Beginner Illustration: From Play to Visual Storytelling

1. Intro: My name is Masha Marksll and I'm a multi disciplinary artist passionate about working on different media, whether it's illustration, creating murals, painting, or creating short animations. With a background in product design and educational digital games, my work is driven by personal style and experimentation rather than formal art education. A significant portion of my work consists of illustration because one of my favorite thing about them is having the silence conversation between viewer conveying a story by evoking emotions through colors, compositions, style, characters and items. I have always been interested in simplifying the creative process and finding different techniques to overcome the artistic blocks. Therefore, I created this class, beginner Illustration, from play to visual storytelling, where I share step by step process how to get started on illustration. This class is designed for two type of learners. One, total beginners who are eager to learn creative ways, how to get started on illustration. And second, experienced creatives who are eager to learn new ways and new techniques, how to overcome their creative obstacles. I believe each illustration tells two different stories. One, a narrative behind an image, and two, the story of a person behind the illustration. At the end of this class, you will find a bonus video, adding a new layer to your creative toolkit, how to create stickers out of your freshly made illustrations. In this class, you will discover that you don't actually need to be an expert to visually tell a story. Now, get ready, and let's dive in. 2. Your Class Project: Before we begin, let's talk about how to prepare for this class. I'll be using the Procreate app on my iPad, and if you have graphic tablet or digital software, feel free to use them because they will help you progress as well. But if you don't have any graphic tablet, don't worry about it because you can use simple materials such as a pencil, eraser, also pen and paper, and the paints of your choice. Throughout the class, we'll use a few templates that you can find at the project and resources page, feel free to download them and print them out or work on top of them in your digital software. We'll start by playing with geometric shapes and then we'll come up with the stories to combine those shapes with each other. Later we'll go through the basics of composition, colors, storytelling, and we'll create a cohesive storyline for your illustration. During this class, you'll create your first illustration. And you will choose a specific style to upscale it later. As a bonus, you'll also learn how to use your sketches and drawings to prepare them to become stickers. If you are an experienced illustrator who finds some steps too basic, feel free to keep some videos to the later lessons. And if I speak too slow or too fast, you can always change the pace of the video, as well as that, if you want me to repeat something, you can also rewind the video for 15 seconds. Now that we covered all the details, let's get into this class. 3. “From Zero to Hero" - Starting from Scratch: In this video, we'll start from scratch. At first, let's open the first template that you can find at project and resources page where you will see very simple ten geometric shapes. I opened the file in the Procreate app and let's go through the shapes together. The first, we have a star shape, then triangle, square, pentagon, hexagon, rectangle. As a seventh, we have trapez then circle, semicircle, and ellipse. If you're working on a printout form, you can draw on top of the shapes right away, but if not, if you don't have a printer and if you don't have any digital software, feel free to draw out those shapes separately on the paper with pencil and use eraser to make changes. I will delete the numbers and the names of the shapes. And if I want, I can always readjust those shapes on the paper. This exercise, what we're going to do is to take each shape and to draw inside or outside the shape, and whatever inspiration comes in our mind, we're going to draw those things. For instance, if you have a circle, you can draw a sun, you can draw googly eyes. If you have a square, feel free to use it as a box, as a house, whatever it reminds you of. Let's start from the star shape. For me, this star shape reminds me of pinata, and I will try to draw pinata. If you make any mistakes, if the object that you were aiming for doesn't look the same, don't worry about it. It's just an exercise and you don't have to stress about little things. I'll draw a thread and some details on pinata in the corners. Then I'll create more lines. Just a quick note, we are not using any colors right now. We are just drawing using the simple and the simplest materials. Let's continue with the triangle shape. Feel free to readjust the shapes according to your inspiration. You can make the edges softer. You can make it even sharper. You can change the entire shape if you are willing to. So for me, this triangle shape reminds me of a character's head, triangular shaped head, and I really would like to make a face inside. So let's continue. I will delete the corners. And I'll make the corners softer. Then I'll add ears and nose, eyes and mouth. I'm going to think about if I want this character to be male or female, maybe it's going to be a female character. It will have a longer hair or maybe a curly hair. We'll see how it looks. The next shape that we have is a rectangle, and I don't know why, but the simplest thing comes to my mind, which is a box. I'm going to create a cardboard box, just a very simple one. Let's continue. Maybe I'll give it more three shape, so it's easier for an eye to perceive what I'm doing. I'll delete the angles. I'll add the wings and maybe a note with a scotch tape saying that it's breakable. I can add additional details if I'm willing, like a thickness of a wing and I'll add some darker color inside hinting that the box is partially open. As you see, none of my creations are top level. I'm doing anything according to my intuition, wherever the process takes me, and feel free to do the same. You don't have to stress about it, just go with the flow. If your drawing doesn't look the way you're willing, it's alright as well. You will have enough chances to redraw them and recreate them as you want. This pentagon shape reminds me of a diamond and maybe I'll create a diamond ring for my female character. Let's get it started. The next, I have hexagon shape and I'm going to create a beehive. I'm going to multiply the shapes a few times and I'm going to add some honey and bees around it. If you're working in the procreate app, feel free to multiply the layer or some details to achieve the result faster. If you're drawing by hand on paper, feel free to draw next to the shapes or we draw them on a separate paper. Five more shapes are left. If you're finding it difficult to find inspiration, look around you, see the objects around you. Do they have any geometric shapes? Do any of them remind you of those shapes that you have? If yes, feel free to draw them. If not, you can also find inspiration in the books on the Internet. You write those specific geometric shapes in the search bar and try to find what those shapes can be transformed into. Now, let's continue with the rest of the shapes. This rectangle shape reminds me of a dog, even though it has drastically different shape. I'd like to add ears. I'd like to add a funny tail and cute nose. I'll delete the angles, as well, so the shape is more rounded than rectangular. The tropez shape reminds me of a skirt. The circle shape reminds me of circular windows that you can find in the summer houses on the last floor. Sometimes if you feel like your items need more hints to understand what it is, for instance, in my case, my circular window doesn't look like window, per se, so that's why I'm going to add wooden textures or maybe I'll add some lines on the window to make viewers understand that there is a glass window rather than anything else. We have only two shapes left. Semicircle reminds me of a shape of a house, something like from the Lord of the Rings Hobbit House. I'll add some moss on top of the house. Then I'll add chimney chimney top, smoke coming out of it, wooden door, circular window on top that I just drew, additional windows. And if I want to make any changes in the current illustrations, I can always resize them, readjust them. And if you are working on a paper with pencil and eraser, you can do the same by erasing the parts that you don't like and add the parts that you are willing to see. I will multiply the ellipse shape to get another eye, and then I will add some details to add some intrigue into story. And if I want these eyes to be a happy eye, it will be brighter and bigger. It can actually express many emotions. And in my case, I want it to be more mysterious, a bit scary. So I'll draw accordingly. As you see, this exercise was super fun. It's kind of a way how to learn through play and without stressing too much. And I hope that you really enjoyed it and you already got ten results, ten different objects, characters or items that you can use in the future. In the next video, we'll talk about the basics of storytelling, and we're going to combine our creations to get a cohesive storyline for our future illustration. 4. Storytelling - Theory and Practice: Whether you're aiming to evoke emotions, spark curiosity or entertain, storytelling is your gateway to engaging your audience. First, let's explore what kind of stories you can tell. It can be a story about love, about friendship, about a story filled with different challenges. It can be scary. It can be a fairy tale. Each type of story has their own charm, and you have to consider what kind of results you are trying to achieve and what kind of audience you are trying to engage. Start by asking yourself what kind of message I'm trying to convey. Then consider how these themes influence the environment and the characters of the story. For instance, a story about friendship can feature two different characters who somehow end up together and find their friendships, and they overcome challenges together. Think about the stories, famous fairy tales or movies that you like. What kind of stories they feature? What kind of characters they have? Also, the characters are not necessarily human. They can be animals, aliens of different planets, insects, they can be even objects sometimes. Also, the environment where your characters live shape the entire mood of the story. For instance, is it happening in the forest? Is it happening on a different planet? Is it happening in the city? What kind of weather there are? Is it snowy, rainy? Is it sunny? Usually, in the horror stories, they use darker settings, and it's happening in the forest where there are many eyes. There are some screams. All the characters are scared. Also, more positive stories feature more sunny environment where everything is green. The scenery is beautiful. The friendship stories can be very different. It can be happening at the party or a family gathering. It can be happening in the village. Just think about your story, what kind of story you want to tell. And then we're going to start by combining the illustrations that you already drew and come up with a cohesive story that you can tell your audience. Now, remember those shapes that we drew in the previous video? Now, let's bring them to life. Now, open the file that you used before or bring those papers back and look at your creations. And if you find any similarities or any storyline in between of them, just make sure that you write them down or you can also add notes or arrows to combine those characters and objects together. My story, I have binata. I have the female character, the box, the diamond ring, bees, a dog or a wolf, a skirt, circular shaped window. I have a house, and I have googly eyes. Do they have anything in common? Let's think about it. For instance, if I think that my female character has a dog, she's wearing a skirt. She's wearing a new diamond ring and she's moving somewhere, maybe the story has a future. So let's think where is she moving? She's moving to a new house that has a circular windows and maybe beehive somewhere next to the house. Also, the spinata is in front of the house, and to add the mystery to the story, maybe there's some mysterious googly eyes hiding on the last floor when you look inside the window. There are just so many variations you can make with ten different objects, and I will try to brainstorm what comes in my mind and feel free to do the same with your object. The second narrative I can come up with is that maybe this dog is living in the house. Suddenly, he hears the knock on the door, and there is this girl who has a googly eye, and she brings the dog some honey and the boxes. Maybe the dog has binata inside the house, and the dog is the one wearing a skirt. She really likes this girl and she invites her in where she discovers this diamond ring that is placed on the window. There are actually so many variations we can use, but I prefer the first story better, so I'm going to stick with this. In your process, if you get stuck, feel free to ask any questions in the discussion page below because I'm really curious about your process, and I want to know if anything is difficult for you so I can improve in the next classes. The first story that I came up with stays with me, and I don't need to write them down. But if you're new to this and if you think that you might forget the story, Feel free to write notes or write the story itself from the beginning till the end. And this story later will become an illustration. Don't worry if any of the items in your list doesn't come together, you can always add more items or you can erase or replace the items to fit the narrative better. Remember that great stories often include the wild twists that keep the audience on their toes. Allow your characters to evolve and react to the situation to add some depth to their narrative. In the next video, we'll get into more helpful tips of creating more successful illustrations and breathe life into your narrative. I'm really curious how your stories are going to unfold. Share your work at the project and resources page where not only me but other students will have a chance to get inspired through your illustration. See you in the next video. 5. Basics of Composition: Let's talk about the basics of composition that can break or make your artwork. So what exactly is composition? To put it very simply, composition is the arrangement of the elements within your artwork. Every decision that you make, starting from the color choice to the arrangement of different objects, affect how your message is perceived. Color plays a vital role in setting the mood. For example, warmer tones like red and orange can evoke more passion and warmth, while the cooler tones like blues and greens can film colmor. Think about how you want the viewers to feel when they look at your illustration. One of my friends gave me this book, Powered by Design by Rene Stevens. That is really helpful sometimes when I want to look at the colors and think about different moods. Let's dive in. Here are the list of emotions and meanings. For example, the good understanding of red is love, passion, energy, power, strength, et cetera, while in a negative connotation, it's warning, danger, and anger. And each color, as you see, has different moods. Purple is a color of royalty, spirituality, luxury, wisdom, brown friendliness, Earth, et cetera. I know that not everybody has different books where they can dive into this information. But on the Internet, you can find plenty of sources where you can see different color meanings. As well as that, let's look at the color wheels and see how we can play with different schemes and color values to convey message better. Some primary colors, secondary colors and tertiary colors. And usually illustrators use combination of primary secondary tertiary colors to add different values of a color. This is just basic information about colors. I don't want to confuse you too much. If you want to dive deeper into this information, you can find plenty of sources on the Internet and think about different color schemes. But let's and talk more about composition so you have a better understanding what we are doing next. A balanced composition guides your side and creates harmony. You can achieve balance through symmetry or by adjusting different visual weights on different part of illustrations. For instance, if you have a large object on one side of an illustration, you can balance it out by using smaller objects but multiple objects on another side of the illustration. Experimenting with placement can create harmony or tension, depending on what kind of results you want to achieve. Let's see a few examples, and I will explain deeply what I mean. For instance, I have this illustration book that is showing different sorts of composition, and let's see what the artist does here. These two illustrations are somehow similar because the girl is looking at the right direction. But the compositions are pretty different. For instance, if you draw lines in between, you see that there is a horizon and these main characters are placed on the left side of the image, while the right side is empty, which can hint the loneliness, hint how this character feels. Those two characters don't even look at her while she is looking somewhere in the emptiness, creating more sentimental mood. In this instance, if I draw lines in between of the illustrations, we will see that those two figures are the central figures that almost cross the illustration itself, and while the horizon here is way lower, we have a bigger space on top. While here, the horizontal line is upper closer to the center. So in this instance, our eye looks at two characters at first, and then we see the third characters. This is also pretty sentimental, but these two characters are more closely related in this illustration rather than in this illustration. And finally, let's look at our third illustration, which is pretty different. It adds drama through this lightning and the horizon is exactly in the center, while the parts of it is in the upper part. We have this character that is climbing on the left side of the illustration, while on the right side, this lightning balances this character out. If this lightning was on the writer side, I would actually prefer it. But still, when I look at this illustration and compare it with this illustration, I see how darker the colors are, how tense the mood is, while here it's calmer, it's more quiet. So when we talk about composition, by readjusting the elements in our drawing, we can achieve different results. And when we move to the next steps, you can always readjust your characters, your items and experiment, see which fits the mood better and which looks better. Without experimentation, it's very difficult to achieve results from the beginning. But if you are already an experienced artist, I'm sure you can find the best way that works for drawing. In the next video, we'll put all these concepts into practice by creating the first illustration with the shapes and forms that we created and the storyline that we came up with in the previous videos. Remember to keep your message and mood in mind while creating your next piece. 6. Your First Illustration: First, let's choose a composition direction for our illustration. You have to decide if you want a balanced composition, dynamic or perhaps a bit chaotic. Once you decide which one you prefer, draw the lines to indicate where your figures are going to go. Those lines will serve as a framework for your illustration, framework or a guide for your illustration. Remember that these guidelines are going to help you maintain cohesive looks for your scene. If you're working on Ado B software, you can use guides to create horizontal and vertical lines. But if you're working on the procreative, you can go to settings Canvas, then to drawing guide, you can adjust the guide, and then you can draw on top of the guides to make sure that those lines are straight. In case you are working on a paper, feel free to use a ruler or something straight like a book. To make straight lines as well. Let's start pencil or chalk paint. I'll add a layer. I'll use a different color to draw a guide to make sure that I can differentiate figures from the guides. I have decided on balanced composition, but with a bit of drama. For that, I'm going to use a very thin margins on each side, and then I'm going to draw horizontal and vertical lines that cross in the center. Once you draw your lines, feel free to erase the guides, or you can also turn off the drawing guide on the Procreate app. Now, let's combine the geometric shapes with the story line that we developed. Start placing the shapes inside the lines that you drew and let your imagination guide you. Whenever something falls off, you can always readjust them. You can erase with an eraser or you can delete in these digital softwares. If you don't remember the small items and characters that you drew before, feel free to copy and page them on the same page, or you can also put them in front of you to make sure that you don't miss any of the characters on the way. I copied my characters. They are here. Just to repeat what I have. I had a pinata, a female character, cardboard box, a diamond ring. A beehive, a dog, a skirt, the circular window, a house, and googly eyes. While drawing, if something feels really off, you can just replace them, but make sure that all the characters come together and they play a part together with the storyline that you came up with. I have these guides. I'm going to create a new layer. I'll block this guide, and then I'll roughly sketch a figure, it's going to be here. Then I have a dog that is shorter. I'll have a house maybe on another side. Maybe there is a path coming towards my characters. Because, as you remember, my entire story is that a female character is moving into a new house with her dog. She's wearing a skirt. She's having this new engagement ring. And this house looks like a hobbithouse from the Lord of the Rings. And there are some boxes waiting outside to make sure that she has a swift moving into the house. And there is a twist in this story, which is this say googly eye hiding somewhere. That's why I want the look to be very balanced in a way, but this twist should be a bit dynamic, a bit dramatic. That's why I'm going to draw a big tree and the googly eyes will have more dramatic look somewhere inside the tree. Once you have a rough sketch of the illustration, look at it and decide if you want to erase anything, if you want to enhance any part of the illustration. In my case, as you see, I have a very, very rough sketch, but I don't actually enjoy how this line, the horizontal line goes. Maybe I'm going to adjust it somehow. And make sure that the house has more hobbit like look, and also I will try to balance out different figures on each side. As well as that, as you see, my beehive is hanging from the tree. But if I have gata as well, then it actually doesn't have a place to go. Maybe I'll consider for my story sake that the pinata is hanging inside, waiting for her when she moves to the new house. But right now I'm going to stick with the beehive only. It's not a final sketch. Nothing is going to happen if you make mistakes. Use different kind of pen or pencil or even a different color to make the main shapes sharper and to make sure that you see the main elements really clearly. You can add additional layer and you can delete the previous layer once you're ready. I'm going to add transparency to this layer and I'm going to use another layer to draw on top of it to have a clearer picture. As you see, I'm not adding too many details just yet, because this is just the first illustration. Afterwards, we're going to work on many small details, work on a style. But for now, it's on the sketch level. Okay, this is what I had, and this is what I have now. 7. Finding the Right Colors: Next, let's talk about color. If you have any colors in mind, that's great. If not, you can take inspiration from color wheel. Try combining primary, secondary, and tertiary colors together. To repeat what we've said before, the warm colors like red and oranges can make your illustration look warmer, and the cool colors like blues and greens can make your illustration look calmer. Think about the mood you are trying to convey, and as well as that, think about the weather and the time of the day that the action is happening. I want my scene to be happening in the evening when the sun just went down because I think that these googly eyes will work better during this time. This female character should be more joyful while my dog is going to be more worrisome to have this kind of intuition that something is going to happen. The colors that I want to use for my illustrations are like purple, blues, maybe some yellows, but just the hint of yellows. The rest will be more cooler to feel calmer, as well as a bit scary. Let's see. I roughly some colors because I want to talk about the color value. Of course, these colors are not going to be my final colors. I just want to explain something to you. So these are my colors. Now. Now, if you're working on the digital software, you can turn your illustration into grayscale mode. In the Procreate app, you can go to the settings, then go to Hue saturation and brightness and then tune down the saturation till the end. If you're working on a paper, you can always take black and white photo of your illustration and see how it looks. Usually, the closes the things are to the light source, brighter they are and further the items are from the light source, the darker they get. In my case, as you see, the girls head, legs, dog, and the beehive is the brightest. What does it tell me? In this case, it tells me that they are the closest to the light source, but is it true actually? Even the clouds are the brighter than any other colors. But in truth, they are pretty far from the main scene. The tree should be brighter. The girl's body should be brighter and everything that is behind should be darker. I can make the color correction, based on the color wheel and based on the primary, secondary, and tertiary colors. Or I can write quick notes and make some points, which I will consider later when we upscale our illustration and when we make the final look. In this case, I'll add a note layer. The cloud should be, darker, clouds brighter, tree, et cetera. As well as that, if composition wise, something disturbs you, you can always write notes or you can add arrows to guide them or adjust the items according to your wish. In my example, I think that the clouds and the net are too close to each other. Either there should be the beehive or clouds in this place. Maybe I'll remove the smoke. Or maybe I'll remove the beehive, but I think that the beehive is more important than smoke itself right now. And maybe there should be more air in my illustration. And the composition wise, what I can do is that I can lower down the layer of grass and the house itself. Finally, don't forget that this is not your final drawing. Embrace the process. Once you finish your initial illustration, take time to experiment. You can adjust horizontal and vertical lines of your composition and see what works best for your drawing. Maybe the horizon should be higher or lower, maybe the vertical lines should be adjusted. Adjusting the composition can really help you find what composition works for your story and for your illustration. And when you are ready, jump to the next video where we are going to find illustration style that works best for your drawing. 8. Finding Your Style: In this video, let's talk about how you can find your unique illustration style. This is a very exciting journey because the style can connect your audience to your illustration. If you are already an experienced illustrator, you can skip this video and you can start redrawing your illustration in your own style. But if you are not, we can explore different artistic influences, different illustration styles to define how we can continue with the further steps. Let's start. Start by looking at the theme of your drawing. Does it remind you of anything? Any other artist's work, any other theme or movie or cartoon? If the answer is yes, you can gather different references from that movie or illustration or the idea that you have in mind. If not, we can continue. If nothing comes to your mind, don't worry about it. We can gather different references from different sources, and we can start by exploring the books. If you have any books at home, that's great. If not, you can visit different libraries or maybe bookstores, book a face, or maybe some of your friends have artistic books that you can use. If not, the Internet is always your. Look for the books that showcase different styles, different artists. You can also use tarot cards or posters or anything that comes to your mind. You can look around. You can visit a gallery around you, where you can see how different artists express their ideas. As you find the pieces that you really love, make notes. You can screenshot or you can save different images. Write down what is exactly that you like and gather those references because later you can look at them and you can copy or you can draw something similar. In case of Ya coono, she has her poetry and next to the poetry, there are illustrations that express her ideas. It's very surreal. You can't pinpoint the items or the characters, but it's very expressive at the same time. Character wise, I really enjoy looking at Mattias Adolson's works because he's very detail oriented and he's drawing his characters with a bit of humor. He uses watercolor and ink pen to illustrate his works and illustrate his ideas. This book is my last purchase. I really like it. It's called witchcraft, and it shows different artists and illustrators drawing events happening in different centuries, expressing how witches were treated or behaving in that century. If I like anything, I will write them down. Or take a photo. Sometimes there are just some parts of artwork that we really enjoy. It might be colors, it might be small details. But whatever it is, if it draws your attention, just capture it and save it for the further use. In case of the website, you can Google what you want to see, or you can also visit websites like Pinterest or Nunness or Jax stepos Magazine, where they showcase contemporary artists or some new discoveries, and they might be new discoveries for you as well. When you see something that you like, make sure to screenshot or save them. When you have your collection ready, just take some time to analyze everything that you gathered? Do they have anything in common? Is there anything specific that you like about those illustrations or references? How do line colors work together? What materials the artists use? Just analyze them for yourself. And don't worry if your skill level is not there just yet. We are learning as we go. You're going to develop your style and you're going to grow over time. A good exercise would be to imagine how specific artists would draw your storyline. Now, feel free to pose the video, take 20, 30 minutes to analyze everything, and to re imagine your current drawing. In a new style. Would you use pencil or pen or marker or acrylic paints? What is going to be a definition of your new style? Always remember that finding your style is an entire journey. It doesn't happen just like that most of the time. So don't worry if you are not there yet, this is just an exercise. The next video is going to be really exciting because we will take all the notes and references that we gathered and we're going to recreate and upscale your previous illustration with a new style. 9. Upscaling Your Illustration: In this video, we're going to upscale your illustration by using the references and notes that we gathered in the previous session. Before we dive in, it's important to take a deep breath because it's much easier to illustrate with less stress. Just remember that this is just an exercise, and the main goal is to explore and experiment. Again, if you are an experienced illustrator, feel free to use your style. And also, while using your style, you can reconsider the entire illustration and thinking what changes you could make. Now, let's bring some life into your illustration. Grab the notes and the references that you gather. And compare them to your illustration. Is there something that you can use from the references? Maybe some colors, maybe some lines? Anything that you liked before can be used and applied in your illustration. Let's get started. I opened my previous illustration and I'm looking at it and considering what I can change. Actually, it doesn't resonate with my current style that much. It looks more childish that I'm willing to look, and I'm going to take just a few ideas from this illustration and I'm going to recreate entirely new image. For instance, I am going to combine my female character and the dog character and create entirely new character. So this is a combination. I'm going to use the element of a beehive, maybe a hexagon shape. I'm going to use the box because I think that the unbreakable or breakable box can offer many interesting things. Maybe I'll open this box and then I'm going to use ugly eyes to express something completely different. Let's start sketching it out. Again, I'm going to use the drawing guide for a new composition. I'm going to adjust the grid size because this is too small. I want to use the emergence. I'll draw one line in the center. And then, actually, I think that I'm going to focus more on the left side. So on the left side of my illustration, there's going to be more drama. While on the right side will be a lighter illustration which will balance it out. Let's see where the horizon is, the center. So this is a center. Then I'm going to hide the drawing guide, and I'm going to start sketching out. As you now see, I'm using the tree shape and I'm creating something completely different that doesn't look like the previous illustration. But this is what happens when you apply your style into a theme. The previous illustration was just a tool to get us inspired, but now it's time for the magic to happen. When it comes to the colors, apply your colors thoughtfully. Start with the bigger areas, and then finish up with a smaller details. And also, don't be afraid to experiment with different combinations. Sometimes what we have in mind doesn't look great on paper and the vice versa. I'm planning to use the minimal colors in my illustrations, not to lose the drama that I have right now. So I'm going to use blacks, whites, but most of the illustrations will have maximum five different colors. Make sure to outline the main characters. Add some texture, some details, maybe some grass or the textile or the frames on the walls. Anything that comes to your mind that is missing, make sure to add them. Also, a tip is that if you're drawing in the digital software, make sure that everything is on different layers, so you can easily erase them or edit them? Great job, everyone. You did really well at upscaling your illustration. In the next video, we're going to finalize it and we're going to add some touches and we're going to combine them to your newly found style. So see you in the next video. 10. Final Touches : In this video, we're going to focus on wrapping up your illustration and making these final touches that bring your entire illustration to life. First, take a look at your final picture. Is there anything that stands out? Does anything feel a bit off? Just trust your intuition and remember that it's a very powerful tool. If something feels like it needs retouching, this is the time to readjust it. One technique that I really like, and I'm not sure if this is something that I came up with or I learned somewhere is to take your illustration and look in the mirror with this illustration. Sometimes changing the perspective shows the weaker spots of the drawing. In case you are drawing on the digital softwares, you can flip the page and see if anything looks odd. As you see, my illustration has some weaknesses, so I'm going to tweak those little parts and improve it. Now, let's consider if your illustration fits the style that you chose. Did you discover anything new? Did you discover perhaps your own style? I would be really interested to know your new discoveries. As a beginner, we often don't feel when it's time to quit. And that's why this mirroring technique really helps you to see what is extra or what is necessary. Remember, you can always redraw your illustration and improve it. And once you feel satisfied with your work, make sure to share it in the project gallery to showcase your hard work and your progress. Along the way, if you have any questions at all, feel free to ask them at the discussion page. After all, we are all here to support each other. Congratulations on reaching this final point. Can't wait to see your creations and see how big of a difference you made throughout this class. As a bonus, make sure to check out my next video where we'll be adding a new layer to your creative toolkit by creating stickers from the illustrations that we made. See you in the next video. 11. Bonus Video: Welcome to my bonus lesson. Now we are going to create digital stickers out of your illustrations. I'm really, really excited to teach you these skills because this is something that I've been making over a decade, and the stickers are a great way of communication and sometimes even promoting yourself. You know, when I was starting as an illustrator, I didn't have too many works, but the ones that I had, I turned them into stickers and then I printed them out. And whenever I would go, even if it was social gathering or a word gathering, I would give my stickers to everyone. And this is how my visual brand called Masholand came to life and how other people got to know my brand. So do you remember those geometric shapes that we use for our first sketches? So we need those. If you were drawing on paper, make sure to photograph what you created. And here, these digital software would be really, really helpful. When you photograph it, you can bring them to the software and start. In my case, as I was drawing on the Procreate app, I'm going to open my creations. I have ten objects, probably you do two. And I'm going to split them apart. At first, I'm going to take Lasso tool going here with a free hand. I'm going to outline my gotta and I'm going to push copy and paste. I'm going to go back to the previous layer and I'm going to repeat those steps. Once I have all my shapes on different layers, I'm going to delete the basic layer where all the shapes are together. Feel free to rename layers, not to mix them up. Now we're going to add some colors because we had only drawings and colorful stickers attract more attention than grayscale. Let's start. Just if you are working on the Procreate app, you can hide the background color to see if anything has a transparent background. While printing the stickers, sometimes transparent backgrounds don't work really well. That's why we need to hide it and we need to make sure that everything has proper coloring. A Alright. Now, when you have all your drawings colored, it's time to add outlines because usually when you go to the printing house, they ask your stickers to have some outlines because it's easier for them to trim. You can create a separate layer for outlines. So what you actually need to do is take white pen or pencil, and then you're going to add outlines around the sticker. Make sure that they don't touch the drawing outlines. Once you're done outlining your stickers, you can choose a background color. And when you print out the entire sheet, this background color can work as an attractive piece and it can enhance your entire sticker pack. I'm going to use darker color for my background. I'm going to take a separate layer. Then you can readjust all these shapes on the paper. You already know how to readjust according to the composition, so you can apply those skills here. Make sure that you have some spaces left on each edge because during the printing process, those parts can be cut, so you don't want to lose any of the pieces in the process. Additionally, don't forget to add your name tag to this illustration pack because it's going to be kind of your signature. As artists write their signature on the painting, you can write your signature to the sticker pack. It's going to be good for marketing, as well as for your future creative business to grow. When you're finished, make sure to convert your file to PDF file and you can save it or send it to the printing office. If you have a printer at home, you can try it out. Usually, the printing offices will add additional thin outline to your already existing outline for the cutter to understand where to cut. Otherwise, I think you're good to go. Of course, there are more techniques, how to create stickers, and there are so many creators on this platform explaining everything step by step. But I think that now you have a bit of an idea how to take your process to the next level and what you can create with the illustrations that we already made throughout this class. If you like my stickers, you can also purchase them at the digital products page. In case you have any questions, I'm always here for you. Don't hesitate to ask me at discussion page, or you can also write me on my social media. In the next video, we're going to wrap up the class, so I'll see you there. 12. Wrap-Up: Congratulations on completing this class. You did so well. Could you imagine at the beginning that you would go so far? I'm really curious to see what you created, and please share your process and the results in the project gallery. It would really encourage me to see that you really enjoyed the class. And if you would leave me a review, it would be a really, really huge thing for me. It would show me that I'm doing well, you're enjoying my classes, and it would give me a push to create more classes. Thank you. Thank you so much for watching this class. You made my day. And I wish you a fantastic day as well, and hope to hear from you, to see your work, and see you in my next class. Bye.