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What a Character! Illustration Flex Class

In this 6-week course, learners will use archetypes as starting points to design and illustrate their own characters that tell stories, developing the skills to create in depth character designs.
Sam
Average rating:
5.0
Number of reviews:
(363)
Popular
Class

What's included

Class Experience

If you like drawing, and like creating interesting characters, this course is for you! Over the six weeks of this course, we'll cover an array of topics, from fundamental skills like body proportions to the thought processes involved in determining a character's outfit, tools, pose, and even haircut! Crafting in-depth, provocative characters is all about the questions you ask yourself during the creative process. The more answers you have, the more fleshed out they will feel! 

I've been drawing people and characters my entire life. The challenge of making seemingly random scratches with a pencil look like a person has always brought a fun creative challenge to my brain. And beyond creating forms that resemble people, looking at the details that tell stories about who they might actually be, is an additional level of creative challenge. Through this course, I want to share the processes I use when I work on character designs and illustrations, whether for a commission or just for fun.

This course will have videos posted weekly in the mornings (I'm in the Eastern Standard Time zone), and will feature the full drawing process for each template, allowing learners to follow along, or simply to absorb and use the information in order to create their own characters. We'll go over these techniques, while also focused on using graphite pencils and paper. Each week, students will need to either recreate the drawing from the video, or create their own, and send it to me via direct message, or post it in the classroom. From there, they will receive personalized, private feedback, focused on constructive critique, rather than criticism. 

Week One: Body Proportions & The Benefits of Simple Shapes
    If we're going to be drawing people, we're going to need a grasp of how people are put together!
Week Two: The Warrior
    From burly berserker barbarians to dexterous dancers of death, the warrior is renowned for their prowess and skills on the battlefield.
Week Three: The Druid
    Whether living in mucky swamps or amongst craggy mountain peaks, the druid seeks to bring balance and protection to the natural environments they call home, and any they might travel to.
Week Four: The Scoundrel
    Rogues, thieves, assassins, smugglers, and more. The scoundrel works in the shadows, often dealing in less above-board schemes.
Week Five: The Magic User
    Maybe they're born with it; maybe it was given to them by a powerful entity; maybe they just studied and practiced for years and years. Whatever the source, magic users wield the arcane forces not accessible to the general masses, and bend reality to their whims.
Week Six: The Tinker
    Perhaps an alchemist, brewing potions and magical concoctions in a lab. Or maybe an inventor, hunched over a work bench with magnifying lenses assisting their sight as they drive tiny screws to hold a steam-powered aerosol unit together. Tinkers bring new things into reality, crafting them from ingredients and materials.


This course is for most levels of drawing experience. Though a fair grasp of form and proportion helps, it's not 100% mandatory.

Other Details

Supply List
Paper and drawing implements are necessary (or a tablet if preferred and available). For recommended drawing materials, see below:

Pencils. 2H, HB, and 2B at least. A wider range is always better, but these three are the minimum you'd need.
Eraser (I love Staedtler Mars Plastic Erasers, personally)
Sketch pad; 8.5"x11" or larger

A few materials that, while entirely non-mandatory, can only enhance your drawings: 
Colored pencils or markers (Prismacolor are fantastic, but also can be costly and are not at all a required brand)
            A few colors will be necessary, as each character has their own colors involved, but nobody needs to get a gigantic set of colors if they don’t want to. They can always simply be drawn in greyscale if necessary or desired!
White and black colored pencils
A black pen for outlines (again, not mandatory)
External Resources
Learners will not need to use any apps or websites beyond the standard Outschool tools.
Joined April, 2020
5.0
363reviews
Popular
Profile
Teacher expertise and credentials
I've been drawing since I could pick up a pencil, which was over thirty years ago. I studied art at Parsons School of Design, and now teach art there.

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Live Group Class
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$15

weekly or $90 for 6 weeks
6 weeks

Completed by 1 learner
No live video meetings
Ages: 10-15

This class is no longer offered
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