Drawing Fundamentals the Silver Way

Every Character Starts as a Shape

If your characters come out stiff, or every face you draw ends up with the same eyes and the same nose, you're not alone. My early drawings were stiff too. I knew I wanted to draw, but I didn't know what to draw or how. Looking back, I didn't understand three things. Drawing through my shapes, construction, and feeling. This course teaches all three, and it starts with an oval.

The Silver Way, Piece by Piece

The Silver Way is the name of my character design book, and it's how I teach. A character in any style is a few clear shapes with solid construction underneath, so you'll begin with a circle. The circle becomes a sphere, then a skull, then a head you can rotate. When you lay in a face you'll use S-O-D-S. Pick one shape, then play with the order, distance and size of the features. That's how you avoid the bowling ball. A bowling ball has three holes, all about the same size, and a face built like that has no contrast. Small eyes and a giant nose? Now you have a character.

I'll ask you to go in order. The hard work is often the boring work, and you're cheating yourself if you skip it. My saying is "piece by piece will bring you peace."

We'll start with basic shapes. Then I'll show you where I find new ones, in the everyday objects around you. A pepper from the kitchen has a shape you can turn into a head. A lamp or a soap bottle can become a whole character. Letters work too, and a U or a C is enough to start a face. You'll draw twelve heads with me in under 60 seconds each. Then we build the body, the skull and each feature of the face, realistic first and cartoon second. Next come eleven lectures on the principles from my book, including line, rhythm, silhouette, balance and caricature. You'll finish with a line-up of five to eight characters for your portfolio.

After that come 32 sessions I recorded live, about an hour each. I draw from photos, Disney's Haunted Mansion maquettes, Daumier's bronze busts and Fred Moore's model sheets, and you draw with me. We'll study a face for thirty seconds, hide it and draw it from memory. We'll sketch the nine basic camera shots so you can stage a character in a scene. By the end, you'll be able to start from one shape and design a cast of characters who don't share a face.

What's Inside

• 38 demos. Watch me draw each idea from the first shape to the finished character.
• 76 assignments. Most lessons end with something for you to draw.
• 45 downloads. 29 of them are worksheets you can print and draw on.
• 17 critiques. I draw over real student work, and each critique sits next to the lesson it answers. You'll watch me fix a hat that doesn't wrap the head and a design crowded with tangents.

This course is for beginners, and it starts from scratch. It's also for you if you've drawn for a while and your characters all share one face, or if you're building a portfolio for animation, where studios test whether you can match their style. You don't need expensive supplies either, because a number two pencil, an eraser and plain copy paper are enough.

So grab a pencil, draw a circle, and I'll see you in the first lesson.

Who Am I

Hi, I'm Stephen Silver. I've worked as an animation character designer since 1997. I grew up in London, never went to art school, and drew caricatures at Sea World and at weddings until a design test got me my first animation job at Warner Bros. At Disney I was a designer on the animated Clerks series, then moved on to The Weekenders. After that I joined Kim Possible to design and develop the show, and at Nickelodeon I became one of the lead character designers on Danny Phantom. I've also designed for Sony, DreamWorks, Universal and Hasbro, and drawn for Mad Magazine. I've written thirteen books, and The Silver Way is the one on character design. Today I'm also an Art and Story Recruiter for Disney Television Animation.