01 Oct 7 Mejores ejercicios para aprender a dibujar personajes

Posted at 10:00h in Ejercicios by sergio ordonez 2 Comments

Probablemente coincidirás conmigo cuando afirmo que es REALMENTE difícil dibujar personajes animados que parezcan vivos. Pero y si te digo lo siguiente…

You can learn how to draw better cartoons in JUST 30 MINUTES a day!

(for your whole life 🙂 )

Si quieres aprender a crear personajes de dibujos animados profesionales, esta publicación podría ser un gran punto de partida, compartiré mis 7 mejores ejercicios de dibujo rápido para principiantes para mejorar tus habilidades de dibujo con un poco de práctica, podrás dibujar personajes como un profesional.

Boceto de un conejo caricaturesco con una expresión curiosa

Boceto de un esqueleto caricaturesco con expresión juguetona

Boceto de un científico caricaturesco con cabello alborotado

Boceto de un niño caricaturesco con gorra y expresión decidida

Boceto de un extraterrestre amigable haciendo el símbolo de paz

Boceto de un lagarto caricaturesco con expresión alegre

Boceto de un diablo caricaturesco con una sonrisa traviesa

Feel free to download those characters sketches to practice.

DRAWING EXERCISES LIST:

Redrawing a character like a pro
Improving action line in cartoon characters
How to improve your character’s posing
Reducing characters to basic shapes
Sketching a character from visual reference
From basic shapes to detailed characters
Drawing a cartoon from memory
Become a professional character designer!
The character designer F.A.Q

ReDRAWING a character like a pro

Drawing Exercise: pick a professional mascot design you like and rebuild the character’s body structure like a master. In the following video I give you a few tips:

Start with simple volumes. Newbies start drawing based on lines, it may work when you copy a character but you will fail miserably whenever you want to change the character’s pose because you didn’t understand the structure. This is the difference between copying a character and moving a character.
Places eyes correctly. The easiest trick to place then in the right place is imagining the character is wearing a mask. Before drawing the eyes, draw the mask with the face expression you like.
Painting shadows. If you don’t fully understand a volume, try adding shadowing, it will help you a lot.
Draw the middle line. Splitting the character in 2 halves helps you to place elements in the right place and with the correct perspective. In this case my character is not completely frontal, so I displaced the middle line to the right.
Draw hidden parts and then overlay elements. Observe how I drew the hand, then the fingers and finally the keys.
Add details at the end, only when your character’s structure is solid. Starting just the opposite is a very common newbie mistake.
Create horizontal lines adapted to the volume, it helps you to understand how to place elements.
SECRET TIP: whenever you are happy with the result, flip your drawing horizontally (or put it in front of a mirror) and all small mistakes will pop up. When you observe a draw for long time, your lazy brain get used to it, by mirroring, you are forcing it to watch it like a new visual stimulus.

What do we learn?: When we start creating cartoon characters, we tend to acquire lots of bad habits that will make our learning curve stepper. By rebuilding a character, constructed with solid foundations, and doing it like a pro, we learn good habits that will result in more natural shapes. It also give us strong principles to start posing our characters… the real challenge of any mascot designer.

IMproving action lines in cartoon character

Drawing Exercise: choose an image of a cartoon character you like. You can use the mascots I created for KSA Pro League. Your task is finding the action line.

Some examples of good actions lines in action poses.

¿Qué aprendemos?: aprenderemos a encontrar líneas de acción que dan vida a nuestro personaje. Con algo de práctica, aprenderás a dibujar personajes animados dinámicos incluso en poses de reposo. Cuando dibujas tu mascota publicitaria siguiendo una línea de acción, resulta más fácil de entender y de dibujar.

How to improve your character’s posing

Drawing Exercise: the task here is creating a character that communicates different moods, attitudes or actions without any lines, just a black shadow. If you do a good work your mascot design pose will be understandable.

Here you can see some of my best silhouettes for a basketball player

Good tips to learn how to draw dynamic poses!

¿Qué aprendemos?: la pose es uno de los aspectos más importantes a la hora de comunicar actitudes, que a su vez es un elemento fundamental en un buen personaje. Una buena silueta hace más fácil y rápida la comprensión de la pose del personaje. Una pose puede tener diferentes siluetas dependiendo de la posición de la cámara; debes aprender a colocarla en el mejor ángulo de visión posible.

Become a Professional Character Designer!

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Reducing characters to basic shapes

Drawing Exercise: your goal is reducing the complexity of any cartoon character to its basic shapes.

Image and character design property of Disney.

Good drawing tips!

¿Qué aprendemos?: este ejercicio de dibujo es muy bueno para principiantes que quieren aprender a dibujar personajes cartoon. Primero debes «entender» las formas básicas que construyen cualquier personaje, posteriormente podrás posar a tu personaje de manera fácil. El resultado serán poses más dinámicas y consistentes.

Sketching A CHARACTER from Visual REFERENCE

Drawing Exercise: we are going to look at any mascot character or object as much time as you need, then you have only 45 seconds to reproduce it (you can look to the cartoon while sketching).

I want to learn to draw like this!

¿Qué aprendemos?: cuando somos principiantes solemos enfocarnos en los detalles del personaje ignorando el todo, lo que es un gran error. Al limitar el tiempo a 45 segundos, forzamos al cerebro a centrarse en formas básicas, esta habilidad de dibujo es fundamenta para crear buenos personajes animados.

From basic shapes to detailed CHARACTERS

Drawing Exercise: the goal is building a mascot character using different basic shapes. Notice how simple and effective are he following characters:

Image courtesy of Cedric Studio

Good drawing tips for beginners

¿Qué aprendemos?: los personajes más efectivos son los que se construyen con formas muy básicas. En este ejercicio aprenderemos a poner los detalles en el lugar correcto. Una vez domines esta habilidad, los personajes estarán bien construidos.

Draw A CARTOON from Memory

Drawing Exercise: choose a character design that you like for 2 minute. Stop and relax for 1 minute and then draw the cartoon from memory. If you find it too easy, try with more complex characters. Repeat the exercise until you get good results.

Original draw courtesy of Loisa

What do we learn?: when we are not experts we tend to draw cartoon characters through visual references. With this exercise, we add resources to our mind. With practice, those resources will come to your mind automatically and you’ll learn how to draw characters unconsciously, just by imagining.

THE CHARACTER DESIGNER F.A.Q

Which tools do you need to create digital characters?

Procreate, iPad, and Apple Pencil are wonderful tools, but I consider them a secondary portable setup. For professional production, I still prefer my desktop station (Macbook Pro + Wacom Cintiq + Photoshop); feel free to visit my post about how to pick the best drawing tablet.

Want to learn how to create digital characters?

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Digital drawing in Photoshop: once you master traditional drawing, transitioning to digital character creation is not that hard. You can buy my detailed premium videotutorial about digital drawing with Photoshop aimed at newbies who want to become professional illustrators.

Applying color in Photoshop: finally, when you master traditional drawing and you know the basics of digital drawing, you can start adding color. This is probably the most detailed Photoshop videotutorial on the web to learn how to create professional digital coloring in Photoshop.

More Educational Resources

Pinterest boards for: anatomy, drawing exercises, face expressions, dynamic poses, static poses
My Youtube short tutorials
Books: The illusion of life