Uploaded January 2017 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
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This is a lesson from the course Character Design For Animation in Illustrator.
Ok. In the last lesson, we saw what we will accomplish after going through all the tutorials, and in here I will show you why we need the character divided in so many layers.
The truth is, we could draw the entire character in one single layer.
That would be super simple.
Or maybe just have 6 layers.
2 for the arms, 2 for the legs, 1 for the body and another for the head.
That would be so manageable. 6 Layers. Super simple right?
And you can use the puppet pin tool to flex the legs and arms right?
Yes, it would be easier to manage, but you would be so limited too.
What I’m going to teach you is how to build a complex character with a lot of movement, and for that we need to have a lot of options, we need different mouths, different hands, different feet,
And that takes time to draw, trace and paint inside Illustrator.
We will give this character a way to move and flex his arm. You can do this with either puppet pin tools, or by having the arm and forearm in different layers, which is a bit simpler.
That’s the way we are going to be designing this character. By having it on different layers.
The basic rig would have at least 16 layers. 3 For each arm, 3 for each leg, 3 for the body and 1 for the head.
But if you want your character to have facial expressions then you need more layers.
Now, if we want different options for the hands, and mouth, then in total there will be 48 layers.
Yep, we will be tracing 48 layers in this training.
Why 48 layers?
Actually, 48 layers is a very poor number, because this character only has 3 options for the hands. If for example, you would like to animate an expressive character, like we did for the trailer of this course, then, know that just the hands I used 38 layers.
Yep, 38 layers for each hand. That is 76, just for the expression of the hands.
You can either think of it as tedious work, but when you work imagining the emotions that your character make the audience feel, then it pays off.
I do this because I imagine people laughing and the gags my friends who help me write the stories and me, can come up.
And for the mouths? I used not just the 10 basic mouths for the lip sync, and I also used another 10 for the upset version. A total of 20 layers, just for the mouth!
Why? Because I needed a happy version and an upset version.
And for the eyes and eyebrows? Well, for the eyes, there are different techniques you can use to get your characters expressing different emotions.
We will cover how to do it with replacement animation.
So, understanding this, trust me, 48 layers sound like much, but it isn’t. And once we go step by step through each section you will find is not that of a big number.
Oh, and by the way, these 48 layers are just for the frontal view, if you needed more views for your character, then you need more rigs. And that is what we are going to talk about in the next lesson.
The different views of your character, see you there.
Get COMPLETE COURSE FOR FREE at tr4ckit.com/gna2
This is a lesson from the course Character Design For Animation in Illustrator.
Ok. In the last lesson, we saw what we will accomplish after going through all the tutorials, and in here I will show you why we need the character divided in so many layers.
The truth is, we could draw the entire character in one single layer.
That would be super simple.
Or maybe just have 6 layers.
2 for the arms, 2 for the legs, 1 for the body and another for the head.
That would be so manageable. 6 Layers. Super simple right?
And you can use the puppet pin tool to flex the legs and arms right?
Yes, it would be easier to manage, but you would be so limited too.
What I’m going to teach you is how to build a complex character with a lot of movement, and for that we need to have a lot of options, we need different mouths, different hands, different feet,
And that takes time to draw, trace and paint inside Illustrator.
We will give this character a way to move and flex his arm. You can do this with either puppet pin tools, or by having the arm and forearm in different layers, which is a bit simpler.
That’s the way we are going to be designing this character. By having it on different layers.
The basic rig would have at least 16 layers. 3 For each arm, 3 for each leg, 3 for the body and 1 for the head.
But if you want your character to have facial expressions then you need more layers.
Now, if we want different options for the hands, and mouth, then in total there will be 48 layers.
Yep, we will be tracing 48 layers in this training.
Why 48 layers?
Actually, 48 layers is a very poor number, because this character only has 3 options for the hands. If for example, you would like to animate an expressive character, like we did for the trailer of this course, then, know that just the hands I used 38 layers.
Yep, 38 layers for each hand. That is 76, just for the expression of the hands.
You can either think of it as tedious work, but when you work imagining the emotions that your character make the audience feel, then it pays off.
I do this because I imagine people laughing and the gags my friends who help me write the stories and me, can come up.
And for the mouths? I used not just the 10 basic mouths for the lip sync, and I also used another 10 for the upset version. A total of 20 layers, just for the mouth!
Why? Because I needed a happy version and an upset version.
And for the eyes and eyebrows? Well, for the eyes, there are different techniques you can use to get your characters expressing different emotions.
We will cover how to do it with replacement animation.
So, understanding this, trust me, 48 layers sound like much, but it isn’t. And once we go step by step through each section you will find is not that of a big number.
Oh, and by the way, these 48 layers are just for the frontal view, if you needed more views for your character, then you need more rigs. And that is what we are going to talk about in the next lesson.
The different views of your character, see you there.
