We have opened the Sketching for Design Workshop, from Purdue’s Product and Process Design course, to help everyone learn to communicate visually.

In this workshop, Prof. Ramani will take you from sketching straight lines to making detailed and complex sketches. These seven short videos will walk you through the different levels of sketching during the design process, along with some practice activities to hone your skills.

To begin, grab some tools from around your house (paper, pencils, pens, markers, crayons) and let’s get started making sketches, adding depth to flat shapes, showing motion and interaction, and creating complicated 3D shapes easily. You’ll be conveying your amazing ideas on paper like a pro in no time!

Materials You Will Need: For this workshop, you will only need some paper and a writing utensil. If you have a marker available, that will be helpful. If you do not, when the videos have you use a marker, simply darken your lines by going over each line a few more times to make them stand out.

Contents

1. Sketching for Design
2. Sketching Basics
3. Line Weights
4. Annotations and Context
5. Showing Motion
6. Theory of Perspective
7. Complicated 3D Shapes
8. More Exercises and Activities for Children

You can also view the Full Playlist as well.

 01. Sketching For Design

Are you a beginner in sketching and want to learn more? This video will show the   benefits of sketching, its uses in ideation, and everyday life to help people       communicate their ideas visually.

 02. Sketching Basics and Tools

This video introduces the basics of sketching for quality and effectiveness. You will   learn about the importance of posture, sketching from the shoulder as opposed to   the arm, the speed at which to draw, and their effects on the product of your   sketches.

 Activity 1: Practice drawing straight lines
 Activity 2: Practice drawing circles and ellipses

 03. Using Your Tools

Everyone uses a writing utensil to make sketches, but are you using your tools to   their maximum potential. Is there a better writing tool available to improve the   sketch, making it more clear? In this video, you will learn how to use line weights and   writing tools to make your sketches more realistic and leave a lasting impression.

 Activity 1: Practice drawing lines with different line weights
 Activity 2: Practice drawing a simple household object (e.g. table, toaster, bookshelf)   utilizing different line weights

 04. Sketching Skills

Want to make fast sketches to communicate your ideas quickly? This video will show   you how to sketch everyday objects quickly and discuss how context can increase   clarity in what you are communicating.

 Activity 1: Sketch different objects in a given context

 05. Showing Motion

Have you ever wondered how to make a sketch come to life? This video will show you   how to add motion or time to sketches using arrows, lines, and other symbols.

 Activity 1: Sketch Jack In The Box
 Activity 2: Sketch a toy that you enjoy and entertains you

 06. Theory of Perspective

This video will show how sketches can be drawn from different points of view. There   are several techniques that will be discussed which will help you draw more refined   sketches for complicated objects.

 Activity 1: Practice sketching prisms at different angles

 07. Complicated 3D Shapes

This video will bring all the concepts from the previous videos and show you how to   create any complicated object of choice, by going through step by step examples and   referring to previously explained ideas from this Sketching Workshop series.

 Activity 1: Sketch a vehicle (e.g. tractor)