A good while ago I purchased a copy of Sketchbook Pro 6. At the time I thought having a digital art app would get me back into art, without the intimidating element of trying to relearn my old mediums. It was a sound idea at the time. What I hadn't factored in was that I would have a whole new application to learn, trying to paint on a tablet, having never done this before. Effectively I had shied away from being intimidated from something I once knew how to do in favour of being intimidated by something I had no idea to use. Genius. Sigh.
The app and tablet sat unused for years until today. I had made sure both were setup previously, but now was the time to use them. As I was back doing art on an almost regular basis I thought adding in digital art would give me a handy alternative to messy medium. Especially on those days when I wasn't feeling very well (this week), and I just wanted a simple way to sit in bed and be creative. Being the over-planned I am I bought a course on Udemy to teach me how to use the app. Long story short, I quickly decided that this wasn't going to work. I asked for a refund and went to YouTube instead. Between the two I got the gist of how it worked and I made a start.
My intention was to create a digital painting using as many handy techniques as I could work out to give me a feel for how it worked. I utilised layers, copy and paste, multiple drawing tools, the smudging tool (love this one), and I ended up with something I was really pleased with. So much so I started another painting as soon as I finished the first one. Honestly I had no idea what I was going to draw. The horse head just came itself. Quite ironic considering I had decided horses were one once favoured drawing subject I would not be returning to. I found myself loving the paint and smudge tools used together. It reminded me of how oil paint works. This is really good as I have been avoiding starting my oil painting course (I think I mentioned that), and have watched a few of the videos without doing any of the painting. The horse painting really made me happy and I couldn't help but wonder how good it would have been had I been able to do it in oil on a large canvas. This may be just the push I need to get me to start that course. We'll see....
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