Character Design for Picture Books, Part 3: Animals

Are you feeling stuck with designing animal characters for picture books? Not sure how to make a four-legged animal walk on two feet? Or how to make a simplified and cute animal sidekick for your main character?

In part three of this character design series, award winning picture book author and illustrator, Mirka Hokkanen will teach you how to design animal characters for picture books.

This class is perfect for beginner and intermediate illustrators wanting to illustrate picture books for kids. Mirka uses examples from her own work and from other picture books to illustrate each lesson, and uses simple exercises to help you build up your skills.

In this class you will:

• Learn how to draw cute animal characters from photo references 
• How to create anthropomorphic animal characters that walk on two feet
• How to add personality to your animal characters
• How to simplify fur and feathers for cute and clear character designs
• How to show emotions on an animal character 

Class Project:

For the class project, you’ll create 3 versions of an animal character: from a simple character sketch to a more elaborate design to an anthropomorphic animal character walking on two feet. We also have exercises in adding personality to a character, drawing expressions and taking one animal and drawing it two different ways with different shapes.   

Interested to learn more about illustrating books for kids?

I have a series of classes already going on the process of illustrating children’s books. You can use the classes to get more insights into the industry and learn the basics.

Character Design for Picture Books, Parts 1 

(https://mirkah.gumroad.com/l/characterdesign1)

Drawing Characters Consistently Part 2

(https://mirkah.gumroad.com/charaacterdesign2)

Procreate for Picture Book Illustration (https://mirkah.gumroad.com/procreatepb)

Picture Book Illustration: Reading for Research (https://mirkah.gumroad.com/l/pbdummiesU)

Crafting Engaging Picture Book Dummies (https://mirkah.gumroad.com/l/pbdummies)