How To Combine Traditional And Digital Techniques In Photoshop For Unique Art – When I started drawing daily, I only did traditional drawings with colored pencils and sometimes watercolors, but now, after a few months, I draw almost exclusively digitally with Photoshop. So I wanted to share my thoughts on why I went digital and why I think both traditional and digital are amazing work!
In May 2020, I started drawing every day to improve my drawing skills and find time to be creative, and although I wanted to learn digital illustration for a while, it wasn’t on my radar at the time. I already had pencils and a sketchbook, so I drew.
How To Combine Traditional And Digital Techniques In Photoshop For Unique Art
I’ve always loved the natural feel of pencil on paper and the flow of watercolor, but I found myself wanting more control over my art and the level of contrast I strive to achieve with art materials. was
Pencils And Pixels; The Art Of Tradigital Mixed Media
So, before posting on Instagram, I started painting my drawings in Photoshop and using digital brushes to add details or enhance parts of the images. I used this mix of traditional and digital for a while before I started going straight to Photoshop and doing all the illustrations there. I already had some digital painting skills, but it took me a while to get my workflow right, so I didn’t care if I messed up the layers or made mistakes every day doing little drawings, I could just do it. even better the next day!
Now that I draw from scratch in Photoshop, I can let my ideas develop as I draw because it’s so easy to change things. If I think the colors don’t go together – no problem! If you need more contrast – simple!
I’m glad I switched to digital art to do this now, but I still love traditional art and it might be time to ditch the computer and pick up pen on paper again. The great thing is that artists don’t have to be just one or the other, and our current preferences don’t have to last forever!
There’s something satisfying about putting real pencil to real paper that I don’t really get in digital art. It’s also nice to have my drawings in a sketchbook that I can take and refer to when I’m on my creative journey for inspiration and confidence.
Digital Painting Basics
Traditional art is also unique in that it can be unpredictable and hard to control the outcome, so it forces you to adapt and go with the flow, which I think is a really rewarding creative exercise. It’s always fun to get rid of the watercolor and see what happens!
I’m an indecisive person, so what I like most about digital art is how easy it is to change the details of my illustrations. Since I often paint things for the first time without doing any color testing beforehand, I find it very helpful to adjust colors and move elements that are out of balance.
It’s also convenient that I can easily use my artwork for other purposes, such as selling it on Redbubble or printing it in different colors.
There really isn’t a right or wrong medium when it comes to creating art, and you definitely don’t have to stick exclusively to traditional or digital art. The basic skills you use in traditional art also apply to digital art (and vice versa), it’s just the tools you actually use. Use what works for you throughout the day!
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Hi, I’m Mimi and I’m a digital illustrator helping other creative people realize their dreams of becoming artists.
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Each tool has a learning curve and I tried to learn them all at once. This made the prospect of starting a piece a daunting task. I painstakingly placed my designs on the art board and after a few wrong acrylic washes I lost them halfway through. I had to finish with colored pencil to avoid coloring the pieces.
Fortunately, it’s virtually impossible to screw up when working digitally. With an unlimited selection of brushes, layers, and a ctrl-Z safety net, trial or error is virtually unaffected. That should make for more convincing finished pieces, right?
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Wrong. I repeated each sign dozens of times to get it right. I would finish the transition and leave
” and repeat this three more times. I felt overwhelmed by the endless possibilities. My pieces gradually got better, but I didn’t like looking at a screen for thirty hours, turning layers on and off.
I needed a process that would give me the freedom to visually experiment in a non-destructive environment to further develop my structural and illustrative voice and artistry to tackle pieces with confidence.
This can be anything from a full render to a simple line, depending on the finish style you choose. I tend to move around the figure without structure, starting with the eye. This allows me to get to an interesting result faster than redrawing and helps keep the drawing loose. At this stage, I often render lightly, smearing the drawing and erasing highlights. I used the excellent Muddy Waters photo as a reference for this piece.
Digital Painting Techniques
This action allows you to save and possibly edit the image. For this work, I scanned my drawing to begin working digitally. You can also traditionally scan, print, glue and paste the drawing (with matte material) to the board to take it to the next step. Sometimes I’ll bring the drawing into Photoshop and crop it, or use Warp/Liquify to move the motion line or likeness a bit. This allows me to “roll back” my looser design, which relieves pressure by making the design fit perfectly in the front.
The next stage involves the application of shadow, texture and midtones in the form of “washes”. It can be both traditional acrylic sheet and digital painting. The idea is to match the color and value range of the piece so that you can turn off light and dark later. Painting with digital tools allows me to find the dominant color temperature of the fabric early on, create a light and dark tone with a complementary tone, and make adjustments at the end if necessary. Photoshop offers amazing black and white image toning options. I usually switch between color balance, photo filters, tone gradient maps and layer style blending sliders.
Some digital toning tools in Photoshop. I also recommend playing around with the levels to make sure your values are working correctly.
The purpose of this step is to create unexpected marks and fragments to resolve when I recreate the light and dark. We can turn the negative area of a colored drawing into a midtone activated with textures and markings. This can be achieved traditionally by combining dry and wet materials, or digitally using texture brushes (I recommend Greg Rutkowski) and clone stamping. Sometimes I cover too much of this stage, but adding elements of abstraction and experimentation to the process helps keep the excitement close to the finish line.
Speed Painting A Old House In Adobe Photoshop
Working from chaos to order can help keep your creativity flowing after you’ve already spent hours on a piece.
It’s time to restore order. Here I use my color and value studies and create lights and darks accordingly. This stage includes naturalistic rendering, digital painting, “ink” line or simply retouching the negative space, flattening to reveal more nuanced areas of texture. If you’re currently working digitally, you can sometimes literally create a painting by blending the lines to the desired transparency. Part of the game is deciding which areas need the most improvement and which areas will show the rhythm of the previous step.
We finish now. This step can take anywhere from 8 minutes to 8 hours, depending on your deadline and level of neuroticism. It can be a good time to look for places to add articles and make sure your contact points are working as planned. At this stage, you should spend a lot of time looking at your piece from across the room to minimize unnecessary adjustments. (I say this after spending the last two hours
