Beginners Artists - new to art, need some advice? Step right in!

TheBigCheese

TheBigCheese

TheBigCheese

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Joined
6 Sep 2005
Posts
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This is a thread in response to the 'show us your artwork thread'.

We have some excellent artists on the forum and then some of us who would love to draw but don't know the difference between a pencil and a piece of coal.

Hopefully some of our resident artists will provide hints and tips and I'll update the first few posts of the thread with relevant hints, tips, tutorials and reviews!

If you want to join in then just post in the thread about your art experiences up to now (if any) and I'll add your name and experience to the OP as I've done for me and we'll go from there! :D

Please DO NOT TROLL - keep your posts on topic and relevant!


Our beginner artists are:

TheBigCheese - prolific user of Photoshop, uses a Wacom Intous 4 Wireless in day to day working but hasn't used it for artwork as yet.
Skillmister
 
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Reviews of drawing equipment.

Everything from tablets, to software, pens to pastels.

Wanting to get started in digital painting? These are the software packages to look at, they range in price from free to hundreds so look for the trial versions!

GIMP - Free - designed to be a 'free Photoshop'

Mypaint - Free - I know nothing about this yet - anyone want to review it?

Corel Painter 12 - dedicated for painting, around £100

Adobe Photoshop - designed to do everything image related, massively costly but you will always learn something new from it.


Wacom Cintiq 24HD - LanceCrossFire has posted a review of it on his blog. tl;dr? It's brilliant with a couple of niggles.
 
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Reviews of teaching aids, websites, books etc.


Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain by Betty Edwards.
Chaos says it's "The best beginner drawing book imo" "You cant draw because you cant see things properly, this book shows you how to look at things properly."
 
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Helpful links and techniques.


www.ctrlpaint.com
"A very neat website with some great small videos as well as written tutorials on how to do stuff. They're simple and not to tiring in length" Cheers LanceCrossfire!

Traditional pencil drawing - see post 36 of this thread, it's big so I won't duplicate it here, thanks Jonnybmac!
 
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Tutorials - everything from how to hold a pencil correctly to how to shade.

I'm hoping our forum artists will post some tutorials and links that I can copy into this post and expand it over time.

Photoshop Shortcut Keys - thanks to LanceCrossfire

Photoshop has many shortcuts which to work quick and effectively need to be utilised. You can map Wacom tablet express keys to any function aswell as view or create your own by going to Edit>Keyboard Shortcuts menu (or by pressing ALT+SHIFT+CTRL+K)

I'll list some important ones below which I use regularly.

Photoshop Keyboard Shortcuts:

b = brush tool
e = eraser tool
i or ALT = colour picking tool
o = dodge/burn tool
p = pen tool
g = gradient/bucket tool
v = move tool
c = cropping tool
t = text tool
l = lasso tool
m = marquee tool
d = reset foreground/background colours
x = cycle foreground/background colours
f = expert mode 1(press again for expert mode 2 and once more to return to normal)
z = zoom tool
Space(Hold) = Pan image(only when zoomed or in expert mode)
CTRL+n = new document
CTRL+SHIFT+n = new layer
[ = reduce brush size
] = increase brush size
1-0 = change opacity
SHIFT+1-0 = change flow
CTRL+ALT+Z = Undo
CTRL+z = Undo/Redo 1
CTRL+0 = Zoom Extent
CTRL+j = duplicate layer
CTRL+l = level adjustment
CTRL+a = select all
CTRL+t = transform selection
CTRL+s = SAVE FFS!
SHIFT+CTRL+U = desaturate image

Other useful actions whilst working are the 'flip horizontal' and 'flip canvas horizontal' commands which I personally bind. By flipping the image you can easier determine potential perspective errors, this is something I try my best too do frequently.
 
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Our favourite artwork

Each budding artists favourite artwork they have produced to date - if you are pleased with it show it off on the first page to keep you motivated, obviously tell me if you want it linked here!
 
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TheBigCheese said:
Don't lurk, join in, that's the point! :)
Click to expand...

When I get some free time I'll have a go at something. I haven't drawn since school but, being from a very arty family, I've always quietly considered it a bit of a waste that I haven't pursued art more faithfully.
 
I shall write some things up later this afternoon for the thread, including some step by steps.

I have a few links to tutorials etc which I'd happily share :)
 
Excellent excellent excellent! :D:D:D

For the beginners don't forgot when you post to give a brief into about yourselves and I'll add it to the OP!

Great stuff, thanks Shifty!

Cheers [FnG]magnolia, want to join in? You could draw what you would like to do to your feline nemeses! ;)
 
I'll be honest i'm horrific at art i struggle to even draw the most basic things like stick men or apples etc etc.

Weirdly i can do technical to scale drawings fine, And i am very jealous of my 15 yr old daughters talent. She doodled 8 cartoon characters yesterday in about 15 minutes i think it would have taken me weeks :(
 
So am I, I have exactly the same problem. I've tried looking at some basic tutorial books but when they talk about the very basics such as drawing figures using circles to get the correct proportions I even struggle to get even sized circles. :(

shifty_uk has been my inspiration to get me started! His technique looks simple to get into (having tried it, it's not that easy!) but he made some incredibly good points which really gave me the incentive to have a go!

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