disclaimer: I am east asian. if anyone who is not white sees anything wrong with my phrasing, inaccuracies, or insensitivity, or something I missed, please feel free to add on. I’m just one person with one perspective; none of what I say should be taken as The Singular way to draw an Asian character. if you havent done so already, please take the effort to expand your view of Asian culture outside this one tutorial.
if a white person reblogs this and adds something stupid I’m going to bite and kick you like a wild animal
I LOVE this post and wanted to add some additional info, cause I see a lot of people who assume that drawing asian hair is the same as drawing white hair. This is not the case! There’s more to it than just the color.
Image description for the original post and my addition are underneath the read more at the end.
Thank you for reading! Once again, image description for my images and OP’s images are under the cut.
Just like OP, I’m only one single person, so if anyone wants to correct me or add something I missed, then go for it. And further disclaimer, there are exceptions to everything I’ve said in this post, and it only applies to East and Southeast asian people who are either not mixed or white-mixed, as those are the hair types I’m most familiar with.
I’d like to add that there are Black people of non-African decent in Asia. We exist. So the whole “I won’t draw Black people in anime because it’s set in ~Asia~” is absolutely bullshit (besides the fact that those of African decent also live there). The so called “negrito” ethnic group is comprised of many different cultures throughout south and southeast Asia and are considered Black (they have dark skin and coiled ‘Afro-texture’ hair) Additionally, the Moluccan and Papuan people of southeast Indonesia are Black.
Also regarding hair, naturally curly hair absolutely is a thing in e/s/se Asia. Our hair runs the gamut from loose wavy curls to tight, kinky coiled hair.
Blonde or red hair and blue eyes are also possible in Maluku and Papua, due to genetic quirk that has nothing to do with having white heritage.
On to types of curly hair Asian people can have:
[A picture of Sandra Oh with a long, curly shag haircut, wearing a pink blouse against a white backdrop] Sandra Oh is a great example of an east Asia person with curly hair. She has wavy/curly hair.
[A picture of Aarti Sequeria, an Indian woman with medium skin tone, shoulder length medium curls, wearing a green blouse against a colorful background]
Curly hair is also common in south Asia. This is Aarti Sequeria, an Indian person with tighter curls.
Then we get to the tightest curls.
[Three pictures of young people from Maluku or Papua Indonesia. The first shows two boys in blue shirts with dark skin and curly hair. The boy on the left has loose, dark curls and the boy on the right has dark red-blonde tightly coiled curls. The second picture shows a child with very dark skin with red undertones. They have tightly curled dark red-orange hair. The last one shows a boy with dark brown skin, dark ash blonde hair, and dark grey eyes. He is not wearing a shirt. End description]
These are all people from Maluku and Papua in southeast Indonesia. This is their natural hair color and texture. Also note how warm their skin tone is. As a note, the reason these are all pictures of children is that more often than not, those with blonde hair as children will have their hair darken as they get older. Additionally, note how the roots are much darker than the ends. This is because most of the blonde hair comes from sun bleaching rather than it coming out of the scalp blonde.
My family is from Maluku and I have cousins with the same bright red hair, and both of their parents have dark brown/black hair. I also have family who have blue eyes, but both of their parents have brown eyes. So while it’s very, very uncommon, it is possible for an Asian person to be blonde. However, unless you are depicting someone from these areas, the blue eyes/blonde hair is still very much a don’t do this, especially if you are a white artist.
There are so many ways to look Asian. So many hair textures, so many skin colors. Asia is a lot more diverse than the west depicts it to be.
eventually you realize you don’t want to die. you just don’t want to live the life you’re living. and slowly you try to create a life you want to live. just gotta start there.
no one needs to add “sounds fake but ok”, “no”, “well, not me”, “impossible”, etc. to this post. and i’d rather you not.
one day you think: I want to die.
and then you think, very quietly: actually. actually. I think I want a coffee. a nap. a sandwich. a book.
and I want to die turns day by day into I want to go home, I want to walk in the woods, I want to see my friend, I want to sit in the sun
I’ve figured out that one way to stump older people that complain about the current generation is to have an inflation calculator app on your phone.
Aunt: When we got our first apartment it was 300 bucks a month why can’t you-
Me: In what year?
Aunt: What?
Me: What year did you get your first apartment?
Aunt: 1973?
Me: Hmmm. Looks like that would be $1755 in 2021 money.
Aunt: *seems to go through seven emotions at once*
Aunt: Oh.
Uncle: Why should minimum wage-
Me: What year did you start college?
Uncle: 1968?
Me: So if you scale up $1.60 to 2021 dollars that would be $11.94 and the current federal minimum wage is $7.25
Uncle: Bu-
Me: And it seems like from a quick google search the median rent in 1970 was $108 and today that would be $722 but this same chart tells me that the actual median rent in 2020 was $1,100.
