Why Animators Still Need to Draw

Fast sketches to capture a pose

In the old 2D days, life drawing was an essential skill for animators. Today, 3D animation is a blend of creative and technical skills, and life drawing is less important than it used to be.

However, it still helps to be able to draw to a basic level of skill, especially for creating thumbnail sketches which can be used to plan animation.

Nowadays there are many opportunities to learn animation online, at sites such as pixelovely and promo. You can also draw friends and family - models don't need to be nude, and gesture drawing clothed models is just as useful for animation, and in some ways more practical, as most animated characters tend to be wearing clothing.

So, how do animators learn the basics of life drawing?

Learn Gesture Drawing Online at Proko

Gesture drawing is an important skill for animators - it helps us learn how to capture a pose, and to master the art of visual storytelling. After all, planning your animation with quick thumbnail sketches that tell a story is still one of the core skills of the 3D animator - it's why we still need to know how to draw - at least just a little bit.  Here at Bucks we're recommending this series of videos by Proko, all hosted for free at his YouTube channel. There are lots of great videos but the particular playlist we're interested in is titled "Figure Drawing - How to Draw People". You can find it here.

More Free Life Drawing Classes For Our Students at Bucks

Calling all Bucks animators and digital artists! Today is the day to sign up with the Bucks Students' Union for their next round of life drawing classes, starting in March. We strongly recommend that everyone sign up. It's a great skill to acquire and will help all our animators become better artists. Drawing skills help with design, storyboards, thumbnails - all necessary parts of the animation process.  So how do you sign up?

Sign Up Now for Life Drawing at Bucks!

Calling all Bucks animators and digital artists! Today is the day to sign up with the Bucks Students' Union for their life drawing classes. We strongly recommend that everyone sign up. It's a great skill to acquire and will help all our animators become better artists. Drawing skills help with design, storyboards, thumbnails - all necessary parts of the animation process.  Sign up now and don't wait - these classes are popular and will fill up fast!

Free Life Drawing classes at Pixelovely.com

Free life drawing at www.pixelovely.com

Animation is a blend of creative and technical skills, and a good animator needs both to survive. It is true that digital animators don't need to draw with the same degree of skill as they did in the days of hand-drawn animation, but good draughtsmanship still helps a great deal, not just for design work but for storyboards, thumbnails, visual development and all the other related areas that a good animator often gets called upon to do

Meet Tom So - James Bond actor - and our life model on Monday morning

Tom So - more than just a model

Tom So is an actor, model, Qi Gong practitioner and Tai Chi expert. You may recognise him from the poker scene in Casino Royale, in which he played Fukutu, one of the world's top poker players. Tom is an expert in martial arts and has made a lifetime study of how energy moves through the body and what energies a person can feel, both internally and externally. He applies his practice of Qi Gong to his modeling work, especially life modeling. We are indeed exceptionally fortunate to have Tom as our life model for our next two life drawing sessions at Bucks.

More life drawing at Bucks - why should animators learn to draw?

For all our animators and digital artists who didn't manage to sign up with the Bucks Students' Union in January for their life drawing classes, or want second helpings of life drawing, the animation department will soon be teaming up with Mark Hudson's graphics students in the Timberlake Building to bring a series of new life drawing sessions.

Sign up today for life drawing at Bucks!

Calling all Bucks animators and digital artists! Today is the day to sign up with the Bucks Students' Union for their life drawing classes. We strongly recommend that everyone sign up. It's great skill to acquire and will help all our animators become better artists. Drawing skills help with design, storyboards, thumbnails - all necessary parts of the animation process.

Full details below. Sign up now and don't wait - these classes are popular and will fill up fast!

Life Drawing Comes to Bucks! - Sign up with the Student Union on January 21st

Figure drawing - great training for animators

Animation is a blend of creative and technical skills, and a good animator needs both to survive. It is true that digital animators don't need to draw with the same degree of skill as they did in the days of hand-drawn animation, but good draughtsmanship still helps a great deal, not just for design work but for storyboards, thumbnails, visual development and all the other related areas that a good animator often gets called upon to do.

We've been working with the Student Union at Bucks to organise life drawing classes for our students, and we strongly recommend that everyone sign up. It's great skill to acquire and will help all our animators become better artists.

What do we look for in applicant's portfolios?

Life drawing, especially quick sketches, provides excellent training for animators

Here at Bucks we often get asked what should go in to an art portfolio, to apply for our animation course. Drawings? Paintings? Life drawing? Digital artwork? The answer is - a bit of everything. Most important is digital artwork hosted at a website or blog, so we can access it easily.

Life Drawing comes to Bucks

Why do animation students need to attend life drawing classes? Surely animation is all done by computers now? Not all all. In reality, life drawing is vital part of the animation process, even for 3D digital artists. Although less important than it used to be in the days of hand-drawn animation, life drawing it is still hugely useful. An animator should be able to capture a pose in a few lines. What is the character thinking and feeling? Where is the weight? Visual problems like these can be solved with the skills gained by learning to draw fluently from life.