Making Art Happily
So I've been doing daily art challenges since before the first of the year. It's great! I know that making it to 365 pieces of art is unlikely over the course of the year, but... well, it's fun. And why not?
One of the challenges I've been working on is learning how best to use Procreate, the art app I have on my iPad which I can use to create in with my Apple Pencil. That's an expensive little setup, but it's worth it. It's so amazing what you can do in this app with the pencil. I've been blown away by the possibilities, and I'm barely tapping into the surface of what the app will offer a real, skilled artist.
So these little illustrations each take from 5-10 minutes to make (well, ok, that's the challenge, some of mine were longer because I lost track of time) and the point is to learn a little more about the app, but not to get bogged down. Snappy and sweet. The daily challenges are by Lisa Bardot, and can be found at her website along with a ton of tutorials.
One of the things I'm really loving about this digital challenge work is that it gives me permission to really just work fast, not fuss, just keep it minimal. Since that's how I usually prefer to work with traditional media, it's happy for me. And with the things you can do in digital you can't in traditional media - blur, snap-to-lines (or circles), cut and paste, blending layers or deleting layers, not to mention undo...
Over the years I've tried stylus after stylus, only to be frustrated with them. They were big, clunky, and frankly even less intuitive than finger painting. So most of the art I've done on tablets (or my phone) has been basically finger painting. The Apple Pencil has changed all of that. Look, I'm not a Mac girl any more, although for years I was. Right up until about 2012, when I realized I couldn't afford to be any longer. Not only was the hardware ridiculous, the software was two or three times the cost for the same programs. I ditched apple and went with Windows and Android. The Apple Pencil on the other hand feels like, well, a pencil. Or a paintbrush. Or... the brushstrokes, lineweight, pressure sensitivity, and ability to us it just like I do traditional media make it fantastic for an artist on the move.
