Instruction on registering for our community Online Art Courses and instructions on how to purchase an online course and join its associated Group and Forum discussion.

GETTING STARTED

Step 1. Head over to: https://londonacademyofart.com/register/ Please note: the website is different to www.londonfineartstudios.com  purely for technical reasons.

Step 2. Create an account which is very similar to any social media registration. You are required to enter your email address, confirmation of your email address, a password, your first name and last name, and finally a “Nickname” which will be your social media handle. Again similar to Instagram, x, etc (Please note: we have
also enabled “social logins”: Continue with Google / Continue with Apple. etc)

Step 3. Click on the link which will have been sent to your email address upon registering.

Step 4. You will then have your profile activated where you will next need to sign-in. You can do that here: https://londonacademyofart.com/wp-login.php

Step 5. Click on your name on the upper right. Hover over “Profile” and in the fly- out menu to the left click “edit”. Add a profile photo and a cover photo. You can go further and add your own Website, Social Media accounts, a Profile Type, Your Billing Address and Shipping Address. But only if you want to. Please note: for any domain website or URL to work it should include https//: Similar to this: https://www.facebook.com/scottpohlschmidt/ 

Step 6. Head over to our Shop to find the Course that you are interested in. For example: https://londonacademyofart.com/product/foundation-course-ten-sessions/

Step 7. Put it in the basket and pay or pay directly through Pay with Apple Pay, Pay with Google Pay or Pay with Link (Stripe’s payment gateway).

Step 8. The exciting bit begins. After paying you will now be registered to access the content of the Course you just purchased, which is in linear format, ie. You must complete each session to access the next session. 

Your purchase unlocks a group. Groups are shown only to members who have purchased a particular course. Therefore, any images and videos you post are only visible to these members. This applies to the Forum Discussion which is also associated with the particular Course and associated Group.

Please note: You have 120 days to complete your course purchase, after which it will then lock again.

Step 9. You can now also download our App, ARS LONGA App which can be downloaded from the Google Play store for Android Phones/Tablets:

https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.londonacademyofart.arslonga&pcampaignid=web_share 

And here on the Apple App Store for iPhone/iPad: https://apps.apple.com/gb/app/ars-longa/id6479874667

This series of three 10-week courses will guide you through the fundamentals of drawing, oil painting and cast drawing. These are our original online courses and are suitable for every experience level. We will teach you the foundations of representational art, re-instating the importance of tradition within contemporary art education.

These courses guide you step-by-step through drawing and painting from home, focusing on foundational skills in proportion, composition, and value. You’ll start by learning to set up your space, choose materials, and observe objects under different lighting.

Part 1 – Drawing for Beginners: Develop core drawing skills, including gesture, perspective, mass/value, edges, and focal points. Transition from pencil to tone on coloured paper and then to simple colour with crayons or pastels, progressing through structured exercises to finished drawings.

Part 2 – Transitioning to Oil Painting: Build on drawing fundamentals and explore oil painting. Learn to work with one or two colours, create mass and value, focus edges and focal points, and introduce colour harmony in lights and darks. Exercises progress from step-by-step practice to finished paintings.

Part 3 – Advanced Cast Drawing & Painting: For more experienced students, this course emphasizes naturalistic lighting, advanced proportion, shadow edges, mass and value, accents, and transitioning skills into oils. Focus is on refining form, edges, and focal points, culminating in detailed finished works.

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Each week, you will unlock a new batch of video and practice-based sessions that take you step-by-step through the process of drawing and painting. You’ll be putting pencil to paper from day one with no need to read pages of theory in advance.

For each of the three courses, you will have access to the following:

• 10 units, unlocked weekly, guiding you through 1-3 hours of drawing/painting time each week
• 1-3 individual sessions per week, totalling a suggested minimum of 3 hours practice
• Expert guidance and one-to-one support from your class mentor
• Collaborative group chat with your own private class and mentor
• Feedback on your artwork from your class and mentor via a private in-app feed of photo uploads
• An assessment to earn your course Certificate of Completion

The Foundation Course is first of our new generation online art courses. They were created to directly mirror London Fine Art Studios’s  in-person classes and to support students’ in-person learning.

The course is structured: 6 sessions in charcoal followed by 4 sessions in oil paint.

There are also 4 additional preliminary videos that cover materials, easels, cleaning brushes, and ‘toning’ the canvas.

In the course, students learn the key principles of classical drawing and painting – proportion, gesture, values and edges, and colour theory (temperature, hue, and chroma), as well as touching on composition.

For those who do study with us in person in London, the Foundation Course is compulsory for all newcomers, regardless of experience – this demonstrates our commitment to all students learning the same artistic language; and then their unique voice develops over time.

Students will receive clear, step-by-step instruction. Students then can post updates and photographs of their work and will receive individual critique and answers to their questions. This feedback can be provided privately directly from the tutor, or posted on message boards that are open to other students on the course. The latter aims to mimic the in-person atelier experience – where students learn from each others’ work as well as from the tutor, no matter their level.

We strongly recommend studying the Foundation Course either in person, or online, however students are also welcome to dive straight into portrait drawing online with us if they prefer.

This comprehensive online course guides you through a complete, step-by-step process for learning classical portrait drawing — from understanding your materials to creating fully realised charcoal and mixed-media portraits. Designed for beginners and developing artists alike, the course builds skills progressively, helping you master proportion, shape, value, and composition with clarity and confidence.

Across ten structured sessions, you will:

• Get comfortable with essential drawing materials
Learn the qualities of different papers, pencils, charcoal types, and simple tools, and understand how to choose the right materials for your level and goals.

• Build strong foundations in proportion and structure
Start with simple geometric forms, learn to map out accurate facial proportions, and practice adjusting them for different angles, expressions, and models.

• Develop value and shading skills step by step
Work from two-value studies into richer value structures. You’ll learn to identify shadow edges, mass in essential darks, unify tones, lift highlights, and introduce increasingly subtle value shifts to create depth and realism.

• Work from both casts and live models
Apply your foundational skills to live portrait drawing, learning visual measurement, shape editing, charcoal handling, and how to use tools like mirrors to refine accuracy.

• Explore toned paper and expanded materials
Progress to drawing on grey-toned paper, add a second value of dark, and experiment with charcoal varieties, chalks, and sanguine to enrich your value range and artistic expression.

• Expand into larger compositions
Move beyond isolated portrait studies and learn to integrate the head with the neck, shoulders, and body to create balanced, rhythmic, and engaging compositions.

• Create a final, fully developed portrait
Bring all your skills together as you mass in darks, refine large shapes, add highlights and accents, and navigate the balance between suggestion and detail.

• Conclude with a full process review
A final walkthrough consolidates your learning with a clear, layered demonstration of the portrait-drawing workflow, preparing you to apply these methods to future work — including the option to introduce more colour.

We strongly recommend studying the Foundation Course either in person, or online, however students are also welcome to dive straight into portrait drawing online with us if they prefer.

This ten-session course offers a clear, structured introduction to classical portrait painting in oils. Designed for both beginners and developing painters, it leads you step by step through the essential skills of proportion, value, colour, and composition — helping you build a confident, repeatable painting process from start to finish.

Throughout the course, you will:

• Build confidence with professional painting materials
Gain a solid understanding of oil paints, brushes, palettes, palette knives, mediums, turpentine, and canvas options. You’ll learn how a limited palette supports your development, how to choose the right surfaces, and how each material affects your mark-making and results.

• Start every portrait with reliable foundational methods
From the very first session, you’ll establish anchor lines, map proportions, and learn the five essential darks of the face. Using simple shapes — the rectangle, the box, or the egg — you’ll build strong structure before moving into colour or detail.

• Learn to paint in two values before adding complexity
You’ll work extensively with two-value portraits, giving you the chance to master the initial steps of painting: laying in shadow shapes, massing the lights and darks, and building the early plane structure of the face. This simplified approach strengthens accuracy, confidence, and brush fluency.

• Gradually introduce new values and tonal transitions
Once the foundation is set, you’ll mix a controlled palette to add more values, highlights, and dark accents. You’ll explore how to “paint” transitions rather than blend, how to adjust shapes using both positive and negative brushes, and how surface materials influence your layering process.

• Create portraits using a limited colour palette
After mastering value, you’ll begin to work with colour. You’ll build a limited-palette portrait from the ground up, learning how to handle relative value, brush direction, background integration, and the effective use of linseed oil.

• Strengthen your eye with colour note studies
By painting a portrait using a single chosen colour, you’ll train your eye to see shape and value without relying on naturalistic colour, reinforcing the core principles of portrait structure.

• Develop a full compositional portrait
In the final sessions, you’ll expand your skills beyond the head and into larger, expressive compositions. Starting with a compositional study, you’ll explore big geometric shapes, shadow patterns, colour choices, and palette organization. You’ll then build your final piece step by step — from value block-in to full colour and detail — learning how to balance creativity with accuracy.

• Conclude with a process-focused review
The final video recaps the complete portrait-painting workflow and encourages continued practice from life, focusing on the importance of process over product as you develop your personal painting journey.

This ten-session course offers a complete introduction to classical portrait drawing in pastel, guiding you from essential materials through to a fully realised, large-scale pastel portrait. Designed for beginners and developing artists, the course builds strong foundational skills in proportion, value, colour, and composition while teaching you how to use pastel’s unique properties with confidence and control.

You’ll begin by learning how to choose your materials — from paper textures and tones to pastel types — and how paper and pigment interact to create depth, softness, and colour harmony. The introductory sessions focus on establishing accurate proportions using simple shapes, working first in charcoal before transitioning into pastel.

As the course progresses, you’ll learn to:

• Create strong foundations using proportion, gesture, and essential shapes
Work from simple geometric forms (the box and the egg) to accurately divide the face, map features, and understand how to adjust for tilt and profile.

• Move from line into mass
Shift from charcoal into pastel as you learn to “mass in” your portrait, focusing on shadow shapes, large value patterns, and the planes of the face.

• Work from light direction and value relationships
Study how light falls across the head, create clear shadow shapes, introduce highlights with chalk, and use the tone of your paper as an essential midtone.

• Transition into working from a live model
Apply your foundational skills to a real model, learning pose setup, lighting considerations, simplification through squinting or mirror use, and how to edit your shapes for accuracy.

• Introduce new values and build tonal complexity
Slowly add mid, light, and dark values to create form, always refining shapes and strengthening value relationships — the key to convincing realism.

• Move from tonal work into colour
Learn to handle the unique properties of coloured pastels, creating layered transitions and geometric structures without relying on naturalistic colour. Value relationships remain the guiding principle.

• Create a full pastel portrait from start to finish
Using a limited but naturalistic palette, you’ll build a portrait through accurate shapes, big masses, expanded value range, and selective detail. You’ll learn how colour choice, pastel types, and value contrast create focus and expression.

• Design and paint a larger composition
In the final three sessions, you’ll move into compositional design. You’ll create a colour note study, plan scale and placement, explore atmospheric colour choices, and design backgrounds with harmony and intention.

• Complete a polished, fully realised pastel portrait
Using your study as a guide, you’ll scale up into your final composition, block in major shapes, develop soft and hard edges, refine value and colour relationships, and make creative decisions about detail, simplification, and emphasis.

By the end of the course, you’ll have a complete pastel portrait, a deep understanding of value and colour, and a repeatable process you can use for future work in pastel or any drawing medium.

Average drawing/painting time: 3 hours per week

1. At the start of each week, you will be prompted to schedule 1 guided video-based session plus 1-2 unguided practice sessions, and to gather all the art materials you’ll need to start drawing.
2. In every guided session, you will follow a LFAS mentor through a series of step-by-step videos in your own studio space, learning directly through your experience. Practice sessions will then prompt you to hone your skills through focused exercises based on what you’ve learnt so far.
3. After each session, you will be asked to upload photos of your artwork for discussion and feedback from your classmates and mentor.

Certification

You will receive a Certificate of Completion for each part of this series of courses once you have completed all units and your tutor has critiqued and approved your artwork.

Both paths teach the same essential principles; the new courses offer expanded content, flexible pacing, and more detailed instruction, while Parts 1–3 offer cohort-based structure and foundational guidance.

Parts 1–3 Online

• Covers the core principles of drawing and painting: proportion, shape, value, massing, and building a portrait step by step.

• Structured, clear lessons using the same fundamental methods as our in-studio courses.

• Runs in scheduled cohorts with limited spaces and start dates throughout the year.

• Great for beginners or anyone building strong foundational skills.

New Online Courses (Foundation, Portrait Drawing, Portrait Painting, Portrait Pastel)

• Builds on the same core principles, with more in-depth demonstrations, updated examples, and higher production quality.

• Carefully staged lessons for a deeper learning experience.

• Flexible start anytime, with 120 days access to content.

• Ideal for students with some experience, those studying in person, or anyone wanting to refine their skills.

• Cohorts may be introduced in the future, but for now you can work at your own pace.

Both paths teach the same principles — the new courses simply give you more of them.