Part II: Artistic Principles For a Digital Age | Digital Character Design and Painting: The Photoshop CS Edition (Graphics Series) (Charles River Media Graphics)

Chapter List

Chapter 6: Basic Principles for Improving the Drawing, Sketching, and Painting of Your Character
Chapter 7: Value and Its Use in Picture Making
Chapter 8: Color and Its Use in Picture Making
Chapter 9: Using Lighting Arrangements to Light a Character Effectively
Chapter 10: Using Edges When Painting a Picture
Chapter 11: Blending Edges in Your Digital Paintings
Chapter 12: Creating Textures and Patterns for Use in Digital Painting
Chapter 13: Photoshop Brushes

Why would a book that is dedicated to digital art contain a part on tradition artistic principles? While the argument can be made that judging art is a subjective business, there is no argument that all good art is based on very non- subjective principles.

In today's fast-paced, information-overloaded, digital age, we sometimes overlook the very basic principles and strategies that the craft of art is based on. The computer is such a powerful tool and the software that we use anticipates our needs so well that there is a tendency to let the technology do all of the work. This is why there is such a big market in program plug-ins. Click a button and, all of a sudden, the image looks like a painting. This approach of letting the computer make the decisions is simply wrong and shortsighted, if your goal is to create true digital art. It may also be the reason that there is so much hesitancy for the public to accept digital works as art, because the computer has done the work.

This is why a part of this book is dedicated to traditional principles. If you are a beginner, you may not have ever had a discussion on value and color or their uses. If you are a professional, maybe you are letting the ghost in the machine do a little too much of the work. Either way, a refresher on traditional picture-making principles is appropriate in a book on digital painting.

Go through this part and read each chapter, then in your next image try to use some of the information in your painting. Your work should definitely improve.