How to Draw a Cartoon Hawk
(the Easy Way)

It's time to spread your wings and get creative by learning how to draw a cartoon hawk! This awesome aviator is one of the most well-known birds of prey and now, you can be flying high when you follow our simple steps and create an epic illustration of this amazing creature.

STEP-1: Learning to Fly With Some Basic Shapes
Are you ready for take-off? The first stage of learning how to draw a cartoon hawk is to sketch out some basic shapes which will eventually take flight into an amazing illustration! To begin with, draw a large oval or egg shape, followed by an angular line above it. These will form the basis for our heroic hawk.

STEP-2: Adding Detail to our Feathered Friend
Now we've got the basics, let's ruffle some feathers and add more detail to our cartoon hawk by sketching in some more lines.Continue the angled line you drew in the first step by drawing another line which meets the body. You can also draw our awesome aviator's beak at this stage – it's a kind of 'V' shape. 

Then, taking the oval shape as your basis, sketch in a jagged line around the chest to represent feathers. 

For the next step in how to draw a cartoon hawk, draw a wing so our heroic cartoon hawk can take flight – again, make the lines jagged to represnet feathers. An American Red-tailed Hawk has a wingspan of up to 145 cm and can fly at speeds of up to 64 km per hour! Finally in this stage, add a tail at the base of the body and make the end jagged. Our cartoon hawk is really starting to take shape. We're nearly ready for lift-off!

STEP-3: Giving our High-flying Hero a Face
Are you enjoying learning how to draw a cartoon hawk? Now that our cartoon hawk is coming along so well, let's swoop down and take a closer look at our high-flying hero. First of all, he needs a face! Start off by drawing two eyebrows as in our illustration, then add some more detail to the beak so we end up with an upper and lower beak. 

Next, draw a couple more lines on the wing and rub out the lines of the body beneath. While we're here, lets add some more detail to the, erm, tail of our cartoon hawk – draw three upside-down 'U' shapes to represent these feathers. Now, it's time to give our bird of prey some legs. 

Starting at the base of the body, draw one leg at a slight angle and the other one behind it. Make the line of the angled leg jagged at the end to represent feathers and then, draw the beginnings of two feet beneath the legs by sketching in some talons or claws – our cartoon hawk is going to need these for perching and grabbing his prey! Just draw three teardrop shapes as in our illustration.

STEP-4: Making our Cartoon Hawk Look Mean by Adding Personality
To keep up his reputation as a fearsome bird of prey, our heroic cartoon hawk needs to look lean, mean and keen to go hunting - this bird is not to be messed with! So, to add a mean expression, draw in the eyes as two small irregular circles directly beneath the eyebrows – notice how much this has changed our feathered friend's expression? Put a dot in the middle of each eye to complete the impression. 

For the next step in how to draw a cartoon hawk, make the top of the head jagged to represent feathers, then draw three curved lines on the wing so we end up with a similar effect to the tail. After this, we're ready to finish off the legs. 

Draw four short vertical lines as in our illustration, then sketch in some large feet around the talons we drew earlier.  There, our cartoon hawk is almost ready to swoop through the skies – all we need to do now is add some awesome color to finish off our illustration!

STEP-5: Taking Flight by Going Crazy With Color!
Now that we've sketched out our cartoon hawk, let's spread our wings and really bring this awesome aviator to life by going crazy with color!First of all, draw around the outline in dark brown, then rub out any lines to don't need. 

Next, color in the body using a medium shade of brown, then select a darker shade of this color for the eyebrows, the tips of the wing and tail and the leg on the left-hand side – this creates an impression of shadow. After this, color in that huge beak with a light yellow, and then choose a darker shade of this color for the feet of our cartoon hawk. 

Finally, choose a nice dark gray for those fearsome-looking talons – our bird of prey is ready to take flight and soar into the sky! We hope you enjoyed learning how to draw a cartoon hawk! Why not try drawing some trees or coloring in some sky around him? See you next time for more high-flying creative fun!