Yoga Pose Anatomy Illustrations
Together with a yoga instructor, I created this series of anatomy illustrations, to help him in his teaching. The idea was to show the general muscular and skeletal anatomy that is involved in the yoga poses on top of the actual poses, giving the illustrations a much more dynamic look than most anatomy charts (which also made it much more challenging to draw correctly). The base drawings of the yogi I drew in pencil and the layers of anatomy were done in illustrator.
Warrior 2
I started off with the Warrior 2 pose. In this pose your front knee bends to create a stretch in your hips, your arms engage and extend straight out from your shoulders, and your gaze remains steady toward your front hand. This pose gave me the opportunity to show most of the skeletal and muscular anatomy all in one figure. While not as difficult as some of the other yoga pose illustrations, the slight turn in the torso still made it challenging enough to figure out the right placement of all the bones and muscles.
Skeletal anatomy
Muscular anatomy
Warrior 1
Next was a three-quarter back view of the Warrior 1 pose. In this pose, the legs are placed in a lunge position with the back foot turned at a 45-60 degree angle and the front leg bent at a 90 degree angle so the knee is stacked over the ankle. The heel of the front foot should be aligned with the heel of the back foot. The hips are squared so the torso faces the bent leg and the arms are raised overhead with the palms facing each other or touching.
Skeletal anatomy
Muscular anatomy
Upward Bow
The third pose was the Upward Bow. This one was probably the most challenging of the whole project, having to figure out how both the skeletal and muscular anatomy twists and changes position to make this pose happen (especially in the shoulder).
Skeletal anatomy
Muscular anatomy
Lotus
And last but not least was the much simpler Lotus position. This one is different from the rest, because of the seated posture but also because the anatomy is not all projected on top of the base drawing.
Core and pelvic floor muscles
Plantar view of the foot anatomy
