Top 5 Character Design Courses to Buy for Aspiring Animators 

Character design is one of the most lucrative and high-demand disciplines in the animation, gaming, and visual development industries. While technical software skills are essential, studios pay premium rates for designers who master visual storytelling, silhouette appeal, gesture, and production-ready mechanics.

Whether an animated project is slated for theatrical release, a streaming series, or a mobile game, every 3D modeler, rigger, and animator downstream relies entirely on the character designer’s model sheets and turnaround blueprints. For artists looking to break into the industry or elevate their portfolio, investing in industry-taught courses offers the fastest path to mastery.

1. Character Design for Animation (CG Master Academy)

Platform: CG Master Academy (CGMA)

Instructor: Nate Wragg (former Art Director at DreamWorks, Pixar)

Format: 8-Week Guided Intensive with Direct Feedback

CG Master Academy’s flagship character design class mirrors real-world studio production pipelines. The curriculum starts with the fundamentals of silhouette clarity and shape language—teaching students why certain geometric silhouettes read instantly on screen.

Over the eight-week span, students learn how to construct expressive facial features, match established production styles, develop cast lineups with contrasting proportions, and build production-standard character turnarounds. Because participants submit assignments weekly and receive personalized, recorded video feedback from seasoned studio leads, this course is ideal for artists who want to bridge the gap between hobbyist sketching and professional studio hiring standards.

👉 Explore Character Design for Animation at CGMA

2. Creating Influential Character Designs (Schoolism)

Platform: Schoolism

Instructor: Pernille Ørum (Visual Development Artist for Disney, Warner Bros., Mattel)

Format: Self-Paced or Critiqued Subscription

Pernille Ørum’s signature Schoolism course focuses on appeal—an elusive yet critical metric studios look for when reviewing visual development portfolios. This course unpacks how to take a simple prompt and turn it into a memorable, emotionally resonant figure with distinct personality and charm.

Lessons examine how subtle weight shifts, line rhythm, and gesture communicate backstory before a character speaks a single line of dialogue. Ørum demonstrates her sketching, inking, and digital coloring techniques while highlighting how to eliminate stiff, symmetrical anatomy in favor of fluid pose dynamics. This course is an indispensable resource for artists targeting feature film, television, or freelance illustration contracts.

👉 Explore Creating Influential Character Designs at Schoolism

3. Character Design for Production (Brainstorm School)

Platform: Brainstorm School

Instructors: Industry Visual Development Leads & Concept Artists

Format: 10-Week Term with Live Lectures & Peer Critiques

Brainstorm School is renowned for training concept artists and designers who land jobs at studios like Sony Pictures Animation, Riot Games, and Disney. Character Design for Production (CD1/CD2) is tailored for intermediate to advanced artists who already understand anatomy but need to learn how commercial pre-production pipelines operate.

Students are given project briefs that simulate production directives: establishing protagonist and antagonist dynamics, designing functional clothing and props, handling turnarounds for 3D modelers, and developing expression sheets. Brainstorm emphasizes speed, visual clarity, and narrative coherence, making it a premier incubator for building studio-ready portfolio packages.

👉 Explore Character Design Courses at Brainstorm School

4. Science of Character Animation & Design (Motion Design School)

Platform: Motion Design School

Instructor: Markus Magnusson

Format: On-Demand Video Training with Project Files

Designing characters that will be rigged and animated requires a distinct mechanical awareness: joints, limbs, and proportions must deform cleanly without clipping or losing clarity. Markus Magnusson’s masterclass bridges the gap between static 2D vector character design and fluid, charismatic animation.

Magnusson breaks down his signature quirky aesthetic, focusing on exaggerated physics, stylized silhouette anatomy, and modular asset preparation in Adobe Illustrator and After Effects. You will learn how to design characters specifically meant for fast rigging and snappy motion graphics—a specialty skill that commands significant freelance rates in commercial advertising, explainer media, and indie game development.

👉 Explore Science of Character Animation at Motion Design School

5. Character Design for Video Games (CalArts via Coursera)

Platform: California Institute of the Arts / Coursera

Instructors: CalArts Faculty

Format: Self-Paced Academic Specialization Module

Developed by the California Institute of the Arts—one of the world’s preeminent institutions for character animation—this course adapts classic character animation principles to modern interactive pipelines.

The curriculum dives deep into the psychology of character creation: how visual cues signal faction alignment, class mechanics, gameplay functionality, and character arc. You will study how silhouettes remain readable from distant camera angles, how to draft orthographic turnaround sheets for 3D sculptors, and how to create cohesive character lineups for diverse casts. It serves as a cost-effective, academically structured entry point for aspiring animators and game artists alike.

👉 Character Design for Video Games (CalArts on Coursera)

Comparison of Top Character Design Courses

Course	Provider	Best For	Format
Character Design for Animation	CG Master Academy	Studio pipeline workflows & professional critiques	8-Week Live Feedback
Creating Influential Character Designs	Schoolism	Appeal, charm, and stylized 2D aesthetics	Self-Paced / Subscription
Character Design for Production	Brainstorm School	High-end visual development & entertainment concept art	10-Week Studio Boot Camp
Science of Character Animation	Motion Design School	Motion graphics, 2D rigging, and commercial animation	On-Demand Video
Character Design for Video Games	CalArts / Coursera	Game art theory, gameplay legibility, and foundations	Flexible Academic Course

Mastering character design requires more than just drawing appealing faces. By selecting a course that challenges your understanding of shape dynamics, production-readiness, and visual hierarchy, you build a skill set that sits at the foundation of the entire animation industry.