Make a habit of including a lot of pictures for any notes for school. Dan Roam’s “The Back of the Napkin”.
The ability to translate ideas into good pictures is commercially valuable.
I don’t see the paint of exploring many different kinds of 2D painting. I would expect that a digital pen beats most other tools. Especially in the future as technology advances.
It might be worth looking into 3D virtual reality painting. It’s a new medium and thus valuable.
I don’t see the paint of exploring many different kinds of 2D painting. I would expect that a digital pen beats most other tools. Especially in the future as technology advances.
There are a lot of people who say that piano is the most versatile instrument, and they’re right about that on a superficial level. You can do polyphonic things with a piano that you can’t do with a clarinet or a trumpet. And like a digital pen, a digital piano can simulate a lot of other instruments, especially if you hook it up to flashy synthesis software that knows all the different articulations for those instruments.
But using a digital piano doesn’t feel very much like using those instruments, and you won’t express the same way you would if you had one.
A calligraphy brush is really fun and you can’t replicate the feeling of using it without the physical tools. Many of them have nice texture and you can feel their shape when you rotate them in your hands—they’re also lightweight, so if you’re not holding one to the page it feels more like a pencil than like a paintbrush.
A lot of my friends do art, and I do art too when they ask me to try it with them. Different art tools feel different, and for some people, some tools are more fun than others. I think it’s really important to try these things out before you make a decision about them.
There are a lot of people who say that piano is the most versatile instrument, and they’re right about that on a superficial level.
Actually the piano is one the least versatile instruments. You get control of which key you press, a chosen velocity and the sustain pedal. A piano performance can be midi recorded using these three values and reproduced in an extremely high level of detail. If you try to do the same with a truly versatile instrument like for example the violin you will find that it is impossible. Not difficult, impossible.
But using a digital piano doesn’t feel very much like using those instruments, and you won’t express the same way you would if you had one.
Yes, the point isn’t to express yourself the same way.
Different art tools feel different, and for some people, some tools are more fun than others.
I don’t think “what tool feels most fun” should be the guiding principle for a person who wants to build up drawing skills that he can use as a career.
You’re probably right! (At least some of the time.)
In music, I know a lot of people who think about things the same way you do, and they sensibly learn to use versatile tools like FM synthesis because FM synthesis covers a wide range of sounds really broadly. A lot of them even know how to make human voice-like sounds using these tools.
On average if you stick to those tools you’ll do pretty well. They still fall back on using physical instruments for a lot of techniques, because you can do elaborate expressive things with physical instruments a lot more easily than with the machine.
In music, machines have been getting better, but they aren’t perfect yet. A lot of input devices, even well-regarded ones, don’t have the build quality of instruments made for professionals. It’s really hard to simulate the physical feel of an acoustic instrument without actually building an acoustic instrument—don’t ask me why, but I’ve shopped around a lot and I’ve only found a couple input devices that really feel great for me after long-term use.
In art, there are a lot of hardware limitations. It’s hard to make a tablet that looks great and feels great, and talking to an art program means you’re subject to a lot of latency, and—if your tablet doesn’t have a display—you’re going to see your drawing appear on a different plane than you made it on. A lot of digital artists struggle with line quality and width variation because those things can be awkward on tablet input devices—and depending on medium, those are often super fundamental (1) to how you pick out parts and subparts of an image and (2) to how you read its form.
You will notice there are a lot of really good digital painters and a lot of really bad digital line artists. That’s a part of why!
Don’t get me wrong, though. I think your point totally holds for parts of art that can be rehearsed and repeated an indefinite number of times until they look right. I also think that for planning and prototyping, you need to be able to iterate really fast and it needs to be fun, or at least unobstructive. This is another one of those things that’s also true for musicians: the really good musicians spend nine hours a day in the studio and there has to be something about it that motivates them to get up in the morning.
Currently, it’s true that line quality on a device like the Surface isn’t perfect. I personally expect both Microsoft and Apple to solve the issue on their pens in the next five years.
I don’t object to doing planning and prototyping on paper with a pencil. While the 12 year old sits in school it’s likely that taking graphical notes on paper is better appreciated by the teacher than taking those notes with a tablet.
I don’t see the paint of exploring many different kinds of 2D painting.
I would imagine that various constraints imposed by their various disadvantages can take you out of your comfort zone, for example when you use a tool that is unable to create small details, you will give up the small details and instead focus on the overall composition… and learning this may somehow become useful even when you return to using a tool that allows you to do details. Like, using an insanely wide brush could make you reinvent impressionism.
I would expect that a digital pen beats most other tools.
Probably yes, but the non-digital tools might give you an idea about what settings you want to try with the digital ones. For example, do you want the new color to completely overwrite the underlying one, or rather to blend with it. Or maybe—although this is mostly a fake purpose—setting the digital tool to resemble high-status non-digital tools (something that Leonardo da Vinci would use, as opposed to what a teenage manga fan uses) could add a high-status feeling to your pictures.
On the other hand, going digital and becoming familiar with the digital tools has some added value. For example, having a nice picture is cool, but turning it into a WordPress template could be more profitable.
Make a habit of including a lot of pictures for any notes for school. Dan Roam’s “The Back of the Napkin”.
The ability to translate ideas into good pictures is commercially valuable.
I don’t see the paint of exploring many different kinds of 2D painting. I would expect that a digital pen beats most other tools. Especially in the future as technology advances.
It might be worth looking into 3D virtual reality painting. It’s a new medium and thus valuable.
There are a lot of people who say that piano is the most versatile instrument, and they’re right about that on a superficial level. You can do polyphonic things with a piano that you can’t do with a clarinet or a trumpet. And like a digital pen, a digital piano can simulate a lot of other instruments, especially if you hook it up to flashy synthesis software that knows all the different articulations for those instruments.
But using a digital piano doesn’t feel very much like using those instruments, and you won’t express the same way you would if you had one.
A calligraphy brush is really fun and you can’t replicate the feeling of using it without the physical tools. Many of them have nice texture and you can feel their shape when you rotate them in your hands—they’re also lightweight, so if you’re not holding one to the page it feels more like a pencil than like a paintbrush.
A lot of my friends do art, and I do art too when they ask me to try it with them. Different art tools feel different, and for some people, some tools are more fun than others. I think it’s really important to try these things out before you make a decision about them.
Actually the piano is one the least versatile instruments. You get control of which key you press, a chosen velocity and the sustain pedal. A piano performance can be midi recorded using these three values and reproduced in an extremely high level of detail. If you try to do the same with a truly versatile instrument like for example the violin you will find that it is impossible. Not difficult, impossible.
I’m confused. Isn’t it evident from the rest of my comment that I agree with you?
(On an unrelated note: I think my upvote button has vanished. Otherwise I would have clicked it for your post!)
Ah, sorry to confuse you. Yes it is obvious that you agree. I was just expanding on the point :)
(You need 20 karma to be able to upvote)
Thank you for the information! My brain does something weird when I see the word “actually,” so I don’t think I was charitable when I read your post.
No problem :)
Yes, the point isn’t to express yourself the same way.
I don’t think “what tool feels most fun” should be the guiding principle for a person who wants to build up drawing skills that he can use as a career.
You’re probably right! (At least some of the time.)
In music, I know a lot of people who think about things the same way you do, and they sensibly learn to use versatile tools like FM synthesis because FM synthesis covers a wide range of sounds really broadly. A lot of them even know how to make human voice-like sounds using these tools.
On average if you stick to those tools you’ll do pretty well. They still fall back on using physical instruments for a lot of techniques, because you can do elaborate expressive things with physical instruments a lot more easily than with the machine.
In music, machines have been getting better, but they aren’t perfect yet. A lot of input devices, even well-regarded ones, don’t have the build quality of instruments made for professionals. It’s really hard to simulate the physical feel of an acoustic instrument without actually building an acoustic instrument—don’t ask me why, but I’ve shopped around a lot and I’ve only found a couple input devices that really feel great for me after long-term use.
In art, there are a lot of hardware limitations. It’s hard to make a tablet that looks great and feels great, and talking to an art program means you’re subject to a lot of latency, and—if your tablet doesn’t have a display—you’re going to see your drawing appear on a different plane than you made it on. A lot of digital artists struggle with line quality and width variation because those things can be awkward on tablet input devices—and depending on medium, those are often super fundamental (1) to how you pick out parts and subparts of an image and (2) to how you read its form.
You will notice there are a lot of really good digital painters and a lot of really bad digital line artists. That’s a part of why!
Don’t get me wrong, though. I think your point totally holds for parts of art that can be rehearsed and repeated an indefinite number of times until they look right. I also think that for planning and prototyping, you need to be able to iterate really fast and it needs to be fun, or at least unobstructive. This is another one of those things that’s also true for musicians: the really good musicians spend nine hours a day in the studio and there has to be something about it that motivates them to get up in the morning.
Currently, it’s true that line quality on a device like the Surface isn’t perfect. I personally expect both Microsoft and Apple to solve the issue on their pens in the next five years.
I don’t object to doing planning and prototyping on paper with a pencil. While the 12 year old sits in school it’s likely that taking graphical notes on paper is better appreciated by the teacher than taking those notes with a tablet.
I like the creation of idea-related sketches.
I would imagine that various constraints imposed by their various disadvantages can take you out of your comfort zone, for example when you use a tool that is unable to create small details, you will give up the small details and instead focus on the overall composition… and learning this may somehow become useful even when you return to using a tool that allows you to do details. Like, using an insanely wide brush could make you reinvent impressionism.
Probably yes, but the non-digital tools might give you an idea about what settings you want to try with the digital ones. For example, do you want the new color to completely overwrite the underlying one, or rather to blend with it. Or maybe—although this is mostly a fake purpose—setting the digital tool to resemble high-status non-digital tools (something that Leonardo da Vinci would use, as opposed to what a teenage manga fan uses) could add a high-status feeling to your pictures.
On the other hand, going digital and becoming familiar with the digital tools has some added value. For example, having a nice picture is cool, but turning it into a WordPress template could be more profitable.
I would rather try different digital tools than different analog ones. Getting a 3D printer also imposes some constraints.
It has the added benefit that a lot of time sitting in school can be used for that purpose.