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This is the general shape of a dog's skeleton, giving us a good idea of size, weight, heft, and posture. The dog is an animal that pursues its prey, not ambushes it, necessitating a long, light frame, strong, enduring muscles, and large lung capacity. This is the body type (with a few demonic alterations) that makes up half of Inuyasha's DNA!
This is a human's attempt at approximating Inuyasha's 4-legged posture, showing us what makes up the other half of Inuyasha's heritage. Inuyasha himself has shorter legs and longer arms than a normal human, giving him more level carriage and better balance. His skull is also mounted more towards the rear rather than the bottom, diagonal to his spine, so he doesn't strain his neck to look up and forward (see the dog skeleton).
(Note the similarities in basic structure between the dog and the human. The difference lies in proportion and length rather than actual structure.)
This is the structure of a dog's torso, which illustrates the light, streamlined design of a fast long-distance runner. With its enormous heart and lung capacity, the dog's body is able to produce great bursts of speed even over long distances. A dog can attack with surprising strength despite the lightness of the frame when compared to felines.
This picture displays three phases in the full running stride of a dog.
This picture displays various postures of a dog when sitting and lying down.Unlike animal dogs, dog-demons in their dog form can stand upright on their hindlimbs. Their shoulder and hip structure is such that they can double as bipedal or quadrupedal movers. This makes them formidable warriors, able to pursue an enemy on all fours and move in for battle on two feet, wielding large and effective weapons. However, the giant enemies of yesteryear are mostly extinct, and the old techniques the Dogs used with their giant weapons are mostly lost. Dog-demons of Inuyasha's time mainly use their sheer size and raw strength to intimidate and defeat opponents.
This is how a dog's foreleg is structured. The dog, as with all other running mammals, walks up on the toes of the limb. The claws are permanently extended, not retractable, to serve as extra traction during running. (The dewclaw in the rear is similar to the thumb of a human hand.) Most canines do not use their claws for combat, preferring their teeth; however, dog-demons use their sharp claws often, and rarely use their teeth unless in dog form.
These are different profiles of the skeleton of a dog's forelimb. In profile the paws of dogs and cats differ in their direction; the dog's paw bends slightly forward after the carpal (wrist) joint, while the cat's is straighter. The fingertip phalanges (the very tipmost finger bone) are claws, non-retractable in dogs. The weight of the body is supported on the extremities of the metacarpus (fingers), hence the existence of pressure-distributing pads on the digits. Here you can clearly see the structure of (top to bottom) shoulder blade, shoulder, elbow, wrist, hand, and finger joints that are comparable to a human's.
When the structure of a dog's forefoot is looked at up close and in detail, it bears striking similarity to a human hand. Each of the "fingers" can be discerned, as well as the "thumb" (dewclaw) mounted higher on the limb. A dog-demon in dog form has a paw that is very similar to the one pictured here; however, it is more structurally similar to a human's hand. The dewclaw is opposeable and doubles as a real thumb (as seen in Sesshomaru), giving the dog-demon the ability to grip objects even in dog form.
Here are listed some canine expressions used for drawing a few of Inuyasha's moods.
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