Recently, I've been viewing a lot of digital art on social media. It's incredibly different from traditional art, particularly in the area of colouring. You have the ability to make the colours on your drawing completely even and kept within the lines, using the tools of whatever software you're using. A few years ago I got alcohol markers to achieve more even and precise colouring in my drawings, similar to the digital work I've seen, but a year later I finally asked for a drawing tablet for my birthday so that I could do digital art.
I began by drawing in the software very similarly to how I draw traditionally: sketch, line, then colour by working lightest to darkest. However, I ended up letting my drawing tablet collect dust for a while, as I wasn't very satisfied with the work I was producing. In January, however, I plugged my tablet back into my laptop and decided to try drawing with Photoshop—a software I had put on my laptop a while ago, but had only used for drawing once. I abandoned digital art after having difficulty, even in the best drawing software, making smooth lineart. I felt discouraged and figured that maybe digital art just wasn’t for me. But when I tried again, I decided right off the bat that I was going to commit to making something I was proud of. I did my lines over and over until I was happy with them, and consulted a friend for tips about colouring. I used the same techniques that I do traditionally, translated to digital tools. I ended up being really satisfied with the final product and posted the sketch, lineart and finished piece to my social media (first two images below). The response was positive and I did a couple more small pieces in January. My tablet died shortly after, completely failing to connect to my laptop. I had an itch to do digital art again, however, and when I eventually replaced my laptop with an iPad, I downloaded Procreate and waited impatiently for my stylus to arrive in the mail. The day it came I ripped into Procreate and made three rough drawings in the first twenty-four hours that I had it. The last two weeks have been filled with constant drawing, as I have the software and my stylus with me all the time now. It gives me the opportunity to sketch all the time, and to turn the sketches into full drawings easily. I’m learning rapidly and finding the medium to be a really useful tool. With every drawing I’m challenging myself a little more, learning out shadows and lighting in a way that I couldn’t with traditional art. My most recent piece was one of the most challenging pieces of art I’ve ever done (final image below). I pushed myself with everything: perspective, lighting, detail, background and shadows. These are things I near never include in my drawings, but with tools like layers, opacity and duplication, I could test things out easily. I never believed I would or even could be a digital artist, but it’s proven to be an accessible and fun medium. Without it, it might have been a long time before I ever did something with perspective and lighting the way that I did. By no means am I thinking of putting aside traditional art—I still enjoy and am more skilled at painting in particular—but focusing on digital art has proven to reap rewarding results. I want to continue working with procreate and trying new things until I can finally feel confident in saying that I’m more than acquainted with digital art.
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About this blogOn this blog page I'll be posting about my progress in achieving art goals, and how I'm learning new things and improving as an artist. Archives
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AuthorLeah is an eighteen-year-old aspiring Canadian artist who enjoys drawing, painting, and photography. |