We’ve partnered with Skillshare several times now to offer you guys access to thousands of quality art and design classes taught by award-winning creatives. A new class has just been released called Customizing Type with Draplin, the third class by the always entertaining and tremendously talented designer Aaron Draplin. Skillshare was interested in Booooooom sharing the class so I personally enrolled in the class so I could review it. We also have an exclusive offer for 2 free months of Skillshare Premium, just hit the link here!
I can say right off the top that this class isn’t for beginners. If you don’t have a basic understanding of Illustrator you can get lost at some parts (I’ve used the program for years and still had to pause and Google a couple of things). Skillshare does offer a bunch of Illustrator classes so you could start with one of those first. Having said that my motto has always been to get in over your head, so if you’re a determined newbie there’s no better way to learn than to jump in with both feet.
The thing I like most about Draplin’s approach is that it’s always quick and dirty, and nothing is sacred. He designs through brute force and uses a lot of shortcuts I wasn’t aware of (like quickly kerning letters with option+arrow keys – somehow I didn’t know this).
It starts to get really good around Lesson 7 when he focuses on sketching. He shows you the way he roughs out an idea, traces it in ink, and re-draws it several times. One quick iPhone photo and he’s immediately back working on it in Illustrator.
I especially liked the bonus lesson on adding texture and imperfection to letters to make them feel handmade, and the one on rebuilding a script. All in all I thought it was a great class and several of Draplin’s methods were immediately helpful for me as I was also working on a t-shirt graphic.
You can watch the trailer for the class below, and if you’re interested in trying out Skillshare we have a special deal for our readers to try 2 months of Skillshare Premium for free!
This article was sponsored by Skillshare but is 100% my own honest opinion. If you have any specific questions about the class feel free to leave a comment.
