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Drawing Pets from Scratch

with Lauren Barger
4.5 (94)
Master the art of drawing adorable animals using simple shapes!
English, Spanish English, Spanish, 5 more French [Auto], German [Auto], Portuguese [Auto], Italian [Auto], bahasa-indonesia-auto
1+
hours
10
lessons
Beginner to Intermediate
level
Lauren Barger

Your Instructor

Lauren is a character designer from the USA, known for creating ‘Coffeedraws’ and her comical cartoons of animals and people. She is a co-host of MerMay on Instagram.

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1+
hours
10
lessons
Beginner to Intermediate
level
English, Spanish
English, Spanish , 5 more
Subtitles
  • French [Auto]
  • German [Auto]
  • Portuguese [Auto]
  • Italian [Auto]
  • bahasa-indonesia-auto

What you’ll learn

  • Craft adorable fur babies using the power of simple shapes
  • Turn real-life references into loveable cartoon creatures
  • Master essential, beginner-friendly anatomy rules for cats and dogs
  • Create a kaleidoscope of expressions for your pet, letting their personality come alive
  • Explore a dazzling array of poses, from high-energy dynamism to calm and curious charm
  • Experiment with age, gender, and personality to give your characters the ultimate makeover
  • Unlock your essential toolkit of brushes, settings, and shortcuts for pet masterpieces
  • Elevate your artwork with insider secrets, making your furry friends dance off the page!
  • Learn the art of creating compositions that speak to the soul and draw the viewer in
  • Dive into the world of 3d magic, adding shadows and highlights for an enchanting depth
  • Add authentic texture to your artwork to create a charming, traditional feel
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Description

Boost your confidence in creating cute and furry animals from scratch.

Drawing animals can seem incredibly tricky, particularly for beginners. It’s not uncommon for artists to feel stuck in capturing an animal’s unique anatomy and flounder when attempting to draw vibrant poses and expressions.

If you feel frustrated and feel held back in your creative pursuits, we’ve tailored the perfect solution for you! Get ready to embark on an engaging adventure of artistic development!

This immersive course was designed specifically to boost your confidence in creating cute, furry friends from scratch. Whether it’s mastering feline and canine anatomy, nailing dynamic poses, or capturing those adorable expressions, this course has got you covered!

With expert guidance and innovative techniques, Lauren Barger leads you through a transformative journey that will elevate your art, empowering you to create fluffy companions that leap off the page and capture hearts like never before.

Lauren shares insider tips and secrets and reveals her own methods and tools that will make drawing cats and dogs a breeze! From easy perspective lines to simple bean shapes, straight-forward silhouettes to clear lines of action, you’ll have tons of powerful tools at your disposal to make your artwork truly stand out!

Gain confidence with each step as you follow a clear illustration process and pick up tricks of the trade! At the end of this course, you’ll possess the skills to bring your cartoon animals to life in ways you never thought possible, leaving your friends and family in awe!

Enroll now, and watch your artistic dreams become a reality!

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Who is this course for

  • Beginners wanting to learn how to draw cartoon animals
  • Artists who want to expand their skills and explore animal drawing
  • Animal lovers looking to draw their own pets
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This course includes

  • 1+ Hours of on-demand videos
  • 9 Assignments (PDF)
  • 7 Cheat sheets/guides
  • 8 Process images
  • Bonus material
  • Certificate of Completion
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Used in course

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What you'll need

  • Just a paper/sketchbook and a pencil
  • Digital drawing software such as Procreate or similar (see examplesAffinity Photo, ArtRage, Artweaver, Astropad, Clip Studio Paint, Corel Painter, Krita, Inkscape, IbisPaint, GIMP, Rebelle 4, Photoshop, Paintstorm Studio, Procreate, MediBang Paint, SketchPad, SketchBook, TwistedBrush, Vectr...)
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Lesson Plan

with Lauren Barger
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00

Introduction

02:53

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The key to artistic development is constant practice and stepping out of your comfort zone. Lauren Barger will help do just that in this course!

She LOVES drawing animals and designed this course to give you the confidence and solid techniques needed to draw them too! Buckle up for a thrilling artistic journey!

01

Tools

17:44

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Get ready for a fun exploration of basic tools, brushes, and Procreate settings that will ignite your creativity and set you up for drawing heartwarming pets.

Lauren summarizes all the steps involved to creating a character, using an adorable doggo to demonstrate each one. Awwww!

You’ll take a quick dive into the art of using layers confidently, sketch with lightning speed, and add a splash of vivid colors and enchanting shadows for an eye-popping 3D effect!

02

References

07:07

Importance of references for drawing cartoons

In this lesson, you’ll discover how using references can level up your artwork, ensuring it remains fresh and original.

This initial stage of gathering references and important info (eg: pet’s gender, age, and personality), sets you up for success and helps prevent pesky problems down the road.

Lauren also shares some Procreate wizardry, guiding you on how to set everything up for a seamless and delightful artistic journey.

03

Dog and Cat Anatomy

19:03

Learn basic cat anatomy for cartoons

Get your pencils ready! In this fascinating lesson, you’ll discover the art of simplifying animal anatomy, a crucial skill that will allow you to stylize and manipulate your creatures effortlessly.

Lauren will show you how to break down complex forms into manageable shapes, starting from the core line of action, to basic circles, to bean shapes and more!

She uses several fun examples on dogs and cats to demonstrate these steps and gives tips on what to focus on. You won’t want to miss it!

04

Animal Expressions

11:38

Draw animals with different ages genders and personalities

Lauren guides you through the art of bringing your furry friends to life with a range of emotions.

Learn how to create convincing expressions on animals by manipulating their features to be more human-like, using squash and stretch techniques for dynamic effects, and masterfully working with shape language.

With the easy methods taught in this lesson, you’ll be able to effortlessly convey a myriad of emotions in your animals, as well as femininity and masculinity, youth and age, innocence and seductiveness and more!

05

Thumbnails

25:47

Understanding composition for artwork

In this lesson, you’ll get professional insights into increasing visual appeal and readability in your illustration. Lauren introduces you to handy thumbnail sketches as a quick and efficient way to explore multiple ideas, encouraging unbridled creativity!

Under her guidance, you’ll learn to flesh out pose variations for a canine and feline character, analyzing the pros and cons of each one and evaluating what’s working and what’s not.

Lauren also shows you how to achieve balanced compositions by using the rule of thirds, identifying focal points, maintaining clear silhouettes and more insider tips.

06

Bonus Timelapse

02:28

Learn to draw cats and dogs

Enjoy a lovely process video of a complete cat and dog illustration demonstrating the topics covered in previous lessons.

07

Line Art

13:03

Draw cats step by step

Get ready to embark on the exploration stage of illustration: sculpting a character pose! With Lauren’s expert guidance, you will build on your chosen thumbnail sketch, refining it into professional, clean line work.

You’ll learn how to nail down a pose and placement of body parts, avoid common pitfalls, discover inking techniques and lots of other fun stuff!

08

Color and Shading

17:13

Draw dogs step by step

We’re getting to the real exciting part: Colors and shading!! Follow along with Lauren in her easy-as-pie method for painting your sketch from the ground up.

Explore the art of adding depth and dimension to your pet illustration through the expert use of shadows and highlights, making it more visually captivating.

As a final touch, you’ll learn cool additions, such as adding a noise layer, enhancing highlights with color dodge, shading with cool tones and more, to elevate the overall quality of your artwork!

09

Conclusion

00:51

Animal drawing course with Lauren Barger

Congratulations on completing this course! You are now ready to unleash the hidden potential of your art with your newfound confidence and mastery of creature design skills!

Looking forward to seeing the endearing, unforgettable characters that you’ll create!

Student Feedback

94 customer reviews & ratings

4.5

Course rating

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5 star
75 %
4 star
13 %
3 star
8 %
2 star
4 %
1 star
3 %
Best Suited for
Beginner
The level is determined by a majority opinion of students who have reviewed this class. The teacher's recommendation is shown until at least 5 student responses are collected.

(Based on 94 reviews)

Most Liked
Engaging Teacher 66
Inspiring 65
Clarity of Instruction 52
Showing 10 reviews of
94
reviews & ratings
SB
Sara B.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
I enjoyed and was very inspired by this course. I would have liked more information on how to create facial expressions but it was very good and enlightening anyway. Good and engaging teacher with beautiful technique.I have taken the course and I am a total beginner so it is not suitable for everyon
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e.
I recommend it for Beginner
4 people found this helpful
AM
Anastasija M.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
One of the coolest and helpful tutorials out there for character designers (and aspiring character designers). Very engaging and fun. For beginners it has a lot of useful tips and tricks that always come in handy. Highly recommended.
I recommend it for Intermediate
4 people found this helpful
Sara H.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
Lauren is an amazing artist and has inspired me to begin drawing when I started watching her coffee draws on IG. I am looking forward to learn more from her in the future.
I recommend it for Intermediate
3 people found this helpful
CC
Charlie C.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
I really liked this course. I would have preferred to see more on the animal anatomy part, but I still loved the course. I've been following Lauren for ages and she is really inspiring. Thank you.
I recommend it for Beginner
Response from 21 Draw

Thank you for your review, Charlie! Thanks to your feedback and that of other students, we just updated the dog and cat anatomy lesson. It's a lot more detailed now (19 min). Hope it helps :)

2 people found this helpful
FB
Felipe B.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
Just amazing
I recommend it for Intermediate
Melike M.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
Thank you for this course :)
I recommend it for All levels
1 person found this helpful
SB
Savina B.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
it's ok thanks savina
I recommend it for Beginner
ST
Samantha T.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
This is an absolutely amazing course for beginners wanting to learn an easy workflow for creating pet art. It was enjoyable and I got a lot out of it.
I recommend it for Beginner
1 person found this helpful
AJ
Angela J.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
Very well done course. I loved the detailed instructions for the use of references, expressions and thumbnails. The examples of making the pet young or older was fascinating. I also loved that Lauren uses the basic brushes that come with Procreate. I can't wait to see more courses from her maybe exp
+ Show more
anding on how to practice expressions for pets and how they might be altered based on the various breeds and the size of the breeds. TWO THUMBS UP!!
I recommend it for Beginner
1 person found this helpful
ML
Mary L.

1 year ago

Verified Purchase
Loooove this course!!
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About the Instructor

Lauren Barger
Character Designer and Illustrator 1 course

Lauren is a character designer based in Charlotte, NC, known for creating ‘Coffeedraws’, being a co-host of MerMay on Instagram and for her comical cartoons of animals and people.


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Many lessons in our courses apply to both digital and traditional art. In a few tutorials, digital drawing software, e.g. Photoshop or Procreate for iPad is required. However, for the majority of lessons it is more about the underlying concepts and all that is needed is a pen and paper.

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