Weekly Live Meetups

Join 5 live sessions each month to stay connected, motivated, and active. Ask me questions as we draw together.

"I want to thank you for all the amazing work that you are putting into SDA, it's been really a great experience for me and I have definitely seen an improvement in my work."

- Diana Luna / Member

Mindset

Develop a creative mindset and learn how to organize a clear path to your art career goals during these encouraging and thought provoking sessions.

"Stephen gave me the tools to improve my drawings, lessons that I still use today."

- Bobby Pontillas / Art director

Beginning Techniques

Whether you're a beginner or seasoned professional; this is a great place to start. Get an exciting refresher on the fundamentals.

"I definitely learned a lot in these lessons! The skull is so simple, yet has always been something I’ve struggled with and avoided. This broke it down in such a great, easy to understand way I feel like I could draw them no problem now!
- Phillip Rauschkolb / Member

Drawing Heads

Learn how to construct and draw the human head in a variety of styles, angles, and shapes

"I Love the fact that your site allows each lesson to be marked complete, It helps me organize the lessons I have already worked on."

- Erica Bey / Member

Gesture

Add life and energy to a range of poses. Discover how to observe and capture movement in any drawing you create. These techniques can be applied to animation, illustration, and more.

"I watched a 4 minute lesson and after it, I was able to focus on the right things and catch the feeling of a pose for the first time in my life."

- Juana Mool / Member

Party Caricature

Sharpen your observation skills and learn how to break down a face, accurately capture likeness, and produce studio quality caricatures. Become equipped to take on freelance work.

"I've taken a lot of classes online for art throughout the years and these courses have progressed me more than all the other ones combined."

- Theodore Fergason / Member

The Silver Way Overview

Access video lessons reviewing the core principles of The Silver Way, one of the top ranked books on character design. Receive step by step breakdowns of concepts outlined in the text to reinforce what you’ve read.

"You Learn the ropes around art techniques, the art business as well as the right attitude for success."

- James Francis / Member

Developing Characters

Discover industry standards for character design; including clean-up, turnarounds, lineups, expression sheets, and more. Design an array of characters in different styles. Understand what you need to show potential clients in order to get work.

"The short video format works perfectly for me as a father of 2 daughters and a full time job."

- Ka Yin / Member

Drawing Animals

Watch as I break down animal shapes and explain my methods. Learn how to find the character in references and explore different art styles as the course progresses.

"You've truly created something amazing and I was overwhelmed at the amount of high quality content on offer."

- David Woodgate

Drawing Drills

Explore daily drawing drills specially designed to polish observation and drafting skills while boosting confidence.

"I've seen a huge improvement in skills and confidence."

- Josh Ohmes / Member

Character Drawing Prompts

Do you struggle to come up with character ideas? This category will help by providing innumerable suggestions for you to draw.

"SDA is a valuable learning resource if you're looking for an online school that teaches easy to understand and practical lessons that you can apply instantly to improve your drawing skills ."

- Ahmed Sidky / Member

Resources

Utilize our library of handpicked reference websites, drawing exercises, animation resources, and more.

"This site is filled with hundreds of short and positive drawing tutorial videos. It's great for busy people who may only have a few spare minutes per day to sketch."

- Matt Watts / Member

8 Week Instructor-Led Fundamentals Of Character Design Course

This is a separate program from the Character Design Program.

Next Semester Begins 

SEPTEMBER 6th 2022

"This 8-week course has taught me a lot of aspects of character design and, among other things—stuff like form, shapes, silhouette (which is still tricky for me at times). The assignments didn't just help me with 2d. Aspects of these lessons have me better understand aspects of 3d (I'm a 3d artist).  Not only has this course helped me with my 2d and 3d skills throughout the course, but I also met incredible artists through the discord, meeting cool cats I wouldn't usually meet in my daily life. People around the world are either students, industry people, or casuals. Thank you, Stephen Silver, for the excellent 8-week course you've created! Going to keep practicing what you've taught me! "

 Frederick Brown/ Member