Course description

Procreate turns an iPad and a stylus into a sketchbook, an ink pen and a paint box in one. It's also full of panels, gestures and settings that can make the first few weeks feel confusing, and it's easy to end up with drawings that won't print properly, colours that look muddy, or a year of work with no backup.

This course takes you from opening the app for the first time to a finished, printed set of illustrated cards. You'll learn the interface and gestures, brushes, layers, colour, line art, shading, lettering, selections, adjustments and simple animation, then how to export for print and screen, share safely, back up your work and understand your rights in general UK terms. If you'd like to build pencil and paper skills too, Drawing for Beginners: Learn to Draw with Line, Shading and Perspective covers them.

There are 10 sections and 50 written lessons, each with a worked example and a short task to try in Procreate. You follow Jiahui, a dental receptionist in Morpeth, through her first year of drawing as she creates a hedgehog character called Pockets, makes a birthday card for her nephew, a sticker sheet and a botanical print, and finishes a set of seasonal cards for a local craft fair, slips included. Every section has a practice pack with a worksheet, example answers and a cheat sheet, plus line art sheets to import and colour, palette swatches, a value scale, perspective, shading and lettering guides, print guides, checklists and project briefs with model answers.

What you'll learn

• Getting started: what you need, canvas sizes in pixels and millimetres, DPI and bleed, RGB and CMYK in plain words, and drawing comfortably without aching hands, wrists or eyes.
• Finding your way around: the Gallery, Stacks, the top left tools, painting, smudging and erasing, the Layers and Colours panels and the gestures that make Procreate quick.
• Brushes: the brush library, pressure and tilt, StreamLine, organising brushes and making your own inking brush in the Brush Studio.
• Layers in depth: a layer plan for every drawing, blend modes, Alpha Lock, clipping masks, layer masks, reference layers, groups and the layer limit.
• Colour: the Colours panel, harmony, palettes and the eyedropper, ColorDrop fills and checking value and contrast in grey.
• Drawing aids, line art and colouring: QuickShape, symmetry, perspective guides, an inking workflow from sketch to clean lines, and tidy flat colours.
• Shading, light, texture and lettering: one light source, shadows and highlights on their own layers, texture, hand lettering and typed text, and laying out words on a card.
• Selections, transforms, adjustments and animation: selections, Transform and Warp, colour adjustments, blur and Liquify, and a simple looping animation with Animation Assist.
• Exporting, sharing and your rights: PNG, JPEG, PSD, PDF and time-lapse exports, print files with bleed and safe areas, sharing safely, backups, and UK copyright and selling in general terms.
• Projects and your final project: a character with a model sheet, a botanical drawing from life, a sticker sheet, and a set of illustrated cards or posters prepared for print and screen.

Who it's for

Hobby artists and beginner illustrators in the UK who have an iPad and a stylus and want to draw digitally with confidence. You don't need any drawing experience. You'll need an iPad that runs Procreate, a compatible stylus, the Procreate app, and a PDF reader for the practice packs.

What this course is, and isn't

This course gives general information about drawing in Procreate at the time of writing. Procreate is updated from time to time, so some buttons and menus may look different on your iPad. The lessons on copyright, selling and health give general information only and point you to GOV.UK and the NHS. The course isn't made or endorsed by the makers of Procreate, and it doesn't recommend any other app or product. The people and businesses in the course are fictional.

What will I learn?

• Set up canvases in pixels or millimetres with the right DPI, bleed and colour profile for print or screen
• Find your way round the Gallery, panels and gestures, and draw comfortably without straining your hands, wrists or eyes
• Choose, adjust, organise and build brushes using pressure, StreamLine and the Brush Studio
• Organise drawings with a layer plan, blend modes, Alpha Lock, clipping masks, layer masks and reference layers
• Choose colours with harmony, palettes and value checks, and fill flats quickly with ColorDrop
• Use QuickShape, symmetry and perspective guides, and work from rough sketch to clean line art and flat colours
• Add shading, light and texture on their own layers, and letter cards by hand or with the text tool
• Select, transform, adjust, blur and liquify your work, and make a simple looping animation
• Export PNG, JPEG, PSD, PDF and time-lapse files, prepare print files with bleed and safe areas, and back up your work
• Understand UK copyright, references, AI tools and selling your artwork in general terms
• Plan and finish a character, a botanical drawing, a sticker sheet and a set of illustrated cards for print and screen

Frequently asked questions