Painting tips (1) Animal’s nose, Cat, Dog and more

Introduction

Through these years of painting animals and wildlife, I have noticed that their noses are very interesting. We often love to paint their eyes, just like human portrait, but probably more reluctant to go for their noses. So I want to put some information that I have learned based on my experience. I hope this would help you to paint or draw animals’ noses.

Cat’s nose

1. Cat’s nostril is connected with the base. Like a tunnel through mountain, the base of the tunnel is connected with the road. It is generally a diamond shape or I would say a heart shape.❤
2. On side view, it is clear that cat’s nose appear in triangle shape. Its fur will cover till the boundary of nose. It means if you look from top, you won’t see much of cat’s nose.
3. The nose has texture, yes. And the nose is wet, yes. So when painting cat’s nose, you want some reflection on the edges.
4. Cat’s nose can be different color. It could be pink, orange, taupe, grey and maybe with some spots and patterns.
5. This structure can apply to all Felidae family such as tiger and leopard and so on.

Dog’s nose

1. Dog’s nose is different from cat’s nose for sure. Its nostril is not connected with the base. If it is a tunnel through mountain, then the entrance of tunnel is half way towards the peak, high above ground.
2. Another important feature for dog’s nose is the long gaps on both sides. When dogs inhale, the air goes in nostril from front. But when dogs exhale, the air goes out via these side gaps. Therefore, the more dogs inhale, the more scent molecule they can pick up because the scent molecule can accumulate without interruption of exhaling air.
3. On side view, even it appears to be a triangle shape, the tip of the dog’s nose is not covered by fur. This means if you look from top, you would see partial nose.
4. The nose has texture, yes. The nose is wet, yes.
5. Dog’s nose are mostly black color. No matter what breed they are, they are always black.
6. This structure can apply to all Canidae family such as fox and wolf.

Horse’s nose

Horse is also one of my favorite animal to paint. Its nose, well, horse doesn’t have a clear section of nose as cat or dog. You can see its nostril with a bumped rim. The nose along with nostrils, mouth, chin, lips are called muzzle. You can consider it as “One piece” nose.

Summary

For non-portrait paintings that doesn’t need close up details, animal’s noses are often just a color block. However, even for this little piece of color block, you may want to indicate its unique feature with a touch of paint.

I hope you enjoy this post.

Thank you.