyhow! Next up, I add shapes around the extra lines.

This is actually fairly easy for me. I simply add ‘loopy’ circles and even MORE lines around former lines, making sure to plane elbows and knees where they should be. And in this case, I chose to keep this pig with the legs of a quadruped; maintaining that sort of ‘disjointed leg’ look. HERE is when I actually look up a picture of the animal I do and study these features, just to make sure I’m doing things properly, while still adding my own flare. I also added ears and, woops, a hat! Gonna give this oinker an outfit!

Up next, we have the face and more accessories.

Again, this is a fairly easy task to me! I follow the guidelines of the head and out comes a face! And there’s even more lines, which are the plans for the clothing. After all this, that’s pretty much it for me! I’m ready to actually make this look like a decent sight to others! Going with a darker color, I simply give this sketch an outline!

And with that, the final product is-

Through this phase, I fix up any small imperfections, maybe even add or change up a few things, but all in all, this is what I come out with! :)

This is pretty much how I do all of my drawings, doodles and all! I depend a lot on the line of action constantly! It gives more livelihood to the picture!

Here are a few more doodles that may further accent how crisp the line of action can make a character look!

(Link to bigger file of this! http://i.imgur.com/fDZPcMg.jpg)

Hopefully my little ‘side notes; and ‘scribbles’ can be read, but these are what I keep in mind!

Though, do note, despite my note saying ‘don’t be afraid to work with straight lines of action’, I would also recommend you try to give your line any curve to it. Try not to make an ‘S’ right off the bat with them, but if when you turn out can actually make such a shape, that shows even more success!

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Sorry for babbling here, and most likely not making any sense at all with this, but hope it maybe sheds some light on how I do things!

Remember; every artist is different in their own methods and ability! While tutorials and simply admiring others artwork can help, picking up that pencil and going at it can show your own abilities and preferences too! :)