Adobe Illustrator Essentials Course Review

Some thoughts on my recent completion of an Adobe Illustrator course.

Hi everyone,

In my quest to further develop the branding and packaging of Ritual, I recently embarked on a journey into the world of Adobe Illustrator. My first steps were guided by a number of casual YouTube videos that helped me solve some of the initial problems I faced and filled some gaps in my understanding. However, as my interest grew, I found myself craving a more comprehensive understanding. This interest led me to the Adobe Illustrator Essentials Course on Udemy, taught by Adobe Certified Expert Daniel Walter Scott. This review covers my experience and thoughts about the course.

Adobe Illustrator CC - Essentials Training Course

A significant factor of the course that appealed to me is its structure and organization. Spanning approximately 9.5 hours, the course is efficiently organized into 13 well-defined sections. The content starts with a succinct overview of the software, delving progressively into crucial tools such as the shape tool, pen tool, curvature, pencil tools, and typography. After covering the basics, it ventures into the intricacies of coloring, swatches, gradients, and effects. The course ends with an exploration of features like the Adobe Capture app and the latest updates to the tool since the course was originally released in 2019.

Daniel Walter Scott’s philosophy, as mentioned in the first lesson - “Design is 80% about the designer and 20% the tools we use”, is clearly reflected in the course's design. The course is systematically arranged to build foundational knowledge and skills before introducing the more complicated and flashy features of Illustrator. The smooth continuity between lessons ensured that there were no knowledge gaps and each lesson served as a stepping stone for the subsequent ones.

Assessing the depth of the course content might be tricky for a novice Illustrator user like myself. Nonetheless, the course covered just about every topic I hoped to learn, and more. Now, having completed the course, I feel so much more confident about my grasp over the basics and feel equipped to produce a broad range of designs.

The lessons are also meticulously detailed, generally starting with the function of a tool or feature, followed by practical examples. Daniel's casual yet professional teaching style is engaging and provides clarity without being overwhelming. The inclusion of assignments, dotted throughout the course, provided a great opportunity to apply each skill as it was covered. The optional course forum allows you to share your creations with peers, a feature I didn’t utilize, but found interesting to see the different creative directions taken by other learners.

To sum it up, my experience with the Adobe Illustrator Essentials Course was fantastic. It is not only comprehensive but also an enjoyable learning journey. For a modest price of $15, the course provides phenomenal value. If you are considering dipping your toes into Adobe Illustrator, I cannot recommend this course enough. My gratitude to Dan for creating such a resourceful course.

Illustrator being the visual platform that it is, I’ve posted some of my course assignments above for your viewing.

As always, thank you for reading and have a wonderful day.