Admin Post: Community Check-In for November

[goss]

Wow, I can't believe it's the last day of the month already! We'd love to have you check in and chat with us. How have things been with you?

Did you take part in any fandom activities in November, or have you been working on any personal art projects? Are you currently trying to meet a deadline? Feel free to share upcoming challenges that have got you excited, any frustrations you've been experiencing, possible goals for the next month, and so on.

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Also, just a reminder that the Prompt Generator challenge is still on (even though it seems like everyone - myself included - needed this entire month as a break) and is supposed to end tomorrow. What do you guys think, should we extend the challenge? Or perhaps instead focus on organising the group art project for December? Let us know your thoughts in the comments. :)

Comments

[syntheid]

As far as tablet size goes, think about whether you tend to say, fill up large sheets of paper with one picture or draw small things. If the latter, a small one is going to be more comfortable. Technically we should all try to draw from the shoulder versus the wrist, but regardless of how much I try to force it, I draw small, so I found a large tablet unwieldy. Larger tablets will kinda force shoulder drawing, though, so typically professionals go as large as possible.

Wacom used to be kind of the only brand worth buying but that’s not true anymore. They do have some perks like a chargeless pen and some of their non-screen tablets have touch pads or extra buttons and come bundled with software, but if you’re on a budget, there’s plenty of alternative brands and even decent free programs.

(Sources are me going through an embarrassing amount of devices and programs over the years, so if you want more detail let me know, but I’m not sure exactly what to rec without your personal requirements, ahah.)

[dhampyresa]

Thank you for the advice!

What's a good beginner art program? I've never done any all-digital art before.

[syntheid]

Somewhat depends on your goals?

Like if you want to produce digital art that still looks like traditional art, you'll probably want to just jump into a program that can do that (like ArtRage or Painter or Clip Studio Paint, which have brush engines that are excellent at mimicking traditional media), but the learning curve can be steeper. Some programs might not be able to handle really large file sizes, so if you want to draw and print out large files you'll have to make sure it handles up to the sizes you need (if you don't care about printing this doesn't matter as much).

But if you're just looking for something that's a relatively low bar to get into and just do something... If you're on Windows and don't mind paying a bit (does have a free trial, though), I think Paint Tool SAI might be the easiest to just use with a decent feature set and brush engine. It's not available for Mac though. Also Windows-only is Microsoft's Fresh Paint, which is interesting for a purely painting/drawing focus. Pretty limited, but might be good as a learning playground if you don't need a lot of image editing or layers.

I've also heard good things about FireAlpaca and Krita but also have heard mixed opinions on whether they're easy to use depending on who I talked to. Since they're free, though, it wouldn't hurt to try them out and see what you think. They're also available on all platforms.

There's also stuff like Tegaki (http://te2.tewi.us/) and Oekaki boards (or MS Paint for that matter, but the former two have social aspects) if you just want something real basic as you're learning to control the tablet with the hand/eye disconnect.