Transcripts
1. Introduction: Hi. I am Ce Marina, a Bolivian, left-handed illustrator and graphic designer based in sunny Barcelona. Today, I'm going to take you to a firm process to create a playful, illustrated character. We will define its personality by playing a curious archetype game. I will provide resources and tips so you can use after this knowledge to create a character that is full of personality and reflects your style. Since I was a child, I wanted to fulfill a dream. I chose to do a Master's in Branding at the Elisava School of Design in Barcelona. During the master's, I fell in love with this beautiful and sunny city. After the graduation, I decided little by little to establish myself here and finally take a leap to build a career in illustration. For this class, I'm going to take you through my work process in three phases. We're going to first gather inspiration, then we will move to the sketching phase, and the final phase is about adding color to your illustration. When I create the character, I assign distinguishing features. I want that character to shine and be noticed as my own style. Even though the path of finding your own style of drawing characters takes time and practice, I think that during this learning process, the one thing you will enjoy the most is how little by little you'll find your style and therefore your own voice. I am thrilled to teach this class. It doesn't matter if you're a beginner or if you have a lot of illustration experience, if you take one thing of this class, I hope it will be a new perspective to create a character. Are you ready to work along Barcelona and create a new character with me? Okay, let's get started.
2. Class Project: Today we're going to learn how to develop a playful illustrated character that is full of personality and also reflects your style. To make it happen, first we're going to look out for inspiration, outside and inside home. Then we're going to define the personality of our character by learning and also play an archetype game. Then we're going to do two exercises to define the face look of her character and also the construction of the body structure. This will lead us to do our sketch. After that, we're going to learn how to create a reduced color palette with also a fun template. After we're going to learn how to apply those colors to our first sketch. I will give you all the tips that I use when I'm doing an illustration. Last but not least, we're going to learn how to export our illustration. The tools you would need for this class are a sketchbook or paper, black pencil, or if you have a red blue pencil, an eraser, any platform that allows you to draw with brushes, like Photoshop, Procreate, or Adobe Fresco. We're also going to upload it to the project section of Skillshare, and also we're going to upload it on Instagram. Last thing, but very important, this class is fun, but also relaxing. There is no pressure to create something fabulous for the first time. I already said it, this process take practice. Please have fun and be patient with yourself. Are you ready to jump into the next class? I can't wait. Let's go.
3. Finding Inspiration: Welcome to the first lesson. When it's time to look out for inspiration, I tend to follow two steps. First, I go out to the streets and observe how real people move, laugh, communicate, dress, et cetera. I do this enjoying my own process, without any pressure. A good tip is that sometimes I delight myself by buying a coffee and observing. The creative process occurs not only when you put yourself to work into paper, but in the moments or activities you enjoy too. Try to do this activity in a place you like, it's supposed to be a relaxing time so your mind is open to receive new ideas. I suggest you explore your city or town and analyze the same aspects. A pro tip is to buy yourself a treat while you're doing it. The second thing I do is to collect images from Pinterest or Instagram. Then I create a board with the images related to the project I will do. Between us, maybe I have like a thousand pin words. In this particular case, I will search for cool styles, colors, people, et cetera. We will try to complete a board with at least 15 to 20 images. I'm saying now, the wider, the better. So let's start to do it. I already create the board, but I want you to see which images I'm choosing. For example, I like this dress, and also I like this dress and I like the attitude of the girl, I like the movement of these two. So the movement of this girl is really cool. The combinations of colors of this girl, like I told you, the main thing is to search for inspiration on people, on the streets, fashionist, et cetera. A good tip is that you don't forget that Pinterest is a platform where everyone is looking for inspiration, and take it a place to look for reference, not a place to copy, that's really important. It's better to do your own interpretation. As you can see, I'm only looking for styles, for people, for poses as a reference. I am not looking at any illustration right now. So today we started looking for inspiration in two ways; we went outside and took a look at how people behave, dress, communicate. Did you like the walk? I enjoyed it a lot. Then we came back home to search for some Pinterest inspo. We created a board with images of cool fashion styles. We looked for different profiles of people, interesting poses that help us to play with movement and expression. We saved all these in a nice board to use later. Those were my first two steps before diving into the core explanation of the class. Now, how about if we add features to your characters to shape their personality? Well, on the next lesson, we're going to define an archetype that will guide us to create those features. So let's go.
4. Give Your Character Personality: When I create a character, I try to give it unique identifying features. I want that character to shine and be its own. I am going to explain Carl Jung's archetypes theory now. Where does it come from? How is it related with branding? Also, how are we going to apply it to our character? Have you ever noticed that in most of the stories, there are characters that fall into broad categories? These are the archetypes. Archetypes are universally recognized forms or images that stand for certain basic human motivations and emotions. The archetypes theory was initiated by Carl Jung, a Swiss psychiatrist and psychoanalyst that founded analytical psychology. He referred that these archetypes were an inherited idea or mode of thought that is present in the individual unconscious. So how is it used in branding? Archetypes are often incarnated as characters meets novel and films. In branding, archetypes are used to build human-like brand personas. This means how a brand is going to connect with people in a more human way. For example, using its personality, showing its beliefs, showing its values. How are we going to apply archetypes toward a character? Jung proposed 12 archetype of figures as a mean of understanding meet psychology and culture. In this particular case, we are going to apply archetypes to define the personality that our character will represent. To make it easier to understand, I will describe the 12 archetypes with its main traits, and also, I will bring an example. We will start with the innocent and we will bring our character from the movie Forrest Gump as an example. The innocent is someone who is also an idealist, a traditionalist, a dreamer. Someone who is utopian, and maybe naive. On the second archetype, we have the sage, and as an example, we have Hermione from Harry Potter. Hermione also behaves like an expert, like an oracle, a thinker, a mentor, and a teacher. In the third archetype, we have Indiana Jones representing the explorer. This archetype is also represented by people who's a pioneer, a seeker, an adventurer, and a wanderer. On the fourth archetype, we have the outlaw and clearly represented by the Joker because it's someone revolutionary, someone who acts like the villain, misfit, the enemy, or someone who is rebel. In their fifth archetype, we have the magician and it's represented by Mary Poppins. This archetype is also represented by people who acts like an inventor, a healer, maybe a transformer, a visionary, and a shaman. The sixth archetype is the most known, I think, of it all, is the hero. It is represented by a warrior, a victor, a champion, and a rescuer. This is clearly related with all the heroes we see in the movies. For example, in this case, Superman, or in another case, can be Batman. In the seventh archetype, we have the lover. The lover is represented by someone who is a partner, someone who is beautiful, someone who is heart-centered, who has a lot of friends and who is a friend, someone who's intimate, and someone who harmonize the ambiance. In this clearly case, I don't know if you've ever seen this series, Friends, but it's one of my favorites. So I bring this character that is Joey from Friends, that is clearly a represent from this archetype. On the number 8, we also have a Friends character that is really important and I think is one of my favorites, and it's Chandler. Chandler acts in this series as the jester, also a comedian, also a performer, entertainer, fool, or clown. As we can see in the series, Chandler is always making jokes, so it fits exactly in this archetype. In the archetype number 9, we have the everyman represented by Malcolm from the series also. The everyman is someone who is also a good old boy, a regular guy, gal, the realist, someone who is the good neighbor. In the number 10, we have the caregiver archetype. This archetype is related with people who are caretaker, altruist, saint, parent, helper, or supporter. As an example, I bring Princess Diana, and also, we can name Mother Teresa, for example. The number 11 is an archetype that I can say it fits with all creatives. It is also the creator, the archetype, the creator. It relates with the all artist, innovators, inventors, musicians, also writers, or just dreamers. In this case, the example is the painter Pablo Picasso. The last archetype, we have the ruler. Of course, I have to bring this up because Monica from Friends, also, is one of the greatest examples for this archetype. The ruler behaves also like a boss, like a leader. Monica, she has always to be the host, so it's perfect for this archetype. Also, the ruler represents politicians, managers, administrators. Let's start to play. In the resources, there's a roulette template for you. Also, there's a PDF where you can find explanation of the 12 archetypes. To start, we will choose one archetype so we will know which traits we are going to apply to our character today. For that purpose, I made a roulette of archetypes so we can play together. I will please ask you to close your eyes and point to the screen so you can guess or see which of the archetype are you going to do. Whichever the archetype close to your finger is, that's going to be the one you are going to draw today. Let's do it together. We will close our eyes and point the screen. Okay. Now you can open your eyes. Which one did you point? I point the creator. I will do the creator today. We will write in our notebook or in another paper, the main characteristics and words extracted from the archetype game as a reference. I will begin with this beautiful notebook and I will write archetype for my character. As I said you before, I chose the creator. I will write really big. I will do like a mind map. I will write creator. Then I will write the main characteristics, like it's an artist, an innovator, like I told you. It's like a mind map. A musician maybe, dreamer. I will note the other words, that is, artistic skills come from this, for example. Yes, give form to a vision. I always do this because I think it's really important to imagine your character, and also, to have its own folder of characteristics. The fear, in this case, it will be to having a mediocre vision or execution. In my case, for example, this girl could fear to have a mediocre style or have a mediocre execution relating to her clothes, for example. But I think this is the base to define what are the words that are going to form my character. These are the base words, basically. Now that we have an archetype for our character, we are going to create a mood board on the next lesson. Let me guide you through it.
5. Create a Mood Board: Now is the time to join our inspiration board with our archetype guidelines. So for that task, I'm going to show you how to create a moodboard. You are going over to your Pinterest board and select which of the images fits better with the description. If you feel that you need to do a search again, like to click something and to see other references that will fit better with your description or you can go ahead. Now, I'm going to ask you please that you can open the moodboard template that is on the resources of this class. You can do this on Photoshop or you can do this on Procreate or the other platform you're working. The main thing is that allows you to place images and also write on these lines. The main task here is to paste 5-7 references extracted from our Pinterest board. Plus here on these lines, the main archetype words, so we can use it as a reference to. It doesn't have to be perfect because its main use is to be a reference guide. Let's get started. I already download the main images. You can have a folder and downloaded it. I will show you quickly how to create this moodboard. I will resize this picture a little bit. For this dress, I love the content, I love the colors. This group of friends over here. She has a beautiful, I don't know if it's a dress or if it's a coat, beautiful, full of colors. I also download this image that contains the main materials or tools that our fashion designer could use. Like scissors, pins, etc. I don't know if I bring this, good. I will leave it here like that because I will reorder later. But the main thing is that you learn how to do this. I will create the type, and I will put here the main words from the archetype. I will put creator and also I will put innovator with only one t. Now, we'll duplicate this, and do that a little smaller. Yes. I will put the complimenting words. For example, dreamer, and then for example that give form to a vision. Last, but not least, it's an artist. I want you to see how my mood word is now. I reorder a little bit the images. I resize all of them for the main purpose. I put those with the words. You see already that and now we're ready to use our moodboard for the next lesson. We are almost there to start drawing. In the next lesson, I will explain a fun exercise to create the faces style.
6. Define Your Character’s Face: One of the moments where I struggled the most when drawing my character was when I needed to find what face style it would have. I frustrated over and over again trying to make my character look like some illustrator's character, just because it looked cool. I think this is something many artists struggle with. I have two tips for this. One, stop trying to look like other illustrators. Find your own style and your characters, experimenting within yourself. The second tip I'm going to give you comes along with an exercise. This exercise has helped me to stop being frustrated and also allow me to find the style that I want. It does not mean that's the only rule. There are hundreds of techniques, but I think it's useful to start. For this exercise, you will need to use your notebook or a piece of paper. Then you will choose one image that you saved on your mood board or on your Pinterest mood board. I chose these beautiful girl with a reference. I will only concentrate on her face. In your notebook, you will have to trace different divisions. First, you have to trace one vertical division and the half of the page or the paper, and then you will trace two more divisions horizontally, one here and another here. It doesn't matter if it's perfect. The only thing you have to consider is that you will have 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6 spots to work. Before starting to do the iteration game, I will explain this theory only with the simple lines, I mean. I will only use a dot and a line, is the main thing I will use to build the face. I don't want to do it the hard way. I just want to find the easy way to build a face. For example, we have the traditional face like this, with eyebrows if you want, or you have the traditional face like this, with those eyebrows. You can play as much as you want. I did the six divisions, so you can try six times. But if you want to keep playing, go ahead. I have this girl. I have her face. It doesn't matter if the iteration is going to be perfect resemblance for this girl. We only want to get an idea of what our character face will look like. Let's begin. I will draw different types of faces. For example, I will draw a square face, for example, on the first one, and I will create this face lines, for example. This one, maybe I will try a circular face. Let's see. It's like a badass looking, maybe. I can do the little l for her nose like this or her eyebrows like this, maybe. I don't know. The next one, maybe I will follow the shape of her face like here. It has a combination between on square face and also a rounded face. Let's see how it goes. Let's see how it goes with the hair or at the hair just a little bit. I'm just playing, don't take it too seriously, because the main thing here is that you can play. The main thing here also is that you can experiment with your hands, with your movement, free your movement, like main things. You don't have to do the hard way. I'm just doing an abstraction of her hair, trying to look at the shape that her head does. Now we can add her ears, make it count that the ears will always be aligned to the eyes. In this case, we only see her left ear. That's cool. Maybe I will invent myself an earing, so she can look cool. We are building our character little by little. The next step is to draw the action that our character will do in order to represent the archetype. Let's go.
7. Drawing Bodies: During this lesson, I will give you some tips that I found useful for drawing the body structure. When I started drawing characters, I had the problem that sometimes, they looked too rough or too false. It was really frustrating until one friend of mine taught me an exercise that opened my mind. I'll show you this method. But it doesn't mean that it is the definite method. There's a lot of techniques you can try. I'll leave some links below in the description so you can dive deep more into it. I will explain now the technique that I was talking about before. The exercise we will do will be the imaginary box exercise. For that matter, we have the main boxes structure of our character here. With this structure, I will explain to you the three main parts when drawing the sketch of your character and also the structure. We have this first box here, on the chest, and we have this second box here, on the hips. This first box will dictate the movement of the legs on the upper part of the body and the second box will dictate the movement of the legs on this second part of the body. Main part that will dictate all the movement of the body will be, the column line or the movement line. That is this blue line that I lined before. For example, someone who's jumping will have a curved column line and the boxes will be built along this line. You have to follow a perspective. For the second part of the box, we have the head, arms and the legs will come from the boxes. Another example can be someone dancing cha-cha-cha, for example. Here we have the main column line. I will draw the box in the first place and the second box. Maybe I will do a little contortion now that my line dictates more movement. The importance of building a character with boxes, it helps us to determine the volume of the body as you can see, now I'm doing impossible contortion for my character. But, this really helps when you're building your main structure for your body and also to represent the action. Maybe I'll need to amplify lines. It's a matter of practice. You can have a little play with your friend and ask him to do some pose. You can draw him or her or your mom or your dad, whichever you feel comfortable. It's important to also indicate the hands like I am doing this triangle and also the feet here. I forgot to indicate the feet and also the hands, and finally the head. Now we have someone trying to dance cha-cha-cha and someone who is jumping. I hope this might help when you're building your main box structure. What I am about to explain are the proportions of the human body when drawing. The proportions are used to establish a unit of measurements to divide the body into more manageable sections and gives you a general reference when you're drawing your character's body. The unit of reference for building a body structure is the head. Considering from the top to the chin. The proportions referring to a standard figure as the one we are seeing now, are thought to be between 7.5 and eight heights tall. As you can see in the figure, there are other points of reference that we can use as a guidance. For example, as the chest, elbow, waist, hips, and also the knee. Human proportions are different from one to each other. For this class, I'm not trying to reach a perfect level of anatomical drawing. The most important thing for me is that you learn to use these rules as a reference to create the main structure of your character, based on real proportions. The best part is arriving dear students. On the next lesson, we're going to sketch out our character.
8. Sketching Your Character: Now, we will draw our character will represent the personality through its actions and movement. This is the basis sketch. We are going to work using the template of the lesson number 5 week 4. In this template, you have the words that define the way your character will act and also useful references. I prefer to use my notebook or paper for this sketching phase. You can do the same, or either you can start on your iPad or directly on Photoshop. However you feel comfortable. We are going to decide the action that the character will do. For that matter I will choose two of the words that for me and thus the action exactly that I want to represent. For example, innovator. For me, it's important and give form to our vision, for example. I think these two can mix to make a good fashion designer, for example, that it's related in the field of fashion, patterns, and creation. The most important. I think, yeah, I would just these two. Now we will draw the basic structure with the tips I gave you last lesson. For this mother, I will use this red blue pencil. I'll use red pencil to draw the structure on boxes. For defining the body and clothes, I'll use the blue pencil. This, of course, is optional. I usually do this. So I wouldn't be confused with lines. You will see in a moment. I thought that maybe the action that my character will represent will be a girl with a purse, a particular purse, because I see it hear I see it here, and I see it here, here. Maybe this kind of pants because I think they look really good on her too. I will apply patterns later. But I was doubting doing a coat or not, or maybe just doing a type of dress like this one that I think it's going to be cute. Let's start. We will start with the basic structure lines, like I taught you on previous lessons. I will do the column line because it's really important to define what type of action our character will do. I will count the heads, just gaze, 2, 3, 4, 5, or less here. I will start with the chest. My action of movement will be really simple, but feel free to explore more. Over here is okay. She will be looking front like, for example, this go here. I like her attitude a lot. The next thing is to draw arms that comes under her legs that comes from here. This girl, I think she has this little shoulder. Her shoulder is just up and I like that. I'll try to do for that reason also her hip. Because as you can see with my friend, if you move something, the other thing will move too. Doesn't matter if it's perfect. It's only the main basic lines. I will do maybe the knee here and her fit, and then the other leg like that. For the arms, I thought she can be like hanging her bag. That will be a particular bag. On the other arm and hand, she will be maybe here like this, yes. Don't forget to align the elbows. You can always draw a particular feature that helps to highlight the personality of your character. For example, I can draw an arm that is bigger to highlight the fact that she's holding scissors, for example. I've to do it the upside down. She will be holding scissors or maybe she will wear a measuring tape. A measuring tape here. Yeah. After doing the basic structure lines, I will refine and I will do the clothes. Like I told you, I thought maybe she can wear dress and pants. Maybe where we like with a here or here. Really wide. This sketch doesn't have to be perfect. I repeated because it's our first approach to our character. On the next phase, we will go and refine it. So we can later apply the color to it. It's important to add some aspects that can help to add this reality. Look like here. I will keep this. If you don't like something, you can erase a line if it's confusing or something. Now the shoes, I think it's going to be like heels like this. Finally, we will do the face. In a previous lesson, we already define how it would look. So it's easy to apply now. For that matter, we can go to our sketching page of the faces, the iteration. Maybe I will go with this one because I like how it looks and yeah. I'll go with that one. Now the hair, I think it can be a combination between the bangs and the shore here. Let's see how it looks. We can always try and if we don't like it, we will refine it on our sketch on Photoshop later. Doesn't matter. Our refine this later. You can also use black pencils. So you can refine the lines that are confusing, or for example, define the hair, maybe so you can have a better idea how it would look. Don't worry if you see yours get a little basic now. Doesn't matter for now. Because the main thing is that you have, yeah, the basic structure to perceive them, to do the refinement. After we will learn how to draw shadows and details on the clothes. Don't worry, if you didn't like it so far, we will refine it later. After you are sure with the basic sketch, you can take a photo with your iPhone or with your iPad however you want because we are going to import it to our computer, or maybe if you are going to use Procreate, you're going to import it to your iPad. Yes, we're going to take a picture. Now you're going to import it to your computer. Well, as you can see, this is a quick and a rough sketch. It doesn't need to be perfect. However, it helps a lot. In the next lesson, we are going to refine it.
9. Let's Go Digital: Refine Sketch: We have our [inaudible] sketch and now we will refine it digitally, so it will be easier for us when painting and adding details. As I said before, it doesn't matter which platform are you going to use. I will use Photoshop, but if you feel comfortable with Procreate or another drawing platform, go ahead. The main thing is that it allows you to draw freely. Please open Photoshop. We will create a new document with the following characteristics. We'll click here on "Create New". Here on this side, there's going to be the details of our file. So please set it up on pixels, because we're going to create a document that will be done for Instagram, maybe also here. We will set on square format. Orientation is okay. It's going to be 1,080, 1,080, the size of this document. The resolution might be 72. But just in case if you are preparing a document that you will later are going to print, you have to set the resolution to 300. So in this case, we are not going to print, we are just going to upload it digitally, so 72 pixels per inch is okay. The color mode, RGB is okay, 8-bit, is okay, and the background white is okay too. Please save your file with a name. I will name it refined sketch, and I will create it. We will unlock the background with double-click. I don't care if the first layer is called zero. Then we're going to import the picture we took in the previous lesson. Meet our sketch. I have it here. We are going to import it. We double-click. We are just going to be sure that is our document. You will see this little icon here. It says that it's a smart object, so it's better to rasterize the layer, so I will click to in "Rasterize". Then we will click on the "Fusion Mode". I'll put multiply, because I want my sketch to be on the first layer so I can follow the lines. Also I will set the opacity to 30 percent. Yes, 30 percent. This is okay. We will create another layer below this layer of the picture. We will name it a sketch. You can name these too. You can name it picture_sketch. In this layer that we created before that is called sketch, we will do the refinement. There is no need to choose a color. I will use only the black fume Photoshop. I will choose brush. You will need to sketch with a brush that has no texture and is neat. Like this one that I choose, it's four pixels. So I will start to refine the lines. For getting beautiful brushes, a tip I might give you is to go to the Adobe Photoshop page. You will find here on the Adobe brushes, all the Kyle T. Webster brushes to download. I think they are free with your subscription of Adobe, so you can easily download it and enjoy thousands of brushes, I will talk about later, but I have tons of them here that comes with the pack. Now we have our brush selected. I use the Kyle's, finer than fine because as you can see, it's a straight line. It has no texture, so it's quite good for this task. I will start. I think the size is a little bit too much, maybe five pixels is okay. As you can see, I'm refining the basic lines of my sketch, so I don't get confused when I'm applying the color. Perfect, I'm doing the length of the purse so it's going to be better. You can always change anything you didn't like from your sketch, because now you are finding it. Maybe I will add some on her purse. I will do that on the new layer, because if I don't like it I will not use it. Maybe she will have this scarf coming out. We did a good thing creating a new layer because otherwise I would have to erase a part from the purse. Then maybe she will have a wallet maybe. Forms the wallet and also maybe pins. This can be optional. I will be trying new stuff. I don't know. I'm not so convinced, but I can try when coloring. I will go back to nice kit part and I will refine fingers. Refining your sketch may take a while, but I'm telling you it's worth it, because you're setting the base for a lady applying the colors. I have my refined sketch ready, so to see how it looks without the picture sketch, we come here, and we click on the eye, and we hide the picture. I think I quite like it and I'm happy with the results, so I can wait to apply the colors. This step was really simple. We'll refine the principle lines of our sketch. We don't want to refine the basic structure lines, those were only for reference. You will see that by the time and practice, you maybe will simplify this process and you will apply the color directly without this refinement. For me, it's still useful. I hope you're enjoying this process along with me. I am excited because the funniest part of the process is about to come, colors.
10. Choose A Color Palette: Colors. This is my favorite part when I'm working on an assignment. When it comes to choosing colors, I always try to choose a reduced color palette. It gives a vary and consistent look to my work. My suggestion is to stick to a minimum of 3-5 colors maximum. Because I love color combination so much, I created a dynamic that is called one palette a month. The idea is for me to create a new palette on my blog each month. As you can see here on my blog, you will see the previous palettes I created. Later I'll share the colors. I use the hexadecimal format as you can see here. This is most useful in web formats, but it's also another shorter way to set the colors. For example, you come here to my blog, you click here, and then you copy. Then you'd go to Photoshop, you click on the color selector, come here on the hashtag section where is the hexadecimal section, and you paste the color without the hashtag. Now, you have a new color to paint. Basics when I choose a color palette, is there any secret when it comes to choosing a color palette? For me, it works with intuition and also knowing the basics of color theory. I will create a palette from scratch to show you an example. Before creating the palette from scratch, I would like to talk a little bit about color theory. Here you will see color wheel. This color wheel is a circle chart that represents the relationships between colors. You can use the color wheel to help you identify harmonious color combinations. The following color harmonies that are used the most. As for example, it is complimentary, analogous, and triadic are based on geometric relationships on the color wheel. We can represent them as shapes and rotate these shapes around the central point of the color wheel to create limitless color combinations. I now will explain with examples. Let's start with the complimentary. The complimentary use two opposite colors on the color wheel. For example, if I pick the red, then the opposite color will be the green. Also if I pick for example, the blue the opposite color will be the orange. For the analogous, we use three adjacent colors on the color wheel. For example, again, if I pick the red, I will pick then the red, orange, and neon orange. For the triadic, we will use three evenly spaced colors on the color wheel. For example, if I pick again the red, I will pick then the yellow-green, and I will pick the blue to form this triadic combinations. There are other color harmonies you can explore, but I'm explaining to you the ones that I use the most. Now is your turn to create your own one palette a month with this template, you can find it on the resources of the class. You will see that I include the color wheels of the different harmonies for you to remember which one to use. Then you can paint on the top of this template. You can create your own palette and also note the hex colors below. I can't wait to see your palette. To create a palette from scratch, I always use Adobe Color. You can find it down on Window Extensions and Adobe Color themes mainly it's on English. Here you have three tabs. The tab of creating, the tab of exploring, and my themes. You can always search for colors here on the top, and you can search through all the color combinations. Here are the color combinations of people around the globe who has made them. But I always try to create a new palette from scratch, picking from these colors. For example, I like my character to show vividness. I will search for vivid colors. Let's see here. Maybe I will pick this one. I had to click here until you see that it appears on your primary color and you paint it there. Then you go, look. I like this one. I like this one because also it's analogous and this one too because it follows the rule of analogous. Now I want to create a complimentary color for this three. I will search for a yellowy zone. Maybe. Like I told you, you have to click it until appears here. I love this. Then I would like to search for a green. I don't know if this one is the one I'm looking for, it's quite good. Yes, but I will pick it just to show you. I will open it here. For example, here you can double-click in the color selector and then you can hear in the brightness in the B, and move up a little bit too at a little bright to this color. Maybe, now I like it better. I will erase this one. I think I like it. I will take another look just in case. But I don't know. This is my favorite part because I think I can spend a lot of time doing this most of my time, I might say. Oh my God, look at this palette, beautiful. This palette, for example is a mix of a complimentary colors and analogous colors, beautiful. I will check this yellow. I'm with the eraser. Like where this yellow than the other that I have. Yeah, basically it's about this. Now I have 1,2,3,4,5 colors to apply to my beautiful character now. I can't wait. I hope that for you, this class has been amazing and processes in the amazing too. I will try just for less than this yellow. For example, if you like to try one color, you can go here to create the label create. Then you can click on this icon here to establish the selected color. Let's see if it works. Now it works. Here you have this little icon with the three circles, and it's the chromatic rules. It's really easy because it automatically do the rule that you're looking for. For example, I was looking for monochromatic, then I will do the triadic. Now you can always move the shapes like I told you this point in the center and you move the shape half turns of different color combinations. Now in the complimentary, for example, we have this, we can maybe do this or you can do this to make the tone a little bit bright, this. Yeah, it's really useful. You have here all the harmonious color combinations, you can try. Also you can do your own color combination moving this. It's pretty useful. I hope you like this palette that we choose, and I hope you choose a beautiful color palette. I can't wait to see. In this lesson, you learned how to create a reduced color palette, and now you have a template for other combinations. Meet me on the next lesson to apply this cool color combination to our character.
11. Adding Base Colors: In the previous lesson, we created a beautiful color palette and now we're ready to apply to our character. I think our character is already waiting for this ColorSpark. We're going back to our Photoshop file. Now we have four layers. We have the background, before was the layer zero. We have our sketch layer, we have the palette we created before, and we have our picture sketch that is hidden. It's going to be hidden by now because It's useful that way. You have to find a brush which you feel comfortable using. In a previous lesson. I'll show you the brushes that I use. The brushes are from Kyle T. Webster. I downloaded the Megapack. I create a special folder here that is named based. You can name it February or etc. Then you can arrange here the brushes you like to use the most. I think it's easier to keep it organized so you don't waste time or lose a good brush. We will create a layer called skin. I will use it to start with the skin and body, because I think it's always easy to start with this and then to add the color of the clothes. First, we're going to arrange this layer to almost the bottom because we want to keep it. The sketch layer above this layer or above the color layers. We have to set the opacity to 50 percent, for example, because we want to have the reference, but also we want to see how the color is looking. Here are the main shortcuts that I use in Photoshop on the keyboard. For example, if you want to change from the brush tool to the eraser tool, you only need to hit B or you only need to hit E because I think it's easier this way. I think it's better to memorize these keys. It's easy when you want to paint and to change the tool. For example, B would be the brush tool, the other V will be the move tool, the I will be the color picker or when you, for example, want to choose the other color of your palate. E would be the eraser tool. The key G, would be the bucket tool. This bucket tool will help you a lot when you have big pieces to paint. I will show you later how to use it. I think the most important keys are the Command plus S, to save your work. Please don't lose your character. Sometimes things happens and Photoshop quits unexpectedly. Please, always do the Command+S. Let's continue with coloring. To show you how the bucket tool works, I will go on to delineate part of the dress after I hit G. Then if I click, it will fill this space. You have two other. However, you have to fill the blank spaces a little bit. But it's really useful for painting big spaces. You have to check that there are no blank spaces or, for example, if you have a blank space, if you hit G, it will fill all the layer. You don't want that. Please be sure to complete the lines. I think I'm ready. Hit G and fill all the blank space. The thing I want to show you is how I change the color if I don't like it. You hit Command, you see this icon appearing. You click on the layer and then you hit "Erase." Then you choose your new color. For example, this, then you hit Alt+Delete and then you have your new color. I think we are ready. Before I will group maybe the picture sketch and the sketch together, you have to key Command+G to group and you have to name it sketch, again. Doesn't matter. Another tip that I have is that, when you want to see how your character is looking, you can hide the sketch group.
12. Adding Details and Shadows: We have the base colors. Now is the time to add shadows and details to create a more realistic look for our character. This is the reference guide for drawing clothes. It is really important to know that when drawing the wrinkles or folds of the clothes, it's better to keep it real, but don't exaggerate it that much so it wouldn't be confusing. Drawing clothes is also a work of observation. When you're in your inspiration work, see how people's clothing reacts to movement. For example, when I draw in the folds or wrinkles of clothes, I like to differentiate the shades of darkness. So I use the darkest colors to denote lines and the lightest color for the folds. For example, here we can annotate that the knee is behind the pants and also I draw an example of a loose coat. You can see there are a lot of wrinkles and folds here. It's important that also you have to paint the back of the coat and also create the wrinkles of the sweater and the details of the sweater. To move forward, I have gone ahead by better painting the edges and the idea of pattern that I want to have on the clothes. Now, I will show you how I made this pattern by applying it on the sleeves. For this matter, it's really important to understand how the masks work on Adobe Photoshop. We create a new layer, we hit "Alt" and you will see that this symbol will appear now, and you click and now you have a mask. This mask will allow you to, for example, draw and then you will have a safe place to draw because the color will be applied only to the edges of the dress, for example, on this case. We will continue doing the pattern here on the sleeves. As you can see, if you paint outside the base color, the lines are not going to be visible. If you, for example, redo the mask, you will see that all that we paint are going to be here. But if we do the mask, again, everything will be in the same zone. Maybe if I want to do something that I want to be darker, you can put the layer on multiply mode and you will see how if you paint, the color will be darker. You can always change the opacity. It's time for the shadows. You will have to decide from which side the sun or the light is going to come. Is it going to be the left side? Is it going to be the right right? Is it going to be from below or from above? I'll make an example for you. I did this layer with the sun or the light coming from the left side of the girl, the right side for you. The theory says that if the sun comes from this side, the opposite side of the sun or the clothes that are facing the sun will be darker, for example, this sleeve will be darker, also this part of the sleeve will be darker, the part of the pants, etc. I'm going to show you better now when I'm doing the shadows and the details of the clothes. You have to apply multiply blend mode and later we will see and we will decide which opacity we are going to apply. For example, I will pick the color, I will decide which part of the face is going to be with shadow. If the sun is coming from here, then the shadow of the neck will appear like this. I will reduce my brush a little bit. This part of the neck also will be in shadows. Maybe this part because of the hair, I will do a line over the ear. Maybe there will be a shadow for the hair and the head and there's going to be a shadow for the measuring tape for sure. Here is also colored. Here we will have little shadow, but I will paint the nails, I will paint all the wrinkles in her hands. Maybe I will change to this brush finer than fine because it allows me to indicate the lines better. We are going to do a new layer above the shadow of the skin to create the lines of the face. We will do the blend mode also to multiply and we will set the opacity to 100 percent. I will do the nose. For the elbow, I will make the little wrinkles here also, because I see a movement here also because of the chains of the purse. You have to take a look at how objects affect the clothes too. I will reduce the opacity to 40 percent maybe and I will do the slight dark technique that I teach you before. Like I told you, we can always take a look. It's pretty good. Looking pretty good without the sketch. We're going to establish a background. I think I will go with the color of the skin. Let's see how it goes. I will hit ''G'' but the problem here is that I don't see the hand. There's a trick that you can apply when something similar happens to you. You double-click here, you go to saturation or brightness. I think it's better saturation this time, so you'll reduce it a little bit and you apply it, and now you don't have a problem. I think this is okay. Do you like it? Maybe we can try with another color. I will create another layer. I will apply this color. I like it so much. I'll reduce the saturation. It's sparkling. To add final details, I will create a multiply here, and I always do this, so people know that my characters are stepping on the floor. It lays as a shadow. So as the sun is on the other side this does not make any sense. If you're proud of your work, why not share it with the world? In the next lesson, I'm going to teach you how to export your illustration to share it on the project page up this class, and also on Instagram.
13. Share Your Work: Exporting: Exporting your artwork to show it to your friends and followers on Instagram, it's really easy. You only need to follow these steps. Go to the Menu, File, Export, save us for Web and a new window is going to pop up. There you're going to choose on the format PNG 24 and you're going to unclick transparency because you need your background to appear. Otherwise, you will click it. On the rest of the indications, you will leave it like this. You have to check the size of the image. The percentage is 100 percent, and also check the weight of your file because to publish on any social media, it's better that the file isn't too big and that is all in configuration. So you are ready to hit "Save". A tip I'm going to give you is that, for example, for name your file, give a recognizable name in case you later want to find it. For example, I'm going to do create a character and I will write the name, Insta. I usually name my files like this. Now that you know how to export your beautiful character, time to share it with the world. I hope your friends and followers love what you created, don't forget to tag me on Skillshare so more people can learn to create their own characters too.
14. Final Thoughts: Congrats dear student, you made it till the end. We covered the entire process to create a character from the face of inspiration, archetypes, sketching, coloring, and the sharing of your work to social media. In the middle, I gave you some practical advice that may be in some cases, will save you time and frustration. Now, you have another approach to do our character illustration. If there's one thing I hope you can take away from this class is that having your own character style is a work that needs practice. Don't be frustrated comparing yourself with other artists. Most of all it's a fun process where you can find your own voice while doing it. I will be thrilled to see the results that you come up with, here and also on Instagram. Don't forget to tag me and recommended class if you like it and consider it useful for your friends. Also, please share your project and the project section of this class. I'll be going through and giving comments on the student projects. Also, if you have any doubts, please don't be shy and ask a question in the discussion panel. I will not forget my dear students. Thank you for being here. It was so much fun sharing this time together. I hope you enjoy it too. Bye.
Cé Marina, Illustrator & Graphic designer
