Need Some Help With Draw Awesome?

For instructions and a video guide on how to access the private Draw Awesome community, please see the third lesson in Draw Awesome (the lesson is called The Draw Awesome Community and is the third one in the Start Here section).

If you're not sure how to post an image to the group. I've created a video showing you how to do that.

I've also added a short video to that page for using the free ArtKula app.

Watch the video of me posting an image to the Draw Awesome community on ArtKula

Draw Awesome is about being consistent, NOT perfect! So there is absolutely no need to keep perfect pace with the release of the projects (which are released weekly).

In fact, most students will be at least a few weeks behind the latest project, especially the longer the syllabus goes on.

And Draw Awesome is a finite course, which lasts about 1 year. That means it will be much easier to catch up in year 2.

But what about your subscription payments though? Won't you end up paying more the longer the course takes you to complete?

When all the projects have been released (end of year 1), you'll have the option of either canceling your subscription and downloading the project videos (assuming you want to keep them), or you can purchase an Ongoing Access plan for a small annual fee.

The Ongoing Access plan saves you the hassle of downloading lots of large video files and gives you another year of access.  

We send you an email reminder at the end of the course with these 2 options.

You pay a monthly fee to access the projects online (a bit like Netflix or Amazon Prime).

If you cancel your subscription, you'll lose access to your Draw Awesome account after the next billing date was due.

However, unlike Netflix or Prime, you can download all the projects and keep them, even after your subscription ends.

Just be aware that downloading lots of large video files can take time and usually requires extra storage (like a hard drive or cloud storage service).

An extra incentive for seeing the course through to the end is that you can purchase an Ongoing Access plan for a small annual fee. This allows you to keep watching all the projects online without having to pay the monthly subscription fee. The Ongoing Access plan is only available once all the projects have been released (which takes just over a year). 

When all the projects have been released (end of year 1), you'll have the option of either canceling your subscription and downloading the project videos (assuming you want to keep them), or you can purchase an Ongoing Access plan for a small annual fee.

The Ongoing Access plan saves you the hassle of downloading lots of large video files and gives you another year of access.  

We send you an email reminder at the end of the course with these 2 options.

Yes, you can download any of the project videos at any time. And you can keep these even if you cancel your subscription!

Just bear in mind that downloading and storing lots of large video files can take a long time and may require extra storage (if you're downloading lots of videos).

To download videos please see this guide: https://www.drawawesome.com/how-to-download-projects.

Yes, you can substitute materials that I recommend or use, for one that you already have. However...

The more closely your materials match what I use, the better your results will be.

For example, you don't need to have the same brand of sketchbook as me but you should be using one with similar qualities (i.e. similar size, paper weight, surface texture etc).

On the materials page, I state when it's important to get the same brand and when the brand isn't that important. 

You can see the full list of materials here:

https://www.drawawesome.com/materials

In a word, no. Draw Awesome is designed to be followed exactly as is and a lot of planning has gone into the syllabus to make it as effective as possible.

Many of the techniques work across different mediums. There are lessons we cover in say, the graphite drawing module, that will apply to say, the coloured pencils module.

Each Module builds on the one before and this is why they can't be reordered.

The best place to ask questions about Draw Awesome lessons is in our private Draw Awesome group on ArtKula.com. Either I, a colleague, or another student will be able to answer you there.

Of course, if you're not on ArtKula, feel free to email me your question using this contact form:

https://www.drawawesome.com/contact

Unfortunately, I can't give one-to-one critiques of project artwork.

Draw Awesome is about steady, consistent practice over time. Like the magic of compound interest, this is what leads to massive results and transformation!

One project per week (with some rest weeks factored in) is achievable for most people who are committed to becoming awesome artists. Any more than that, and there's a risk of burnout and of you becoming overwhelmed - which leads to you quitting much earlier than you would have otherwise.

Because this schedule is at the very heart of Draw Awesome, projects can't be released earlier, unfortunately.

Absolutely! You can post the artwork you make from any of my instructor-led projects, anywhere you like. You don't need to ask me for permission and you don't need to credit me or Draw Awesome - although that would nice. :)

Your challenge artwork is obviously your own creation, so as long you've not broken someone else's copyright in creating your images, you can obviously do with them what you want.

Yes and no...

If you want to sell a project drawing to someone who's asked to buy it, then by all means go ahead and I'd love to hear about it! After all, one of my goals for you is that you reach a point where you're making commission-worthy artwork!

The only thing I ask you not to do is make digital copies or prints of the artwork and sell those. It's cool to sell the original (and I'd encourage it), just not duplications of the original, if that's okay. 

The reference photos I use for Draw Awesome projects are either taken by me (so I own the copyright and give you permission to do with those photos what you want), or they're from Pixabay, Pexels or Unsplash (where photos are made to be used freely).

There are some restrictions on the photos at those sites, which won't affect most artists, but it's worth taking a quick read of their licences:

Unsplash: https://unsplash.com/license

Pexels: https://www.pexels.com/license/

Pixabay: https://pixabay.com/service/license/

You can cancel your membership by doing the following:

• Log in to your Draw Awesome account.
• Click on your Avatar (little head and shoulders icon) at the top of any page.
• Select Settings from the dropdown.
• Click Billing Info in the top-right of the page.
• Click the 3 dots next to your active subscription and click Cancel this subscription or Cancel in Paypal.

NOTE: If you joined using Paypal, you'll be redirected to your Paypal account and you'll need to sign in. Once you've done that:

• Click Payments in the top menu.
• Select Manage automatic payments under the "Automatic payments" section.
• Select the agreement you want to cancel in the left sidebar (i.e. Draw Awesome).
• Click the Cancel button.
• Click Cancel Automatic Payments.

If you want us to cancel for you, please email us here.

After you cancel, you'll still have access to your account up until your next billing date. That will include any new projects released up to that date.

If you want to keep projects that have been released, you can download the videos and reference material.

Just bear in mind that downloading lots of large video files can take time and may require extra storage.

An extra incentive for seeing the course through to the end is that you can purchase an Ongoing Access plan for a small annual fee. This allows you to keep watching all the projects online without having to pay the monthly subscription fee. The Ongoing Access plan is only available once all the projects have been released (which takes just over a year). 

The reason most people ask to pause their subscription is that they are going away for a while and won't have time to follow the projects... or they feel like they can't keep up with the release of projects and want a chance to catch up.

Here are two options if this is the case for you...

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OPTION 1 - Cancel your subscription and download the projects released so far

When you cancel your subscription, you'll retain access to your Draw Awesome account until when your next subscription payment was due. After that, you'll no longer be able to access Draw Awesome and the projects.

However...

What you can do is download all the project videos and reference photos and keep them forever. The downside to this option is that it can take a very long time to download lots of large video files. Plus, you need to factor in the cost of storage (like an external hard drive or cloud storage service).

See this guide for downloading videos:

https://www.drawawesome.com/how-to-download-projects

If you want to go with this option, please cancel your plan from the Settings page in your Draw Awesome account (click the little head and shoulders icon > Billing Info), or you can ask us to cancel for you

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OPTION 2 - Keep your Draw Awesome subscription going until the end, and then switch to our "Ongoing Access" plan

Draw Awesome lasts for one year and has a set number of modules and projects. This means that it's easy to catch up in the second year as no more projects are released.

But obviously, you don't want to be paying the full monthly subscription fee in that second year...

So, what we've done is create a low-cost Ongoing Access plan that you can switch to after the last project has been released to you. This way you're not penalized financially for taking longer to complete the course. And the big upside is that you don't have to worry about downloading and storing all those large video files!

The cost of the Ongoing Access plan is $25 USD / £25 GBP / $36 CAD / $39 AUD / €29 EUR for the whole year. So effectively, you pay one month's subscription but it gives you a whole extra year to complete everything.

When the final project is released to you (at the end of year one), we'll send you an email to remind you to switch your account over to the Ongoing Access plan.

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Hopefully, those two options make sense.

If you are wanting to pause with the intent of coming back to finish the course, Option 2 is the least disruptive for you and will cost no more compared to pausing your subscription. In this case, there's nothing for you to do - we'll email you at the end of the course with instructions for switching plans.

Of course, if you need to cancel right now for financial reasons, then Option 1 is best and you'll need to cancel your plan from the Settings page in your Draw Awesome account (click the little head and shoulders icon > Billing Info), or contact us and ask us to cancel your account.

You can contact us here

Changing your card details depends on the payment method you used to join Draw Awesome - either credit/debit card or Paypal...

If you used a credit/debit card to sign up:

1. Sign in to your Draw Awesome account.

2. Go to the Settings page by clicking or tapping on your avatar (the little head and shoulders icon) and click or tap on Billing Info.

3. You'll see an option to add a new card as well as the card being used for your Active subscription.

4. Go ahead and add a new card.

5. Click the 3 dots next to your Active Subscription and select the new card you've just added.

Unfortunately, you can't remove old cards but we can do that for you if you like. If you want us to do that, please email us with which card to remove (we just need the last 4 digits of the card).

You can contact us here

If you used Paypal to sign up:

1. Sign into your Paypal account.

2. Click Payments in the top menu.

3. Select Manage automatic payments under the "Automatic Payments" section.

4. Select the merchant whose agreement you want to cancel in the left sidebar (we will show as Draw Awesome or Paintbox Art Media).

5. You should be given the option to change your payment method. If not, you'll need to contact Paypal support as we don't have any access to your Paypal account.

There are five currencies to choose from when purchasing from Draw Awesome - USD, GBP, CAD, AUD and EUR.

While you can choose any currency (your card issuer will just convert the amount automatically), you should choose the currency of your country where possible, to avoid your bank charging small conversion fees.

If you live outside of the USA, the UK, Canada, Australia or the EU, you should choose USD as your currency as this is the least likely to trigger any small conversion charges. 

Assuming you've rejoined, please send us an email and we'll reset your account so that you can pick up where you left off. :)

If you haven't rejoined yet, send us an email and we'll send you a backdoor link to access Draw Awesome right away (even if it's closed to new students). 

You'll be billed immediately when you join and then the same date each month thereafter. So if you join on January 6th, you'll be billed on February 6th, March 6th and so on. 

No, it's just monthly membership at the moment.

Yes! You can try the first Draw Awesome project in full and completely risk-free. If you don't love it, just ask for a full refund. The only condition is that you need to ask for a refund within 30 days of joining up and not have started any projects other than the first one. 

If you can't sign in, it's down to one of three issues:

1. You don't have a Draw Awesome account

2. You are entering the wrong email and/or password

3. The web browser you are using has a setting that is interfering with the Draw Awesome website

Step 1: Are you sure you have a Draw Awesome account? A lot of people can mixed up between Draw Awesome and ArtKula (our free community website). Draw Awesome is a paid-for course so if you're sure you have a paid account at Draw Awesome more to Step 2...

Step 2: Try resetting your password here: 

https://www.drawawesome.com/password/new

Make sure you enter the email address you use for your Draw Awesome account. If the reset email doesn't turn up, check your spam folder. If it's not in there, the issue is with your email address. Please contact us with your full name and any email addresses your account could be under so we can do some digging.

Step 3: If you DO receive the reset email and resetting your password doesn't help (or you keep having to reset your password), the problem will be with your browser. Try using a different browser on the device you're having an issue with (i.e. use Firefox or Safari if you're currently using Chrome, or vice versa).

Nine times out of ten, you'll be able to sign in okay using another browser.

If none of the above work for you, please contact us here. 

If you know your existing password and simply want to update it, here's what to do:

1. Sign into your Draw Awesome account.

2. Go to the Settings page (by clicking or tapping on your avatar).

3. Update your password and/or email address on that page.

If you've forgotten your password, you can set up a new one on this page:

https://www.drawawesome.com/password/new

The first project will unlock itself when you watch and complete the two introduction videos (Welcome to Draw Awesome and How To Set Up Your Workspace). 

Beneath each video on Draw Awesome is a "Mark As Complete" button. This will automatically "complete" when you reach the end of a video. Or you could cheat and click or tap it any time. But don't do that. ;) 

Please see this guide for getting and using the free app for ArtKula (where we host the private Draw Awesome community).

Please see this guide: https://www.drawawesome.com/how-to-download-projects

When you have issues playing videos on the web, is almost always down to one of tow things:

1) Temporary Internet peed problems, which causes videos to stop and start (buffer).

2) Something on your web browser that interferes with the video player.

1) I'm having issues with videos stopping and starting (buffering):

It's an Internet speed issue. Speed issues can happen at any place between your location in the world and where our videos are hosted. So even if videos on the likes of YouTube play okay, it doesn't rule out Internet speed issues.

If you don't have speed issues at other sites like YouTube, any buffering on Draw Awesome videos will resolve itself and usually quite quickly.

If it doesn't resolve after 24 hours, please contact me here and we can run through more detailed checks.

2) I'm having other issues with the videos, like getting them to play at all or no sound:

This is almost certainly down to a setting on your browser (Chrome, Safari, Firefox, Edge etc,) interfering with the video player.

Even if video played fine yesterday and not today, it's still likely to be a browser issue because they're always updating themselves in the background, and those updates can stop other stuff from working.

The fastest way to resolve this is to use another brower. So if you normally use Safari, for example, try Chrome or Firefox. 

All the main browsers are free and very easy to install. Here's a handy webpage that with download links for all the major browsers:

https://www.whatismybrowser.com/guides/how-to-try-a-different-web-browser

Not at the moment, unfortunately. But I will be adding these over time.

Sorry, not at the moment.