Have you ever dreamed of drawing amazing cartoon characters? In this course the talented artist and illustrator Maria Malandrino will go through the process of drawing a cartoon portrait starting from a reference picture. She will guide you through the entire workflow, covering all stages of the creative process: sketching, colouring, shading and refining your artwork.
Some experience is required for this course! You will see Maria using her favourite app Procreate, and an iPad but all you need for this tutorial is a digital drawing software (like Photoshop or any other suitable alternative that you like) and a graphic tablet to be able to follow her through the colouring process.
Maria’s tips and tricks will help you develop and improve your own drawing style and you will be amazed at the final result!
At the end of this course you will have created a beautiful digital artwork of yourself, a friend or a loved one!
Class Assignment
Your task is to sketch, draw and colour a bust/half body portrait of yourself /a friend/ a celebrity/ whomever you want, following the video instructions. It would be best if you posted your work in progress as you watch each video so you can receive feedback from your classmates as you move along!
Preview class
Meet Maria Malandrino, a talented Italian illustrator and animator, who will show you how to draw a cartoon character from start to finish!
Using her iPad and Procreate digital illustration app for iPad, Maria will give you great tips on how to get references and approach the stages of sketching, colouring and final rendering!
Class Assignment
Your task is to sketch, draw and colour a bust/half body portrait of yourself /a friend/ a celebrity/ whomever you want, following the video instructions. It would be best if you posted your work in progress as you watch each video so you can receive feedback from your classmates as you move along!
Preview class
In Lesson 2 you will understand the importance of drawing inspiration from different sources in order to feed your imagination and creativity and to give your figures realistic posing and anatomy.
Maria will show you how to create a canvas, draw a mannequin and use sketching to convert realistic shapes and proportions into “cartoony” ones, without losing real anatomy details.
Preview class
See how drawing exercises can help you improve your hand-eye coordination and retain the freshness of the sketch in the clean drawing!
Drawing hairstyles, jewellery, clothes and shoes can be challenging, as you need to convey tridimensionality, realistic visual strength and add details that flesh your character out.
Preview class
Before moving to the colouring stage you first need to create your own palette! In this lesson Maria will show you how to work more efficiently using a restricted number of colours. She will then teach you how to pick the right colour scheme to obtain the desired effects, and will explore a colouring technique that makes it easier to add tone variations, additional details, dynamic elements and special effects.
Preview class
Did you know that shading and lighting is very much about refining and erasing rather than painting?
In this lesson you will learn to create the illusion of shade using the available settings of your design software!
Maria will share her tips about adding shadows according to the source of light on your canvas, adding reflected light effects and experimenting with various lighting settings until you are happy with the overall result.
Preview class
This is a time-lapse of the full illustration process, in which Maria recaps her take-home messages and adds some useful tips and final considerations.
5 work-in-process Images (JPG) included
1 final image (PNG) included
Maria is an illustrator and story artist from Turin, Italy. She has a BA degree in Magazine Publishing from the University of the Arts London, has studied Traditional Animation at the International School of Comics in Turin and attended a masterclass in Storyboarding at the online school CGMA.
21 Draw is an online learning community where students of all skill levels can learn how to be a better artist. Our contributing artists and instructors are the best in the world.
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Membership includes unlimited access to all 17+ courses taught by the world’s best artists PLUS new courses as they are released.
Each class includes 10-20 video lessons that are 10 minutes long on average. Most classes include exercise sheets, assignments and layered PSD or PNG files.
Some classes include the ability to chat with the instructor in a public forum, e.g., if you want feedback on your artwork.
21 Draw courses are on-demand (pre-recorded) video tutorials that you can watch online with any digital devices anytime and for an unlimited number of times! This means you can easily watch (and rewatch) them at your own pace and convenience.
We have classes for all levels, even for those with zero drawing experience. In general, artists at all levels can benefit from these courses—whether beginner, intermediate or advanced.
Many lessons in our courses apply to both digital and traditional art. In a few tutorials, digital drawing software, e.g. Photoshop or Procreate for iPad is required. However, for the majority of lessons it is more about the underlying concepts and all that is needed is a pen and paper.
You can download the course resources (exercise sheets, assignments, PSD files, etc.) from the site, but you cannot download the video lessons to your computer.
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Also available is a monthly membership at $9.99 USD/month.
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This was such a fun and inspiring tutorial. I learned some really valuable tips about workflow in Procreate and illustration in general. Maria’s lessons are very easy to follow and well produced. Thanks!
I really enjoyed Maria’s masterclass, a great 101 using Procreate on iPad. It’s been awhile since I created something from scratch, and I was able to design and finish a cartoon character. I’ve always wanted to get better at inking and digital painting. Great pro-tips and good quality videos helps a lot. Thanks for kickstarting my drawing again and making me feel confident that I can draw.
I’ve drawn cartoons for a very long time, so I wasn’t sure what I’d get out of the course, but I plunged in anyway. So glad I did! I picked up several new tricks in Procreate, a whole new coloring style, and an easier way to render light and shadow, all in about an hour. The lesson is broken into titled chapters for an easier way of finding what you want to watch again.
I absolutely love this course!
This class helped just as much with drawing tips as much as software tips
Very complete! I really like it and learned new knowledge. I am happy to be able to come back as I please to rewatch and pause to try it out! Thank you for this fantastic class
This course was fine but it needed a little bit of slowing because the techniques you used was very quickly and i didnt get all of them
Thank you for it Maria ❤️
I love this one. Very clear, understandable, practical and useful.
I really love her course! I was able to follow along really easily and I definitely learned a lot.
I agree that this course teaches great content AND since I have an iPad and Procreate I was able to follow along and learn more how to use the app while exploring the creative workflow (helped more than I thought). When I am not struggling with the software I can focus on the creative process.
Granted you don’t need an iPad or Procreate
I was able to make my own character while following along the first part. Still working through the next steps but I am sure it will continue to be great.