Painting without Paints by Alex Hand

Alex Hand

6/1/11

Throughout the ages artists have been using paints to create master pieces. As commercial illustration developed the need to produce artwork at high speeds became a necessity. While a fine artist may take several years to complete one piece, a concept illustrator may only have a day or two to complete a finished piece. The importance of speed in the field of the illustrator is of the utmost importance. If they are not able to produce a suitable piece in a short period then they will not be able to get a commission. Digital technologies are constantly being developed to aid the illustrators in their work and artists are switching to digital mediums. Many illustrators are putting down their brushes and picking up styluses. Some artists even bypass the brush stage and head straight for the stylus and tablet. Is this really wise to abandon the old or is it more important as an illustrator to have a good knowledge of traditional mediums despite the push for digital media? The following essay examines the two fields of traditional artwork and digital work and takes a look at the opinions of a couple illustrators who work digitally.

Traditional mediums are the materials that an artist uses to create an artwork manually and not on a computer. This can include oil paints, acrylic, charcoal, and all the other materials that have been traditionally used to create artwork. Digital Imaging Software is used as the medium in which digital illustrators work. The programs most commonly associated with illustration are Photoshop, Painter, and Illustrator, each has their own strong points and some illustrators use a combination of these programs instead of just one. These programs emulate traditional media while eliminating the mess and space that traditional mediums would require. The tools within the programs are named after the traditional tools used when working in a traditional manner. Although these programs can be considered a medium themselves there are also different mediums or tools that exist within them. For instance Photoshop may be the medium through which you are creating a work but the tool you are primarily using is a paintbrush. It is because the digital programs are so versatile they are more of a workspace than a particular medium. To say that someone created an image using Photoshop would be too vague to actually give a clear understanding of the process involved in creating the image.

One reason many artists prefer to work digitally is the non-existent cleanup and easy storage of file that take up no physical space. This is a huge benefit that allows artists to create vast bodies of work without worrying about finding a place to store them within their studio. This easy archiving has its disadvantages though. As digital programs become more advanced and newer versions are released they sometimes lose compatibility with files from older versions. Similar to the transition from VHS to DVD, illustration programs move to new platforms as well. This is due to a difference in coding and often happens over the span of several versions of a programs development. The Digital Art Conservation project is a collaboration between several art institutions in Europe to help preserve pieces of digital artwork for public viewing. The work that these institutions are faced with can be described as this, “The most used formats are more robust over time. Versions of the same software may not be compatible, and therefore all or part of the code does not work as well as when the work was created. That requires additional time to reprogram or to use a software to emulate.”(Laforet). This means that the work of digital artists is fragile and that it can quickly become outdated. Though they may not be deteriorating physically these pieces are threatened by the rapid development of the programs used to create and display these works. Although this applies primarily to pieces that are meant to be displayed, it does apply to the work of illustrators and their ability to go back and use old pieces as reference.

Another reason many illustrators are working digitally today is their ability to work quickly and easily edit and image. With the emergence of programs like Photoshop artists are able to rework or edit an image that they are more than halfway finished creating in a very short period of time. Jonathan Kirtz a concept artist who studied under C.F.Payne and worked on concept artwork for Warhammer Online explains his experience with digital media, “Concept art requires efficiency, and traditional media is too slow. Often an artist would be required to make changes, sometimes drastic ones, halfway through a piece and digital lends itself well to that.”(Kirtz) An example of this would be, if the colors are off in an illustration all the artist has to do is slide a few meters and the hue changes. With traditional media this process could take hours of painstaking work and might even require the artist to redo their work.

A Video of me creating a digital painting in Photoshop.

An artist who was trained and worked traditionally but recently switched to working digitally, Richard Collingridge, describes a moment of frustration that caused him to make the transition. “The final straw came when working on the cover for ‘Trash’ by Andy Mulligan. I had produced a very red sky as a backdrop to the main image and it was decided that the sky needed to have blues as well as reds in it. I tried to do this using my traditional technique by selecting certain areas of the sky and changing their hue to blue. This didn’t work so I ended up having to paint the blue parts of the sky digitally.” (Collingridge). Before this point Collingridge made it clear that he did not want to work digitally and tried to strictly using traditional mediums. Although he wants to work in a traditional manner he is unable to in his line of work as an illustrator. John Kirtz also expresses a similar desire to work traditionally but feels that it is impractical when Photoshop allows him to quickly produce work within the deadline. “I actually really love the feel of brush on canvas and really miss that with my Cintiq. To help circumvent

this I try to use brushes in Photoshop sometimes that emulate the bristles of a paintbrush. “(Kirtz) The Cintiq which Kirtz described is a tablet that also acts as a computer monitor allowing the artist to draw directly onto the image instead of a pad. Although the Cintiq is a high tech piece of hardware that allows the artist to work more naturally, it still does not offer some of the subtleties of working traditionally.

Perhaps it is the nuances or subtleties of feeling a pencil or brush on a canvas that originally drew artists to their craft. That they are perhaps only working digitally for the sake of their employers and want to someday return to working primarily with traditional methods. Although Digital Media is definitely an effective means of producing amazing pieces of art in a short period of time, there is a connection between an artist and the tangible that still exists. In my interview with Jonathan Kirtz he expressed his thoughts on the abandonment of traditional mediums,” A lot of kids get into art these days and never even pick up a paintbrush. There's something really satisfying about having a real tangible, physical piece of art in your hand.”(Kirtz). He believes that everyone should have the same experience working traditionally before moving to digital. And so as artists leave there brushes behind to create their own digital masterpieces they still may feel the grasp of nostalgia calling them back to the traditional.

Artwork of Jonathan Kirtz

Works Cited

Collingridge, Richard. "From Traditional to Digital Illustration." The View from Here Literary Magazine. Web. 23 May 2011.

Laforet, Anne. "Digital Art Preservation." Digital Art International: the International Portal & Community Dedicated to Digital Art. 05 May 2011.