winterbramble:

Hey there! Thanks for the ask!

When you’re drawing a character who is both fat and athletic, THE WORLD IS YOUR OYSTER. The way that their body gains fat and the different ways they might train their body means there are hundreds of different ways you could draw them. If they were to solely focus on upper body strength, for example, they might have really fit arms/shoulders/back/chest and their lower body may be fatter or softer. Depending on the activities they do, their body will be shaped differently.

When you’re drawing a very strong fat character, there are a few important things to remember:

The body stores fat in a layer beneath the skin (dermis, which is just beneath the epidermis, our outer layer of skin). Beneath our fat is a thin layer of connective tissue, and beneath that is where the muscle is. This means that the muscles will be obscured beneath fat, so you won’t see fat athletes with a ripped 6-pack.

Muscle is also more dense and heavy than fat, which means a fat person who is also muscular and strong will be much heavier than someone their same size who is all chub.

I hope this helps!

(as an aside, many people commented on my last tutorial that fat people often have those big firm bellies and may not be strong or work out at all – it’s true, tummies are very unique! Not every fat person has a super soft or jiggly belly.)