graphic art for highschool

[faithmom]

I'm overwhelmed with trying to find a graphic arts course for my highschooler. For many years, she has drawn with her Wacom tablet and she loves it. There are so many things out there. (She does NOT want graphic design right now, so she's not interested in Canva.) She would like animation, possibly.  She says she really wants to get better at her digital artistic abilities. If you have any experience with graphic arts courses (free or otherwise) please let me know your reviews as well. We have already completed 2 courses.....GIMP and Inkscape by Homeschool Spark. Thank you. 

Edited July 23, 2021 by faithmom

[Alte Veste Academy]

My DD also loves digital illustration and her Wacom. She has the Adobe Creative Cloud student subscription and knows a lot of Adobe programs like the back of her hand just from playing around with them. What programs does your DD use now?

Through my library, we have free access to the courses on Lynda, which is now affiliated with Linked In, marketed as Linked In Learning. You could see if your library has it too. The classes are generally good, and some of them are actually pretty expensive without the free access. Some are short, one-time classes and others are longer, multi-part courses. They also have pathways for certain learning goals, with each pathway made up of different courses. 

[pitterpatter]

DD and I are creating an art credit out of classes she's interested in on Skillshare. She uses Procreate to draw and animate. She took some classes with Udemy last year to help her really learn the app. She's done some pretty neat things with it since then.

She is starting out on Skillshare with several classes on various types of figure drawing (from realistic to chibi) and how to develop poses and stories for characters. I don't know that she'll pic after that. She may look into learning Adobe Fresco too.

[cintinative]

nm

Edited July 24, 2021 by cintinative

[alisoncooks]

Following. My rising 8th grader is very into digital art. I'd love some ideas for her art credits. 

[faithmom]

These are great replies! I hope more chime in. This is a great start!

 

[rutheart]

Don't use Anime Studio (aka MOHO)! Even with tutorials, that killed my oldest's love of animation.

Layering is a good intermediate digital art skill to work on. Anything that focuses on layering would be good.

My oldest had previously made digital art in Scratch, Gimp, and Inkscape. She's currently using Clip Studio Paint (she wanted Adobe, but I won't pay for software subscriptions) with an XP-Pen drawing tablet. I haven't registered her for any classes, but Google shows that there are a lot available (free and paid). Even the official tutorials have a lot to work through and you can filter "for beginners":

https://tips.clip-studio.com/en-us/official

My daughter taught herself independently how to use the software. She said Google was her friend when she had specific issues. She wasn't taking an art course that semester, so she just made art for fun in her free time, learning new techniques as she needed them.

If you're interested in doing an independent course, I would alternate tutorials with projects. You could have the student do a step-by-step tutorial with the tutorial's subject, then do a creative project using those same skills with the subject determined by personal interest (for my oldest, it would be dragons, avatars, and fan art). Digital art can suck up hours and hours of time, so it would not be hard to earn credit(s) even without a formal class. I just thought I would throw the idea out there in case you'd be willing to spend money on software rather than a teacher. FWIW, I think learning the software on her own was a good general learning experience for my oldest.

Also, it's worth asking your child if she could come up with a syllabus. I have been pleasantly surprised by how much my daughter would plan out an elective when given the opportunity.

[Farrar]

Nothing matches Adobe. BUT... if you want something more affordable that has 98% of the functionality of the two core Adobe products, then Affinity is much cheaper, very very similar, and you only pay once.

There are some graphic design type classes online for homeschoolers. FundaFunda has one and some of the Christian online schools have them... We have found the dual enrollment is the best way to serve this need if it's available to you.

[faithmom]

Thank you. I will look at options. I appreciate replies.

[Lori D.]

List of free online Graphic Arts Classes, Courses, and Lessons

Possibly some of the Creative Live graphic design and/or art & design courses?

Edited August 1, 2021 by Lori D.

[Lanny]

When I read this thread on WTM I asked my DD to write a response, which I will Copy and Paste Below. We bought her a Wacom Bamboo tablet by surprise, when she began taking a Math course from TTUISD in 6th grade and it went off to UNC Chapel Hill with her.   🙂  The only other thing I know about this topic is that years ago we bought her the Paint Tool Sai Software and it was sold by someone in Japan.  Below is Copied and Pasted from an email DD sent to me this morning. Possibly this will help the OP or someone else who has participated in this thread or will read it in the future. I never Cross Post but I may post this in the WTM Chat also.

 

Since she's interested in animation, highly recommend https://creatureartteacher.com/ . This guy used to animate for Disney, and often his courses go on discount for a handful of dollars.

 

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCAxYH9DWyVmMpS9NgyxoTFQ this guy might also be useful - they might recognize him from "animator vs animation" fame. I can only really speak to his 12 principles of animation video though -- I have more experience with 3d than 2d animation (little though that is).

 

If she's interested in 3d sculpting/animation, this guy's videos were super easy to follow along for me: https://www.youtube.com/user/mediagabbitt

 

If she's looking to just get familiar with the tools of digital art programs... Honestly a lot of it depends on first choosing a program, and then looking up a tutorial for said program, because often they have different features. If she's familiar working with layers, masks, brushes, filters, etc. the basics won't change and it will just be a matter of getting familiarized with a specific program. From there it's easier to work on specific parts of art she might want to improve, such as... anatomy, composition, color palettes, etc.

 

She's asking about courses, not programs, but since I first misread the question might as well include...

 

Paint Tool Sai is the one we bought. She should likely get v2 - I think it's out now, and it has more features. It's simple but powerful. No animation feature that I know of.

 

If she wants a full-fledged digital art program that's also free, she should try Krita. A lot more complicated than PTS, but if she's familiar with say, photoshop or gimp, it shouldn't be too much of a stretch. It does have animation but it's a feature still in the workshop and won't be 'fully realized' until the next version (5.0) comes out at least. Even so, it's still usable, if basic, and the digital art side of it is excellent. It also has a database of tutorials, iirc.

 

Clip Studio Paint is the most expensive of the digital art options I know, but it's also an industry leader. It constantly goes on sale so if they're willing to wait or pay the full amount, that can work. It has several different packages available, and a very good animation feature. I'd recommend trying out the free trial with this one and seeing how she likes it before buying, or at least waiting for a sale.

 

I've heard lots of good things about Procreate lately, but I think that's for Ipad only.

 

For animation specifically there are also several ways to go--  Blender is a 3d modeling/animation program that, technically, supports 2d animation. It's a very powerful program, and even pros rarely master all aspects of it, so it really depends on how her interest in animation intersects with 3d.

 

Purely 2d the only one I have experience with is OpenToonz, of Studio Ghibli fame. It is a very powerful program, but not entirely intuitive. Pencil 2d is widely regarded as the simplest (but still usable) choice. It might be better to learn animation using that, before diving into powerhouses like OpenToonz.

[history-fan]

I will second the resources that Lanny has already listed. My son is an animator and used many of these programs. He uses Maya instead of Blender because that's what most studios use unless they have their own programs. When he was in high school he took online classes with Chad Stewart  bhttps://www.theanimcourse.com/about     We can't say enough positive things about these courses!!