How to Draw a Spider - Realistic Orb-Weaver in 8 Steps

Take an orange coloured pencil, or any pencil you have, and draw a big oval a little below the middle of the page. That is the abdomen, the round back end of the spider. Go over the line twice if the first pass is off. Nobody sees this later.

Sit an upside-down U on top of the oval for the thorax, then add two small bumps at its top for the fangs. Run a faint line straight down through both shapes. That centre line keeps the legs even on both sides.

Every leg starts as one thin line. From the side of the thorax, draw the first segment up and out, put a dot where the joint goes, draw the second segment, add another dot, then bring a short diagonal back in for the foot. Draw a second leg right beside it, a bit shorter.

Repeat that pair on the other side. The middle pair is stubby and bends forward. The back pair runs long and down past the abdomen. The legs do not need to match. A spider mid-step looks more alive than a symmetrical one.

Switch to a tan alcohol marker. The creator uses a colour labelled orange that dries closer to sand. Fill the abdomen and thorax solid, working fast so the strokes blend while wet.

Now go over the legs. The top segment gets two or three strokes side by side to make it thick. The middle segment gets a couple of strokes. The last segment is one thin line, and stays that way. Do the first two legs slowly, then pause the video and finish the rest at your own pace.

Pick up a black coloured pencil and shade the top of the thorax dark, easing off as you come down toward the abdomen. Messy is right here. This part of a real orb-weaver is fuzzy, so add short dashes for hairs as you go.

Press hard where the thorax meets the abdomen and along the split down the centre. Those two dark lines give the body its shape. Add a little shading around the fangs to finish the head.

Each leg gets the same treatment. Start at the very tip and darken almost all the way to the first joint. Jump to the joint itself and make it dark, then fade lighter as you move down. Darken the next joint, and fade again toward the body. Finish with a dark patch where the leg plugs into the thorax.

That is one leg. Seven more to go, so pause and take your time. Leave the little hairs off for now. They come last, after the marker blending.

Sketch the markings on the abdomen with the black pencil, pressing lightly. An upside-down heart near the top, a smaller one under it, two circles, a U shape, then an oval at the bottom. Make every edge bumpy. Add a wiggly line down each side and a few small spots.

Now fill the space between those shapes with light diagonal strokes, all running the same direction. The shapes stay tan and the background goes dark, which is what makes the pattern read as a real orb-weaver.

Take the colourless blender (the marker with the white cap and no pigment) and run it over the black pencil on the abdomen, thorax and legs. The strokes melt together and the pencil texture goes soft, like painting water over watercolour pencil.

Then switch to a white coloured pencil. Flick tiny hairs onto the thorax, brighten the spots on the abdomen, and run a thin highlight down each leg. Spider legs have a hard shell, and the highlight is what makes them look shiny.

Use a light gray marker (CG1) to draw a shadow under the body and along one side of each leg. This lifts the spider off the page. When the first layer dries, add a second layer only close to the body, so the shadow is darkest underneath and fades toward the leg tips. Do not forget the shadow under the abdomen.

Last move: sharpen the black pencil and flick short hairs off every leg, different lengths, spread out. Sharpen again as soon as the point goes dull.