Creative Drawing Specialization: From Fundamentals to Artistic Expression

Meet some of the artists I admire and from whom I continue to learn about how they communicate using drawing as a graphic and textual language. Each one contributes different things, but something common to all of them is that, when I met them, each one of them opened up a unique and different world to me. All of them have used illustration and drawing not only as artistic expression, but as a language in itself to communicate things. And they all speak from humor, irony or a different and surprising perspective.

Inspiration / Javirroyo

19m

Inspiration / Fist

Here we will reflect on the possibility of finding and generating new artistic learning methods that are alternatives to academic stereotypes, as well as the different phases of the teaching process.

Inspiration / Gusti

Gusti will talk to you about the artists and people who have influenced me throughout my professional career. I have been influenced by everything from cartoon characters to illustrators who relied on drawing, not only as a way of life, but also as a way out of the darkness they found themselves in at a certain point in their lives.

Inspiration / Fortuna Studio

Inspiration can come from anywhere, from what we see every day, the music we listen to, the movies we watch to what we learn about history, art and literature. Now, we'll tell you where ours comes from.

Inspiration / Fist

Finally, you will meet some artists that I like. You will see that their works are very simple, but they all have something special.

Module 2

In this first module, you will learn to draw from scratch with a rational and playful approach from the hand of the artist Puño. Through dynamic exercises, you will develop your creativity and understand the brain processes involved in drawing. Following a structured manual, you will complete a sketchbook.

16 lessons (2h 47m)

The notebook is a garden of ideas and memories

To start, you'll learn why the sketchbook is a sketcher's best friend. I'll give you some tips on choosing the right sketchbook and drawing materials, as well as some tricks.

The hand of the cartoonist has been a faithful and close model since the beginning of time. Let's see how it can help us on our way to becoming cartoonists.

The hand, eternal model

Doodles 1

Before facing the representation of what surrounds us, abstract drawing will be very useful to learn some basic concepts of the act of drawing that can only be understood through practice.

15m

Doodles 2

You'll see how to practice drawing patterns such as clouds, hatching, caves and interlaced paths. You'll explore their structure, variations and visual effects, developing precision and creativity. Finally, you'll reflect on your favourites and how to combine them into new compositions.

Collage with cellophane

You will see a fun image transfer exercise based on the sample with which we will practice the composition of the portrait.

Games for various proto-drawers

Drawing can be a very fun activity. Let's try some games to experiment with as a group.

Geometric shapes, your new best friends 1

In this lesson we will work with what we already know how to draw: letters and basic geometric shapes. We will also practice some balancing on paper.

Geometric shapes, your new best friends 2

In this exercise you will create a portrait using a shape ruler and a circular base. You will explore facial proportions and symmetry, working with ink, brush or collage to experiment with precision and composition. By the end, you will be able to combine multiple faces into a more complex composition.

Through some basic formulas we will learn to provide gestural and corporal expression to anything, even a lemon, as you will see in this lesson.

What does a lemon feel?

Prosopography and ethopoeia

Many literary rhetorical figures have a visual translation, as we will see in this lesson. We will also see how the size of the human figure within the frame influences some of them, such as prosopography and ethopoeia.

Games for two (or more) fearless cartoonists

It's time to let go of your fears and start being more daring. To do this, I'll show you a new series of games that will help you enjoy the pencil and paper.

Restrictions and challenges

Do you remember how divergent and convergent processes affect our brain? Let's check out how we can use constraints in drawing to stimulate our creative muscle.

Urban notebook 1

At this point, you're more than ready to hit the streets with your favorite supplies. In this lesson, I'll share some tips and tricks for drawing buildings, plants, and people. Plus, I'll tell you some ways you can get the most out of your sketchbook.

You will learn to draw plants and trees, exploring their structure, volume and textures. You will practice shading and watercolor techniques to represent crowns, trunks and shadows with realism. In addition, you will do exercises to understand the order of the elements in the drawing and improve your precision.

Urban notebook 2

Have you ever drawn people? There are a huge number of people who don't do it because they are afraid. In this lesson, I will help you get rid of that fear and give you my best tips for drawing people in a practical and simple way.

Drawing people

Games for packs of cartoonists

These games are suitable for large groups of artists. Ideal for the classroom or for evenings with friends!

Module 3

In this module, Javirroyo invites you to train your creativity through simple exercises and practical tools. Like a professional athlete, developing creative skills requires practice and dedication. With his experience as an illustrator and designer, he will share his secrets for transforming ideas into striking drawings and diagrams. Get ready to explore endless creative possibilities and bring your ideas to life!

18 lessons (2h 25m)

Creativity, communication and neurons

In this lesson I'm going to define what creativity is. We're going to find out why many of us stopped drawing as children and then I'll show you the process I follow from the moment I start looking for an idea until I publish it.

Procrastinate, think, draw and share

Now let's see why procrastinating is an important phase within that creative process that follows thinking, illustrating (or doing any other activity) and sharing.

Find your weirdness, find your motivation

You will discover what your main motivation is, starting from the passion, mission, profession and vocation that you seek in life, to get closer to your Ikigai. Ultimately, it is about investigating the possibilities and your own talent or, in other words, we will answer the questions "What makes me strange? What makes me different?"

Descriptive self-portrait

In the previous lesson we talked about how Ikigai can serve as a tool to help us know what we want to do in life, in order to establish motivational goals. Now we are going to discover what we are like in order to move towards that goal: we are going to do an introspection exercise through a self-portrait, using drawing and text.

Analyze your capabilities and your limitations

One of the most important steps in determining what path we should take in the future in relation to our activity is to recognize ourselves in what we are best at and what we are worst at. And to do this we must delve deeper into our capabilities and our limitations. In this lesson we will learn to discover them.

Connecting concepts

In this lesson you will learn how to connect ideas from a topic and a sketch or base drawing that I will propose to you. It will be like doing sit-ups in our creative gym with the muscle of the brain. Everything will be very fast and very automatic. Have your stopwatch at hand and try to do one every 4 minutes.

The importance of conceptualizing and simplifying stories

You will discover the importance of empathy in daily work. I will also show you how to think visually and we will see some graphical representation systems that work as tools in the form of graphs and diagrams, allegories, analogies and abstract analogies, analogies and allegories that will help you conceptualize.

Concept map

One way to find new concepts is to make a concept map. In this way, we can refine or discover ideas that were initially hidden, but which, thanks to the map, we can discover. In this lesson we are going to develop an illustrated concept map based on a topic.

A mutant form

In this lesson we will start with an archetypal representation: starting from the figure of the human body we will represent seemingly distant ideas. We will also mix the representation of the body with different themes to obtain unexpected results. We will experiment, play with seemingly dissociated ideas and mix them through drawing.

Taming chance to get new ideas

Chance is a great generator of new ideas. In fact, there are great discoveries throughout history that were generated thanks to mistakes. In this lesson we will force chance. We will try to make things happen, to make ideas emerge by mixing other seemingly distant ones... We will associate ideas by chance; and the results will surprise you!

Express ideas from different emotions

During the module we have seen how ideas are made up of, among other things, our beliefs, our desires, our expectations, our imagination and, above all, our emotions. Therefore, you will see how to represent situations through them.

Finding a story and simplifying it

To generate ideas that are understandable and reach more people, we need to simplify them, and make them understandable, connectable and empathetic. The same thing happens with stories, with storytelling: we need to build stories by removing what is superfluous or adding elements that facilitate their connection. Here I show you how to do it.

Thinking outside the box as normal

We are going to ask ourselves what normality is and we are going to learn techniques to help break routines. My job when I publish cartoons on Instagram or work on a book is to ask the reader questions, to ask them the right questions that lead them to their own reflection. At no point do I intend or want to indoctrinate or speak of great truths. I believe that our job is to ask questions. Creative work connects directly with this continuous action of asking if everything we have learned and the world around us could really be different. Now I am going to teach you techniques that will help you ask yourself different questions.

Turning an image into many graphic ideas

In this lesson we are going to do the opposite process that we saw in the previous lesson, where we asked many questions to an image. Here we will try to obtain graphical answers based on a single shape. In this way, we will explore all the possibilities it has.

Playing a tennis match with concepts

Another way to find creative solutions to problems is a kind of tennis match. Play action-reaction. That's what we're going to do in this lesson; play a tennis match with concepts, with questions that contain a problem and answers that bring us an unexpected solution.

This lesson has a lot to do with the meaning of philosophy. Or, in other words, how to question absolutely everything; how to use the question "Why not?" as a battering ram in the face of structures that seem immovable at present. We are going to rethink the rules, to move things so that others emerge that remain hidden. We are going to "think outside the box."

Breaking the rules

Communicating ideas through different media

Now we will not only rethink the “normal” reality, but we will also apply different media to respond to problems. We will not only draw, but we will use written language, sound and a recipe to express ideas. Or, in other words, we will represent ideas by leaving our comfort zone.

Humor is the king of creativity

Finally, let's talk about humor and the limits of humor. And I won't draw, but I'll show you 4 examples where I've worked with the limits of humor and really sensitive topics. [textbox type=alert]I warn you that this last lesson may contain images that may hurt certain sensitivities.[/textbox]

The notebook, a faithful friend

Module 4

In this module, you will dive into the world of drawing alongside PUÑO, who has spent years helping people overcome their fear of blank paper. Through fun and simple exercises, he will guide you to face challenges such as perspective, proportions, shadows and color. Whether you are a beginner or have some experience, this module is the perfect complement.

12 lessons (2h 41m)

To begin this module, you will see what materials we will need to carry out the course exercises.

Composition and visual weight

You will learn some basic notions that will allow us to better organize and place our drawings and make them more balanced, as well as to establish elements that attract the viewer's attention above others.

Action of lines and geometric figures

There are some compositional rules inherent to the perception of the human brain, which we can use as a tool when drawing. In this lesson we will study their possibilities.

Perspective in drawing: basic rules

We will take some first technical steps in the representation of three-dimensionality using the rules of perspective. It may be difficult at first, but with a little practice you will see that it is a piece of cake.

22m

Proportions

If we want to represent something faithfully, we must necessarily take measurements of all the elements that compose it and establish distance relationships between them, that is: more measurements. We can only improve through practice, but I will give you some keys that will make everything much easier and more fun. In additional resources you have the photo of Audrey Hepburn that I used as a model in this lesson. It is very good to have it on hand to see it while you draw.

21m

Shadows and depth

In this lesson we are going to practice some simple dynamics to understand how the shading technique works to create the effect of depth and to gain enough confidence to gradually dare to add shadow to our drawings without fear of making mistakes.

Life drawing (more or less)

Now I will propose a dynamic to be able to copy an object from nature, instead of a photo, in the least painful and most satisfying way possible: drawing a ball of crumpled paper.

It is very important to warm up your hand before drawing, whether as an amateur or a professional. I will offer you some exercises that will help your brain get into the right zone for drawing, and help your hand and wrist visibly improve their psychomotor skills.

Hand warmer

The blotted line technique was used by Andy Warhol to create numerous drawings during his time as an advertising illustrator in New York in the 1950s and combines drawing and printing. Let's see how to reproduce it in a very simple way.

Blotted line

Not everything in this module is going to be about training the eye and the hand: it is also necessary to enrich our ideas, because a skilled hand without a creative brain behind it rarely draws something interesting. We are going to use metaphors, a literary resource that also has its visual version.

Visual metaphors

Mini drawings: one day, one topic

In this lesson we will be able to express ourselves freely. We will experiment and apply what we have learned at our own pace, following a simple but compelling weekly challenge drawn. Each day we will complete one or more pages following a previously decided theme.

Show yourself to the world

It's time to publish our drawings! We're going to create an Instagram account where we'll show our work and form an online network of artists.

Module 5

Gusti Rosemffet believes that the key to creativity is to let go of fear and enjoy painting and drawing. Here you will explore fun and educational techniques to unleash your potential and bring an inclusive and colorful character to life. Using watercolors, colored pencils, pens, and even collage, you will learn to overcome creative blocks and enjoy the process.

14 lessons (3h 7m)

The notebook as a space of freedom

In this lesson I will review the different creative notebooks that I have created throughout my professional career. I will show you that there are different types of notebooks that can be adapted to your different styles and stories.

Telling stories by drawing

I will review some of the books I have illustrated throughout my professional career. I will explain where ideas for illustrating stories come from and how to start writing a story.

The blockade: our great ally 1

I'm going to explain to you how we can generate ideas to overcome creative blocks in a simple and practical way. Remember that the most important thing is to stop thinking about what you can't do and enhance what you can do and give free rein to your spontaneity.

The blockade: our great ally 2

Let's continue imagining without limits. In this second part of the lesson, you will explore techniques to unlock creativity: drawing with the opposite hand, creating illustrations from random words, and designing characters with geometric shapes. These exercises will take you out of your comfort zone and stimulate your imagination in a free and spontaneous way.

15m

The Materials family

In this lesson I will go over all the materials you will be using during the course. I will also present alternative materials, in case you want to consider them.

imperfect portraits

Now I'll tell you how to make imperfect portraits. To do this, we'll use a notebook and colored pens.

Learn to count with your eyes

I'll tell you how to learn to count with your eyes. You'll need a good dose of humor to face this lesson, as well as having your crayons at hand. Let's have fun.

16m

Portraits with collage

In this lesson we are going to learn how to make portraits using the collage technique. You will need materials such as scissors, colored paper or glue. You can also use old magazines or whatever you have at hand.

You will learn to draw animals using one of the techniques that I like the most: the pen. I will also tell you how you can get inspired to create these creatures.

Animals with pen and ink

You will see how to draw cars from a miniature or a toy. It is also about daring to use objects, with everything you have at hand. From there, I will teach you how to apply the watercolor technique.

Fantastic cars

Inclusive stories: disabling the classics

In this lesson I will tell you what inclusive stories are and why they are so important for the world. I will also explain how to create the main characters of these stories.

In this lesson, I'm going to teach you how to create an inclusive story by creating a character, Alberto the camel. Let me introduce him to you and tell you how he came about.

Creating our story 1

11m

Creating our story 2

I have the camels ready. What I am going to do now is go over them and then paint them with ochre paint. When the paint is ready, I will give them volume with the pen.

Drawing and human relations

Finally, I will tell you how I relate to my readers, how drawing can help you, not only to express your creativity and your emotions, but also in your social relationships.

Module 6

Together with Fortuna Studio, the Peruvian illustration collective led by Pierina Masquez and Jose Maria Denegri, you will rediscover the beauty of what surrounds you. You will learn to illustrate three everyday elements with oil pastels and colored pencils, giving them a creative and vibrant touch.

10 lessons (1h 38m)

What will we do in the module?

Do you want to know what we are going to work on throughout the module? During the lesson, we will tell you everything you need to know. In this module you will learn to give relevance to creative processes and you will begin to see errors as a possibility.

The day to day that surrounds us

For us, everyday life is all those activities, spaces and objects that make up our daily lives, and whose presence is almost a habit in our lives. We will tell you how you can learn to recognize the places you go to frequently, what you eat, what you enjoy, etc. This will help you to visualize what is present in your life.

What materials are we going to use?

It is important to always know what we are going to work with, as well as to take into account what each of the materials will be used for. In this lesson, we will show you the materials that we will use throughout the course. We suggest you prepare them and have them close by, since you will start using them from the next lesson.

Testing materials

You will learn how to use the materials through some exercises that we will work on. These exercises will help you understand the pictorial possibilities that oil pastel has and that you can use to draw your project.

You already know all the material, you've already tried it, now it's time to see and start drawing. You'll learn the dynamics that we use to make our drawings and we'll make a few to loosen up our hand, this way we'll make sure we're ready for the moment of truth. Don't worry if some stroke or part gets complicated, if it happens you'll just have to take a breath and allow yourself to continue.

Blind drawing

The doodle as a starting point

We will teach you some key questions so that you can carry out a deep observation exercise. In addition, they will allow you to graphically see your ideas and key words of the elements you want to create. They will also help you better understand the material and affective nature of the elements.

Sketch and color proof

In this lesson, you will create your first sketches and do a color test that will help you find the right temperature to understand in a simplified way the colors that make up your objects.

After all the preparation steps we are ready to start the last part of our final project. You will learn how to use the log as a visual support tool.

Outlined

In this lesson, you will learn how to paint your drawing in an orderly manner, so you don't mess up the format. We will show you how to do it, while giving you some tips that will be very useful.

From the inside out

Finally, we will teach you how to bring back those details that were lost in the drawing. You will learn how to add more textures and defined shapes through the line.

Lines and final details

Throughout this lesson you will find five exercises that will spark creative thinking in our brain, which will be the only tool we will need to solve them... besides paper, pencil, scissors and glue!

Module 7

Led by Puño—a Spanish illustrator and educator based in Colombia—you will explore fun games and exercises to develop artistic skills, overcome creative blocks, and spark new ideas. Ideal for a rainy day or a family activity, this course proves that anyone can be an artist.

12 lessons (1h 52m)

Recharge your brain!

Photo safari

With just a phone or a camera and a printer, we will learn not only to observe what surrounds us, but also to interpret it. We will also understand what makes an image an illustration and we will see that 1+1 can be = 3.

What do we name it?

Giving a title to our work is one of the most fun and exciting moments of the creative process. Throughout this lesson we are going to play with titles to continue experimenting with what happens when we mix text and an image.

Let's invent a character

Now we are going to invent our own character by answering the questions in a questionnaire: Where were you born? What do you like for breakfast? How many eyes do you have? Only you have the answers!

Drawings to warm up your hand and brain

In this lesson we are not only going to use drawing to stimulate the hand and the brain, but we are going to use them as a model for these two warm-up dynamics: the shadow hands and the traced self-portrait, as well as other exercises such as the materials test and the drawn crowd.

11m

Gestural and corporal expression

Now that we know what it looks like, we are going to use body language and gestures so that our character can tell us how he or she feels. We will also continue to explore the possibilities of mixing text and images.

Building animals with geometric shapes

Everything is made of shapes! If you can draw the most basic shapes, you can draw all the animals in this lesson.

19m

Album of drawn photos

It's time to complete our character's photo album with our drawings. Do you remember when you answered the questionnaire about his life? Now we're going to do something similar, but instead of answering by writing, we'll do it by drawing.

Primary and complementary colors

We will use colored papers to experiment with how colors interact with each other without getting our hands dirty.

Photographing abstract landscapes

In this lesson we will learn how to choose, build and compose, which means knowing where to place each thing. We will set out in search of real objects and turn them into abstract landscapes using only a camera and our artist's eye.

Homemade multi-color printing

Throughout this lesson we will learn how to make printed drawings with several different inks using EVA foam, rollers and colored tempera paints.