forum Hey so I have a tablet coming in...
Started by @Mystic ac_unit
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@Mystic ac_unit

Up until this point, all art I've done has been "traditional", using paper and art utensils. I'm very aware that digital art is a super different style and I want to prepare myself for transitioning from one art style to another.

So…

Any tips to a beginner on digital art?
Things I should try? Things I shouldn't try?
Videos I should watch?
Personal reccomendations?

Deleted user

Oooh! Always do your base in a different color.
Layers!
Don't line with black, use more along the lines of a dark brown
LAYERS

Deleted user

Mhm, I do a bit of digital art though I mostly stick to traditional.

@Norepinephrinxx

I do indeed do digital art, I use the program krita it's free and it's pretty good in my opinion, I would reccomend learning about groups and clipping masks in whatever program you decide to use it can he very helpful for organizing and just generally makes life easier, make sure you label your layers it's just a good habit to do XD Just layers in general are very important they make life so much easier

@Mystic ac_unit

Got it. Use all of the layers. Experiment with the programs I have.

Any tips for avoiding common mistakes a beginnner may make when doing digital art?

Deleted user

Just… Check all the layers and make sure you aren't doing the sketching and the line work on the same layer.

@Fraust

I use Medibang Paint Pro, which is free and pretty cool. Layers yes, black lines maybe depending on what kind of style, that kind of stuff. It requires some practice, but I picked it up pretty quick

@The-N-U-T-Cracker

FINALLY A USE FOR MY USELESS KNOWLEDGE :D

So, before I get started throwing a bunch of nonsensical information at your face, what tablet are you getting? What kind of art style do you have/want (realistic, cartoony, anime, lineless, semi-realistic, etc)? And what kind of traditional mediums do you normally use?

@Mystic ac_unit

I use Medibang Paint Pro, which is free and pretty cool. Layers yes, black lines maybe depending on what kind of style, that kind of stuff. It requires some practice, but I picked it up pretty quick

Hmm… I'll check when it gets here but I think it might also come pre-programed with something like that (Medibang Paint Pro). Thank you!

@Mystic ac_unit

FINALLY A USE FOR MY USELESS KNOWLEDGE :D

So, before I get started throwing a bunch of nonsensical information at your face, what tablet are you getting? What kind of art style do you have/want (realistic, cartoony, anime, lineless, semi-realistic, etc)? And what kind of traditional mediums do you normally use?

It's not useless now that it's helping someone out!

I'm not sure exactly what type of tablet but I can check once I get home in a few hours. I have a pretty anime/comic style (with very messy sketches), and I've tried those other styles but I can never seem to do them right.

I've used pencil and paper, pen, acrylic paint, watercolors, and pastel oils.

@ninja_violinist

I'm a beginnerish digital artist as well, so here are some tips I would have appreciated when I first started out:

  • It's okay to paint/draw over traditional sketches! Transitioning to digital art can be a struggle so it's fine (and fun) to start out on paper and do what you can digitally!
  • Find an artist whose style kind of matches your own and then watch their speedpaints - as you're watching, look out especially for their workflow and how they go about an illustration. Then try out the workflow for yourself. If something bugs you about it or feels unnatural, then change that bit. It's a lot easier than trying to build your own workflow from scratch.
  • like people have said, l a y e r s
    Generally I recommend at least one sketch layer, one refined sketch, one lineart (or a few if you're feeling insecure, but in one group), and then various colour ones underneath the lineart (if you're using lineart, that is. Painting or lineless stuff can be a bit different.)
  • If you look up tutorials, it's super helpful to find teachers who use the same art programme as you. This can limit your scope quite a bit, but I really do recommend it! It can get super frustrating if you're being taught to use an interface that you don't have access to, if that makes sense
  • Shortcuts are your best friend!! They depend on your programme, but they're very easy to look up online and they make life 100% easier. Things you'll probably find yourself needing shortcuts for:
    -> zooming in and out
    -> new layer
    -> merge layers
    -> UNDO (!!!)
    -> REDO (!!!)
    -> colour pick (usually ctrl and hover over the colour you want)
    -> switching to the brush tool (b) and eraser tool (e)
    -> grouping!! groups are your best friends especially if you're using krita (the programme I use)
    -> depending on your tablet, you might also have express keys which you can set up to do these things for you. Very helpful, but not strictly necessary
  • The fill bucket tool is not as cool as it seems.
  • Neither is the blending tool or the airbrush.
  • Colours and shading are a struggle and I'm still not sure how they work exactly, but one quick tip is not to shade with black, and to try to change the hue along with the value (so, shading red with a slightly darker, more purple colour, or shading yellow with a slightly darker, more orange colour).
  • Trying to draw long lines slowly will look shaky. Short lines and wrist flicks are your friend. (and undo!!)
  • I've shared tutorials that I found helpful in the past in this thread but honestly @NutEllaDraws-Is-A-Big-Ball-Of-Happy is the undisputed queen of knowing helpful tutorials and where to look for them. Her tips are probably going to end up being the most helpful, if we're honest
  • Have fun with it!!! This sounds cheesy but it's important. I got my first cheap, crappy tablet in 2015, but I couldn't figure out how to use it and really frustrated me so I didn't really get into digital art until 2017. The main reason I hated it so much was that I felt my digital art looked a lot worse than my traditional stuff, so I was embarrassed and gave up. Looking back, I wish that I'd put aside the need for it to look immediately fabulous and just have fun trying out this new medium. It's ok if it doesn't immediately match up to your traditional stuff. It's just part of changing mediums, and it's totally fine

ooof, sorry about the long essay. hope this is somewhat helpful at least lol

@Norepinephrinxx

Yeah ive never found the fill bucket works for me, I see a lot where it will leave like a white line around the edge of the colouring and I generally have never found the fill bucket to work for me
Also! Have fun experimenting with different brushes in the program you use, manual blending looks a lot more natural or paint depending on what kind of style you go for in colouring and finding a brush that you find comfortable for colouring, lineart, sketching and blending will make everything a lot nicer to try and work with
Also it's very easy to get overwhelmed with colour choice since there us a whole colourwheel to play with but I recommend limiting your colour pallet and try not to use all super saturated bright colours (unless that's what you want to go for in your art style you can go ahead!) I would recommend looking up colour pallets online and looking up some tutorials on colour theory

I say this because when I first started digital art my colour choices were awful in my opinion haha
Also don't get too discouraged by lineart and the weird feeling of trying to get used to drawing on a tablet, if you don't have like a screen tablet it's pretty hard to start off and have to draw with one surface but look somewhere else completely. It feels really unnatural at first but over time it becomes pretty comfortable! Have fun with it! It wont look perfect right off the bat but it doesn't have to! Dont worry too much if it doesn't look good I know my first digital art pieces looked sooo bad but I love them anyway because I had fun making them!

@The-N-U-T-Cracker

Alright, most of the stuff I was going to say has already been said, make use of layers, learn about things such as clipping and smoothing, watch tutorials, don't abuse the airbrush, shade properly, etc, etc, so I'll try not to repeat stuff too much.

With art software, I'd recommend starting with something free.

Medibang/Firealpaca is a great program to start with but can be quite limiting. I personally dislike it but my overly talented friend swears by it so I guess that's just a preference thing

Autodesk Sketchbook is another great one for beginners, it's very well-featured, easy to figure out, the brush customization is fabulous, it has some more traditional-style brushes/features which makes transitioning from traditional to digital art much easier, and the only thing it really limits is the number of times you can undo. (it also doesn't have clipping yet, unfortunately…)

Krita is absolutely incredible, the closest thing you'll find to free Photoshop. It's by far my favorite out of all of them, however, it can be quite difficult to start with because there's just so many features that you can easily get lost in it all. Still a 10/10 program tho

(There are a ton of other great ones out there that I didn't list, so if you have questions about any software just let me know.)

For tutorials, I always recommend the same exact stuff but that's because it's really great advice

-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=02xAH3HlcEM&list=PLLmXZMqb_9sbNLM83NrM005vRQHw1yTKn
^The 10 minutes to better painting series, which, despite the title, applies to so much more than just painting
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPz8Xyt3z-w
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FPz8Xyt3z-w
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fLV5ezO64w
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gwLQ0cDb4cE
^More stuff that might help you or might not, it's just good stuff to know
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OEv6MdbjwZw&list=PLhG73R7q9Bl8D3Pa4Z6qcajA3zIilbo1V
^A bunch of anime tutorials, I've only watched like three but they're good
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQIxdrNrG30
^Common digital art mistakes
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yP0KG3-nIzk
^Digital art hacks
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mIZwUsAnRtg
^Weird stuff that makes your art look more professional
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IVbqoy_JEV0&list=PLflflDShjUKH4EfZyf0vuKEuqeqvlV0Qd
^The anatomy quick tips playlist, which I realize isn't what you came here for tutorial-wise but I recommend it to everyone anyway because it's the greatest thing ever
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6tmUJAv_k8&list=PL3BE843C2DE5DC6AC
^A bunch of random things, some more useful than others
-https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k0ufz75UvHs
^Once again, not exactly what you may have come here for, but here's a nice tutorial that helps with general art improvement

Really any tutorials by Sinix Design, Marco Bucci, Sycra, Pluvias, Ross Draws, Sara Tepes, or WLOP are guaranteed to be good.

…I can't think of what else to say at the moment but yeah, there's some stuff
hope it helps

@Mystic ac_unit

oh my goodness…

I love it all! Thank you so so so much!! I really can't thank you guys enough for helping me out and steering me in the right direction.

@StarkSpangledMayflower_Mad_Elder

Hey @NutEllaDraws-Is-A-Big-Ball-Of-Happy and @Norepinephrinxx, I use Autodesk because it was free but I haven't really been able to…get a hang of it. I dint understand how to layer and that's really stressful because I normally have ti erase crap to redraw and then erase the sketch.

Is there any other free drawing things? I have a 360 flip touchscreen laptop that I draw on with an Adonit pen if that helps