Trying Digital Art

I received an iPad for my birthday this year. The model I got was this one.(link here) It is by far the best piece of technology I own.

When my parents and I were initially discussing getting an iPad, I was worried that it might not have much use. I didn’t think that an iPad could do anything that a computer can’t.

I was wrong. An iPad can definitely not replace a computer, but it is such a versatile device. I can annotate pdfs directly, which is quite handy since all my schoolwork is online now. But, this post is not about the iPad’s utility.

I’ve been wanting to try digital art for a while now, and the iPad was perfect for it. I didn’t end up getting the Apple Pencil, rather I bought a capacitative stylus off of Amazon. The stylus was significantly cheaper, but it does lack a very important functionality: pressure sensitivity. Other than that, it works very well.

Now, when I say I’m terrible at drawing, I mean it. I, and a friend of mine were once trying to draw a T-rex on a random sheet of paper. On the bottom you can see his attempt, and on the top you can see my attempt. You can also see a lot of empty space where I chose to give up after seeing the monstrosity of the head I drew.

I once had a biology teacher tell me that my diagram of the reproductive system looked like a guy in boxing gloves. She gave me half a mark for that diagram.

There are people who can just think of something and draw it out on a sheet of paper. How?! I envy these people so much. How does their brain work that way? And to get your drawing to look like the real thing? Wow.

Despite being so utterly terrible at drawing, I’ve always been attracted to graphic art. How the colours look, the neat designing- it’s all so wonderful. I decided to at least give it a try.

Autodesk Sketchbook

Procreate dominates the market for digital art softwares for the iPad. But, as a newbie, I started by using Autodesk Sketchbook for drawing. This was the first thing I made. It was for my cousin, and this was before I had learnt anything. What was I even thinking?

I found this great tutorial on YouTube for caricatures (link here) For the first time, I was able to draw a face that didn’t look like a misshapen oval with a bunch of lines on it. Here is some of the stuff I made on autodesk.

It’s a free and great software, but there are hardly any tutorials for it. Finding brush and function equivalents was very hard, so I ended up getting Procreate.

Procreate

Most of the stuff I had made until now was directly based on YouTube tutorials. But, on Procreate I tried making stuff without references or tutorials.

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For some reason I got really into drawing wallpapers. I think that’s because they were relatively easy to make. I’ve changed my iPad’s wallpaper twice this week.

I even made this animation. It is a frame-by-frame animation. It took HOURS to make. And it’s two seconds long. Never happening again. Here is the link if you want to give it a try.

I made this most recently. The details aren’t very well done and it is too busy, but I love the concept of this kind of art. Abstract, colourful and random.

I’ve realised that my drawing skills are subpar BECAUSE I think I’m so bad. I actively avoid drawing. I can’t get better if I don’t practice the skill.

In the future, I hope to be able to make more stuff without references and tutorials. I want to learn the proper proportions for humans. I want to learn how to make animals. Perhaps even start making proper animated stories. I loved the abstract woman I made most recently, and want to get better at that kind of style too.

Also, Ruchi ma’am from grade 8 – my diagram was very well labelled.