Chapter 1 Assignment
Chapter 1 Assignment
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Fundamentals of Character Design

Chapter 1 - Intro

Chapter 1 Assignment

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Fill 15 to 20 pages of your sketchbook with sketches of characters you see in real life. Whether it’s folks at a coffee shop or store, or even dogs at a dog park. Try to use at least 3 different mediums throughout the assignment. Have fun with this assignment. Experiment with shapes, new approaches, and new ideas. Take the opportunity to try out different styles.
Newest
@redbeardcory
Hi all, I'm a beginner when it comes to drawing. I'm also working through the drawing basics course but character design and animation is really what I want to be doing which is why I'm here! A few pages into this assignment and I'm struggling a bit. I'm not sure how to approach turning these people that I'm seeing into characters! Any tips would be much appreciated! I'm trying to play with proportions a little and I think that's helping but they quickly turn into something a bit too basic and too far from what I'm seeing? Here's what I've got so far, a couple I'm pretty happy with, the rest not so much haha. (Also ignore the ink, was just playing around with a brush pen which I'll be using in my upcoming sessions)
@nothanks
1mo
Hi! I just started this course myself (getting back into drawing after a loooong break). Something I've learned in other courses is that you can find a prominent feature on the person (for example, I have a big nose IRL) and *really* push it, so a caricature of me would have an even bigger nose. Another example, if a character is moving, you exaggerate the motion of their limbs (longer limbs, farther apart, etc.) I think working with gesture drawing lessons will help you learn how to find these lines of action, as well as improving your anatomy understanding overall, which will help you identify major features more easily.
@redbeardcory
Some more sketches from the train. I feel like I'm slowly getting more confident with faces but when it comes to full body I just fall apart, probably means I just need more mileage. I am starting to do gesture on the regular and I think it's building up my confidence with full body. Another problem I have is I also find it easier to copy what I see but struggle when trying to push some characterising aspect. I think the difference being when I'm drawing from observation alone something I'm analysing the perspective, looking at the shapes and values however when I want to change something it's like my mind reverse back to my skill level from before I really started learning to draw. @David Colman any advice would be much appreciated!
Edo Moya
6mo
2/20 👽
Edo Moya
6mo
6/20 🏰 No idea what I'm doing with a brush in my had
Edo Moya
6mo
5/20 🥷
Edo Moya
6mo
I need to be more playful, loosen up a little, explore. 4/20 🦹‍♂️
Edo Moya
7mo
Well, my fundamentals are not that strong and I did this page from pinterest references, I'll try drawing outside on the weekends. I like them all in general. I think I need to "speak" more clear on some areas, also I need to remember design tools like big/medium/small, contrast, complex vs simple, play with proportions, better rhythms, etc. to make the drawing visually interesting and nice. 1/20 😌
Rachel Dawn Owens
THESE ARE AWESOME :D
@natalomik
11mo
Hi! Did a few live sketches and a Disney copy assignment! I know I have to do a lot more but feel free to add some comments, for my improvement :) thanks !
Pankaj Singh
Wow these are really nice!
@teolindroos
Good day! Haha, i think i started a sketchbook over a year ago doing these trainstation sketches+other peoplesketching. It has been so fun and i hope i can continue it all the time. There has been totally shitti drawing days, can't get grip of people's characters ect. Here are the highlights! Thanks for looking!
Martha Muniz
These are a lot of fun to look through, thanks for sharing and awesome job :D I like all the different shapes and approaches to style, as well as how you gathered from a variety of references. Something you can think about as you continue is to add further gesture to these drawings, as this can help push the exaggeration and stylization, as well as liveliness and character. More specifically, starting with/visualizing the line of action, taking into account the motion of the subjects, and then adding weight/force to further reinforce this (think about where their weight lands, what surfaces they're pressing up against, the squash vs stretch, or if they are pushing or pulling, etc.). Hope this helps, keep up the good work!
Andres Torres
I don’t really go out much so it’s hard to do the coffee shop sketches.
Andres Torres
Did 3 pages today
Mark Bustin
Hey David, here's my first ever coffee shop sketches. I found this a lot harder than anticipated but I am getting used to it and already feel an improvement in my designs and decision making from these 15 pages so thanks, I'm definitely getting a lot out of this. I would love hear what you think about what I've done and how I'm going about it. Looking forward to doing more, cheers.
@onegog
2yr
@David Colman And the second part
@onegog
2yr
@David Colman Hello! Can you please comment on what I can improve in my drawings? This is the first part.
David Colman
Although you draw with volume they tend to lack structure... The features are sliding on the face. They are missing solid construction and need to have more dimensional forms- break them down and dont be so concerned with making a pretty drawing at this stage- its about learning. Hope this helps
Daniel Sookram
Please see below my first 6 sketches of people in my local coffee shop. This was allot of fun and very challenging I think I might have grown as a person doing this assignment. I am sure the first person I sketch I might have look at him a few too many times. Do we look once? that should be okay, twice? O no, three times? now I am in trouble for sure. What is the ethical thing to do should I ask them "can i sketch you?". I am going back tonight to do some more sketches. My one family member said If we are taking a picture out in public and someone walks by in the back ground we don't ask can I have this picture with you in it, my other family member was not as cool about it. What do you think?, did anyone experience the same thing? Also please critique my sketches. Thank you
Linus Lehmann
I really understand the struggle you are feeling with how long and often to look at people, i felt the same. The thing i started to do was looking at the person for a little bit, trying to memorize the most important things and than draw the things i remembered. Most of the people i started to draw were just people walking by. Sometimes in the train i also drew people where i could look multiple times, i still tried to not look too often so that they wouldnt notice me. And for some general drawing/practicing advice i would say that you should focus on the things that make each person unike. All of the persons that i drew had something i liked. Maybe it was their pose, or expression or the long beard, thats why i chose to sketch them. And also always try to include thinking about some of the things David Colman talked about. Straights, curves, simple complex, pose, silhouette, and so many more there are so many things to think about while drawing. It is very challenging for quite some time, but thats a good thing, if it were already easy you wouldnt be learning.
Sita Rabeling
Second part of the assignment, master copy (height of the figures 21-22cm). Loved this.
Daniel Sookram
This really good
Jesper Axelsson
I love Milt Kahl's stuff!
Sita Rabeling
First 3 images are older sketches. Before I discovered Proko I saw Danny G. (in ‘21) on YouTube and I was inspired to keep sketchbooks and started drawing from television programs. The last 4 I did this week (2 from Yt) but I’m not content with those. Maybe I didn’t feel inspired.
Daniel Sookram
Very nice work, thank you for sharing. I am going try the assignment today
Mathias Ragnarsson
Ok! It didn’t amount to 20 nor 15 pages, but at least I got to 12 digital sheets! I really wanted to push it to 15 but, I also wanted to get going with the other assignments and there hasn’t really been many good opportunities for me to do coffee shop sketching. So a good amount of these has been done a little bit differently; like taking a mental snapshot of people when buying groceries and then draw them from memory. I saw that there’s more coffee shop sketching further along the course so, I’m gonna plan for a day when I can really take my time at one place. Anyway, enough with the excuses. As a first assignment this really made me appreciate simple yet compelling characters even more. It’s difficult to distill a person into a believable character by just looking at them for a short period of time. And to find a balance of stylizing, pushing forms but still contain some similarity, while also not making a caricature. Looking forward to what comes next. And it goes without saying, any honest feedback that can help me improve is very much appreciated!
Daniel Sookram
Great job, very interesting characters
Adam Chabros
My master study assignment. As a self-taught person I never took part in any courses, so I have no idea if I done this correct. I did it as I thought it would be fine and I'm ready to redraw it if it's necessarily.
Daniel Sookram
You did amazing, I like the facial expression of the eyes and mouth
Linus Lehmann
Here is part one of my assignment. I will upload the other ones in the reply-section of this post. The sketchbook i was using was very small, so i did more than twenty pages. I was walking through the city, and whenever i saw someone interessting i would try to memorize some of their distinctive features. Then i would go to the side and try to do a drawing of them, trying to capture whatever sparked my attention. I also tried to use some of the designadvice from the videolesson. It was raining on the first days and cold every day, so most of those drawings where done quite fast. Though it wasnt easy i had a lot of fun most of the time, i have never paid attention to what noses people have, or to how they walk before. Im really enjoying this course so far and i am exited to start with week two. Any critique would be very welcome.
Daniel Sookram
You did a great job capturing allot of visual information and expressing it quickly
Linus Lehmann
And here is my Shere Khan submission.
Linus Lehmann
part three
Mark Bustin
My Shere Khan study submission for this lesson's homework
Daniel Sookram
Really nicely done, very clean
Andrew Schlageter
part 2 (mostly watercolor pencil). See the 1st post before critiquing. Thank you!
Daniel Sookram
Very creative both post look great, I really like the fly
Andrew Schlageter
here's part 1, I'll include the last 5 in another post. So I really wanted to go out of my comfort zone with this one and play around with what I learned in the lecture, especially with tension, contrast, flats/rounds, and a bit with making simple silhouettes. I also wanted to play with anatomy (redesigning) the way the instructor pointed out with illustrators like Jamie Hewlett. I feel this worked out in some sketches but fear that others are too caricatured or feel anatomically awkward rather than decisive. I also did these in a week on top of my other homework and a job, so if the amount of content and diversity of style is underwhelming let me know. A bit of background, I graduated in illustration in 2019, have a long term goal of becoming a character designer, and so want to strengthen my fundamentals. Even if I don't go into entertainment art, becoming a better character designer is something that will help me in the short term, as I love making narrative art with expressive characters and environments and want to have the best fundamentals and draftsmanship I can.
David Colman
Youre putting in the time and thats what really matters...
David Colman
I love how committed you are
Andrew Schlageter
Hey, I can't find the download for the shere khan study, could someone help me?
Katey Jensma
HI Andrew, all downloads are located in the "Downloads" tab of each lesson.
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About instructor
Illustrator working in film as a designer and storyboard artist- known as the "animal guy" for my passion for doodling animals. insta @davidsdoodles
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