I am sure very few of us actually understand what the art of digital painting really is. Well, I'm here to simplify that for you. Digital painting is an art form in which traditional painting methods like painting with oils, pastels, watercolors, crayons, etc are applied to a canvas on your computer using digital tools with the help of a graphics tablet and a stylus or pen. There is also software involved to help in the selection of brushes, a particular shade of color, effects, etc.

Its really easy to confuse this form of art as being just a picture on the screen however it takes hours of work, maybe days and a similar kind of attention to detail that is needed while painting on a real canvas. All of my work published under “Portfolio” has taken me hours to first sketch and then fill in the colors. I love the fact that you do not have to have a whole bunch of paints lying around, brushes thrown here and there and the constant smell of varnish floating through your studio when you get accustomed to Digital Painting.

I have been a traditional artist all my life. I only painted for fun, however, I always would be caught in a fix when I did not have the right shade of color or ran out of paints. Oil paints can be very expensive. Well with digital painting, I never run out of paints, I don't have to clean up my messy brushes and I have the whole spectrum of colors to choose from! Digital painting relies on the RGB (Red Green Blue) Color space or Color system. The red, green and blue use 8 bits each, which have integer values from 0 to 255. This makes 256x256x256 = 16,777,216 possible colors to choose from!! Imagine if I had to keep buying all those paints, I’d definitely be broke by now!

Digital painting is mostly used in production art, conceptual design for film, television and video games. Digital painting software such as Corel Painter, Adobe Photoshop, ArtRage, GIMP, Krita, and openCanvas give us artists the same feeling like painting with a physical medium on canvas. They also give us several options like using special effect brushes, a mixing palette, palette knives, charcoal painting, blenders, sponges, the list goes on. There are pros and cons of digital painting though. Many artists believe that they do experience more control over their brush than holding a stylus. They also believe you cannot add your own essence to a painting done online versus one done on canvas.

I have seen the best of both worlds and I personally prefer digital painting, since I really believe it gives you the freedom to push yourself beyond being limited to space, materials, and odour. Let me know what you think about it, and for now, enjoy my latest artwork here.

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