Who is Godzilla? And How to Draw Godzilla
Godzilla is a giant creature that first appeared in the movie Godzilla in 1954. The movie was directed and written by Ishiro Honda. Large monsters are called Kaijus. Kaijuaas are giant monsters with a distinct personality, that are of Japanese origin. Sometimes, Kaiju has also been referred to as any type of giant monster not necessarily of Japanese background. Godzilla has been called the King of the Monsters. He is the most famous Kaiju ever, with King Kong as a close second.
There have been over 30 plus Godzilla movies, and with nearly every movie, there was a new Godzilla design. Some designs change ever so slightly, but some are a drastic departure from previous versions. On this page, l’going to focus on Legendary Godzilla, first introduced in 2014 in the American Godzilla film, by Legendary Pictures. This version of Godzilla has appeared in Godzilla (2014), Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019), Godzilla vs Kong (2021), and Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024).
Versions of Godzilla
This version of Godzilla has changed very slightly across these movies, but the overall design stayed the same within these 4 movies. The largest notable change was his spikes were much more flower-like in the more recent films as opposed to being mountain-like shapes. Also, he seems to have slimmed down a bit from the first appearace. I think this is due to Godzilla being much more mobile and athletic in his 2024 outing. In 2024 Godzilla was actually shown physically running, so the series is becoming more playful and less realistic.
Every Godzilla has had some sort of real animal traits incorporated into their design, but this one, I feel, is more animal-like than any other version. The original Godzilla design was loosely designed with a dog’s head in mind. Legendary Godzilla takes direct influence from reptiles like monitor lizards and crocodiles. The head, in particular, is very similar to a monitor lizard.
Godzilla Drawing Process
There are so many different ways to draw Godzilla. Of the 38 versions of Godzilla, this legendary version of Godzilla is by far the most realistic. We are going to go over the legendary version of Godzilla. Sometimes called Monsterverse Godzilla. Just for note, there’s not one right way to draw this version of Godzilla, but by the end of this page, I want to supply you with a great start for you to draw him.
Simple Godzilla Shapes
Drawing Godzilla can be a large task. Since this version of Godzilla resembles real animals closer than any other version of Godzilla, then it might feel like you are trying to draw a real animal. If you’ve never studied anatomy of any sort then it could feel almost impossible to know what you are looking at. To begin drawing Godzilla, learning anatomy isn’t necessary. It’s a plus to understand, but it’s not required by any means.
Focus on learning simple shapes that make up his mass. These Simple Shapes are incredibly easy to learn. Seeing Godzilla in abstract simplistic shapes dramatically makes the entire process much easier. It also lets you create freely from your mind in the future. You just need a system of simplification. You can create your own as you go, but I will provide you with one here on the page.
Simplified
When looking at Godzilla’s neck, it can be simplified down into a cone-like shape. This simplified shape is an important building block to building Godzilla.
When looking at Godzilla in general, his body goes from small at the top of his head to larger as you go down his body. The reason for this, is because the animal would need to have incredibly large legs to carry his own weight with gravity. Think of animals like elephants, where they have tree trunk-like legs to support their body. His head is proportionally very small. This also ads to the appearance of his giant mass.
The simple shape we use representing the neck can be modified and altered to make the shape of the neck you need for the drawing. Godzilla tends to have frills that go from the back of his ear down the length of his neck. When looking at the overall shape of Godzilla’s neck, it’s not an exact cone-like shape, but it resembles a cone if simplified down. If you were to look at the shape of the cone, it flairs out at the frills of the neck. We use the simple shape as a jumping off point to find the more nuanced and small shapes of the rest of the area.
Godzilla Head Drawing
It’s important to remember the focus on the head of Godzilla. The viewer’s attention always goes straight to the face. The face of every version of Godzilla has been different and unique. I could do
an entire drawing course focusing only on the faces of the different Godzillas. The soul of the character lies in the face shape. This version of Godzilla has a very low forehead. The low forehead is very similar to real-life lizards and reptiles. As mentioned before, the Legendary Godzilla bears closer resemblance to typical reptiles than any other version of Godzilla. You can download the free Godzilla head worksheets to give yourself much greater understanding of Godzilla’s head. Download them here.
The head of Godzilla can be broken down into simple boxes. His head is angular and box-like.
More than any other version of Godzilla, Legendary has a box-like head. This is to the benefit of anyone drawing him. If you can draw a cube, you can draw Godzilla’s head. Since the head is relatively small on the body, so are his features. For example, his teeth are relatively tiny. The top row sticks out of the mouth when the mouth is at rest.
Unique
Something unique to this Godzilla is that this Godzilla has gils on the side of his neck to breathe underwater. This version of Godzilla spends a large amount of time underneath water. It was highlighted when he first encountered King Kong in the 2021 movie. He was able to survive underwater, while King Kong was gasping for air. If you look at the way Godzilla swims, his motion is very similar to a crocodile’s swim. The smooth swimming motion gives Godzilla speed in the water, like no other Godzilla before him.
His facial expressions are relatively limited. While King Kong has a series of different expressions, because he has pliable lips, Godzilla’s range of emotion is much lower. Since Godzilla has no lips he emotes with his eyes. The most expressive this Godzilla has looked, was a very creepy smile he made throughout ‘Godzilla vs Kong”. The expression was made by lowering the front position of his snout and scrunching the skin around the lower section of his eyes. There hasn’t been much place for him to emote in the movies he has appeared in. The drama and story were centered around King Kong. Maybe in a future movie, Godzilla will have more reasons to emote.
Godzilla frequently opens his mouth to roar or shoot his atomic breath at an enemy. It’s arguably his coolest action with his face. Atomic breath comes from a chain reaction built up from his body.
His face has a large amount of scrunching and tension when he is shooting the atomic blast. While shooting, the pupil of his eyes disappears. It’s replaced with a white glow.
Thicker
As mentioned before, Godzilla’s body is thicker and wider than previous versions, in proportion to his head. When you want to create a character that looks very large, shrinking his head is a great way to do it. This makes the overall body mass appear much larger. A good example of this is the Hulk. We intuitively use the size of the head as a base measuring tool for the rest of the body. This doesn’t apply to every Kaiju, but it does apply with this version of Godzilla.
Godzilla’s body is very human like, he stands and walks upright, even runs.
His arms are not as mobile or dexterous as a human’s arm, but they are structured like human arms. A Notable difference is he has 4 fingers on each hand.
The original Godzilla would walk completely upright, dragging his tail behind him. This was mainly because of the limitations of the Godzilla outfit at the time. The Legendary version of Godzilla leans forward, to emulate real animals.
This is to use the tail as a counterbalance while walking.
It’s also used while he is swimming, very similar to the way a crocodile uses it. The other reason Godzilla walks with a forward lean, is to carry the massive plates on his back.
The plates on Godzilla’s back resembles a Stegasaurus. They are a large part of why Godzilla is famous. This gives Godzilla a very distinct and recognizable silhouette which is the basis of good
character design.
Characteristic
The plates have had so many different iterations. Godzilla’s legs are massively thick for his body to support his giant skeletal structure. I’m guessing his legs were inspired by the feet of elephants and saurapod dinosaurs. Another feature that makes Godzilla very similair to dinosaurs is the construction of his legs. Godzilla goes straight downward from this torso, instead of going out the sides, like in lizards and reptiles.
This characteristic was seen as very unique way to separating dinosaurs from other reptiles. His pelvis is similar to that of a Tyrannosaurus Rex, he has that lizard shaped hip. His scales are rocklike structures as they near his back. The back scales are osteoderms. The scales change formation based on what part of the body they are on.
These scales can be simplified pretty easily. As far as Godzilla’s stance goes, there are very brief moments when this version of Godzilla walks on all fours. In Godzilla vs Kong, he does this for a brief moment. This makes him look more animal-like in nature. The moment is so rare that its hardly ever mentioned. anywhere.
Line Art vs Tonal Art
Drawing Godzilla in line art can be a very effective way to learn. Line art is art made up of mostly linear style. Think of comic books. This contained look can be very simple or it can be very elaborate. I recommend line art for initial learning because I think it helps learn Godzilla much
better. You learn many more surface shapes if you are forced to draw a line over it. Learning every little shape and crevice of Godzilla can force you to draw more deliberately and memorize landmarks.
Tonal drawing is when you use shadow and light to find your drawing shapes. This can be a very good way to draw when experienced, but I’m speaking to you as a beginner. I think when you start, tonal art can possibly be a way to hide things you don’t know about. This can be great for dramatic style, but it also can have you never pinpoint weaknesses in drawing. Facing your weaknesses early can be a large key to improving your Godzilla drawing from the start. It’s easy to hide things we don’t know behind dramatic lighting for effect.
Sometimes when you are good at dramatic lighting, it can be addictive, because the result is so nice without having to put in the ground work and really learning to draw.
After learning to draw with line art, then it’s a great idea to add on the dramatic atmospheric effects of lighting. This can be simple shading, which we will go over, or more compositional lighting. Line is the frame of the house holding up the building, and tonal drawing is the decorations on the house itself.
Be Creative and Learning to Draw
Be creative with the ideas you have Godzilla do. At the start, the entire point is to make drawing Godzilla a doable process. After that, anything goes. You can create more than the genera!
Godzilla pose, if you wish. Since Godzilla is a lumbering giant beast, he tends to be drawn in the same traditional poses. The creativity comes from altering his design slightly to suit the artist, or to pose him in creative ways or situations. Use what you know about drawing Godzilla to play with ideas. Situational ideas and creative posing will make you stand out more than how nice you render every scale on Godzilla’s head.
The Godzilla Drawing Comes Together
These are small pieces of a larger picture. You’ll start to learn these aspects of drawing Godzilla separately and practice them at separate times. But in practice, you’ll start exploring what part of Godzilla you are good at drawing. Most people excel at drawing Godzilla’s head. I actually recommend you focus on drawing his head and shoulder first. Get a decent grasp at that before drawing the head and really spending a lot of time drawing his body. Since Legendary Godzilla is such a complex and fascinating character design, you’ll have to learn to draw him in segments.
Bringing all different parts of learning together to make Godzilla. It may seem overwhelming, but the process becomes easier over time and repeated practice. It’s pretty common to fear to get started on a drawing.
Drawing Godzilla relies on putting something down on the page first and then modifying that. It’s almost impossible as a beginner to start drawing a finished product immediately. We fear drawing mistakes naturally, but drawing Godzilla comes in stages. With Godzilla drawing, we draw a framework that we rework until it’s time to move forward into the next drawing stage.
Conclusion
Drawing Kaijus is one of the greatest joys you’ll ever have. It’s amazing to draw the King of the Kaijus, Godzilla. Bringing together the entire process can be a really exciting experience. The things outlined on this page are to help you build a base of learning. But the real expression happens when you have some grasp of the basic steps I laid out for you. Stay consistent with your drawing because mistakes will happen. Mistakes are a part of the learning process. You have to make thousands of mistakes in order to find your way to the path you want. Something that I tell everyone to enjoy the learning portion of Drawing Godzilla. Feel the inherent joy in the learning. If you always crave the result, it might make the learning miserable.
