Best products from r/DigitalPainting

Hey guys I just wanted to share that I have recently purchased a Ugee 21.5" drawing screen thing from amazon. At first I was looking into the Wacom 13hd but for the price I felt like I needed more bang for my buck. Anyway with the return and great customer service of amazon i took the plunge and got the tablet. Let me say that first it only is responsive to the pen that it gives you. Thats fine for me or else my hands would get in the way lol. Anyway drawing and stuff dramatically improved and for the prce I now have 21 inches of glorious space to have photoshop open with more then enough room to draw on. there is a 19 inch for 400 dollars to and I would assume that it works just the same. Oh the 21.5 inch is full 1080p and wonderful screen quality. That was the reason I bought it. others werent full resolution or somthing.

Cords are fine. you have 3 out of the back an hdmi/DVI/VGA (your choice and a usb cord for touch pen information and a power cord that is so frekn long omg its amazing lol. but they are great. Overall heavily consider this product if you ant the extra roomto draw an animate on.

Lastly. I spent the amount of money that I did on an "off brand" tablet because my dollars could go farther and get me more screen size which is what I wanted. and was a relativly small investment compared to Wacoms product of the 22in cintiq for like 2 grand. anyawy hope this was helpful and if you want some more info or pics let me know! and good luck!

I was in your shoes about 7 months ago. Wanted to dip my feet into digital art. I wanted a tablet with a screen, but they were so expensive. So I decided to go with this instead.

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https://www.amazon.com/Wacom-Wireless-Software-Included-CTL6100WLK0/dp/B079NWPZTG/ref=sr_1_3_sspa?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1541882267&sr=1-3-spons&keywords=wacom+intuos&psc=1

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While a little bit pricey, compared to other non-screen tablets, it is the best name brand on the market. There is another version of this tablet that is only 100$ but it was quite a bit smaller. I ended up with this one because 200$ did not kill my budget and I wanted a slightly bigger one. As far as the disconnect between looking at the monitor while drawing and not your had, it took me about 2 hours to lose the weird feeling. After that it felt completely normal. So I would not worry about that too much.

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After about 5 months with this tablet my birthday came around and I decided to upgrade to one with a screen. While I could not really afford one of the screened Wacom ones, I did find this.

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https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0779QTQ13/ref=dp_prsubs_1

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After alot of research on youtube I found that this tablet was the best bang for my buck. It was not 1000$ like the Wacoms, and provided a bigger screen for comfort. I am so happy I went with this in the end.

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Id say start without a screen, and later on upgrade if you enjoy digital art. You can always sell your old tablet on ebay to make some of that money back. Also as a side note, I'd also HIGHLY recommend Krita as your first digital art program. It is 100% free, and is the best free software on the market. Or at least the one that most easily translates over to Photoshop, which is what most professionals use. Hope any of this helps. Good luck!

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I thought this was a pretty good book on the subject, but a lot of stuff only sinks in with practice (at least for me). Lots of environment studies and architecture and the like help. :)

Other than that, honestly the best overall resource I've found are Nathan fowkes' schoolism classes and watching the feedback he gives to other students. It covers a bit of everything, though it's not specifically about perspective.

As for brushes.. well. There's definitely a good balance to be struck. I find that having too many will slow you down and distract you, but there are definitely some great helpful ones. The problem is that everyone prefers something else. :)

This collects artist brushes that are a lot of fun to check out and play around with, but I would advise to only keep the ones you find really useful and try to avoid to get lost in shiny tools. You could do a forest just fine with a chalk brush!

Nice to see someone just hop into drawing :)
As /u/Lotusbunny mentioned, everyone learns differently. You need to find the right way that fits for you. If you really want to improve and don't hesitate to spend some money, search for some drawing and sketching books. There are tons out there. My approach was a bit more techy because I like Industrialdesign and Scifi, so I bought myself How to Draw from Scott Robertson and How to Render from Scott Robertson

Same goes for environment, anatomy, rendering, etc, there is a huge amount of books you can choose from. Also Imagine FX is a nice magazine with tutorials and cool stuff to read, see and learn. They also got a Youtube Channel Give it a try.

But of course you can entirely come back to Youtube videos. A quick search with 'How to draw X' and you're ready to go. Also twitch is really nice where you can see people drawing in realtime. BUT don't rely enterily on videos - you won't get better by watching hours of tutorials without actually drawing :)

For anatomy Posemaniacs is awesome! Tons of poses you can choose and study from. Grab you Wacom or pencil and keep drawing. The 30 seconds drawing option is very nice to improve your time limit output.


The keywords are practice and patience. Art and drawing is a skill you need to obtain, digitally or mechanically. It won't grow overnight so don't force yourself with every piece to get better and better. You will automatically with every minute you're drawing.

And the best thing to do is to improve your visual library. Look at pictures and try to adapt. You need to see and remember things before you can draw them without looking them up first. Always open up references you can rely on. I'd suggest you start to paint studys first. Open up Daily Dozen and redraw/study a picture you like. First start off with black & white and if you're confident, get into color. Also, a great way to improve your skill is to limit your time. Start with quick and small thumbnails with a 10 minute limit, then 30 minutes, 1 hour, 2 hour and open end. With this you are first forced to concentrate on the overall look and composition rather than details and with the 1 hour and above ones you can do more and more finished paintings.

One thing that scares many is a blank canvas. If you want to start, first get rid of the blank white space. Fill in a gradient, quickly paint some diffuse silhouettes or fill it with a colour but get rid of the plain canvas.


I don't know which software you're using (I assume Photoshop) but for the brushes and functions - just test them out. You don't need a ton of textured brushes but sometimes they're a nice addition. Search online for brushes and test them. Keep the ones you like and get the best results with.

Besides that - keep on and practice a lot :)


Btw, I did a small redo in Pixelart some time ago for someone :)

You're far too kind to me!

Most of my digital painting skills have come from several sources. The first, and and by far best resource I used to learn was this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Beginners-Guide-Digital-Painting-Photoshop/dp/0955153077

Best book on digital painting ever written. Ever. a solid 80%+ of my digital painting understanding and tools mastery came from this book.

I studied Scott Robertson's Gnomon videos on Perspective, and Value. These are the best tools for understanding these subjects I have ever found.If you spend any real amount of time practicing his techniques, its impossible to not get good at them.

http://www.amazon.com/Techniques-Scott-Robertson-Perspective-Drawing/dp/1930878818/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1404610130&sr=1-2&keywords=gnomon+scott+robertson

http://www.amazon.com/How-Render-Matte-Surfaces-Shading/dp/B000GETV6O/ref=pd_sim_sbs_b_10?ie=UTF8&refRID=17MGSE75N3Q0BAGD0GYJ

As far as color and light goes, Jeremy Vickery was the best source I could find. He works for Pixar and is the mastermind behind their unbelievable redering. This DVD is a good source to check out-

http://www.amazon.com/Theory-Application-Jeremy-Vickery-Practical/dp/B0013TPNPY/ref=sr_1_1?s=movies-tv&ie=UTF8&qid=1404610239&sr=1-1&keywords=Jeremy+Vickery+Gnomon

Finally, if you wanna learn human anatomy at a boss level, Go to Alienthink.com and buy Riven Phoenix's anatomy videos. All of them. They're worth ten times their cost easily. You cannot still be bad after learning his methods. I'm serious. It's literally impossible.

http://alienthink.com/

Finally, If you wanna learn from one of the best artists in the industry about everything possible about digital painting, go to Youtube and look up Feng Zhu Design Cinema. Start at #1 and watch every single on in order. You will get the kind of design education most artists only dream of. I cannot tell you how much I have learned from him. Hell, this painting right here was an experiment with a new painting workflow I learned from one of his videos. Check him out and see.

I hope all of this helps!

What's the price you found for the yiynova? On Amazon it's only $70 less than the Monoprice.

It's hard to say what you'll get once you get the the ultra low price, but there's a good chance you get what you pay for. Whatever you get, make sure you have the option to return it if you don't like it.

You could look into smaller 10" or 13" tablet monitors, if you're looking for something cheaper. Don't know if it's any good but the reviews are generally positive: https://www.amazon.com/Parblo-Coast10-Digital-Cordless-Battery-free/dp/B01CTVHHHG/ref=pd_sim_sbs_147_2?ie=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=WC9Z4BY9TRYWFVYFP1RT

Or keep practicing on the Intuos for a bit while you save up for the 13" Cintiq. Wacom products are high quality, so, personally, I'd feel comfortable buying a slightly used one off ebay to save a little cash.

I'm no master, however let me share my thoughts on this.

The cartoon-like outlines are actually the base on which a lot of paintings have been built. In fact, the full-sized under-drawing that an artist does before starting a full-scale painting is itself called a Cartoon *. So there's no need to step away from that, you need to push forward through it. Don''t stop using it, after all it's crucial for planing and making sure your drawings are proportionate.Do stop thinking in 2D. When you're shifting your gears, you need to start imagining your drawings as 3D object's forms and depth. If you're able to visualize your creations in 3D, then the edge/types of edges become clear to you. Yet, when you transfer your 3D visualization to paper, you're still left with something that feels like a cartoon: flat. The remedy to this is of course, as you and /u/firesion have mentioned : Light and Shadow. Without that, we wouldn't see forms at all. So proper understanding of how Light and Shadow work / interact with various types of materials would seem to be key to painting in a realistic manner. Sycra's Foundation of light and shadow series is a very good beginner's overview of this. If you would like to push your understanding further in this subject, I would strongly suggest Gurney's Light and Color book. It is an amazing resource regarding the relationships of light/shadow/colours. Your ruminations on the edges and outlines are good. However, you're avoiding the main part. If you're to paint realistically, then you need to stop thinking in lines. Lines don't exist. You need to start thinking in forms. The interactions of various forms in your painting will make the edges that will differentiate them.

As for the don't use straight lines in your work, I would say that depends on what you're trying to paint. If you were painting something architectural, I would say by all means to use lots of straight/ angled lines. But if you're planning on painting people or other organics, then lines would make your job very difficult. Most of your points basically would be ameliorated if you began visualizing things in 3D.

For your third and last point, there are many ways to call focus to your focal point in paintings. There are drastic value changes, using a more saturated colour, using a complementary colour to the rest of the colour scheme (if you were using an Analogous+complementary scheme, this would be an excellent way to drive home what the focal point is). And like most things,there isn't one "right way" to do it. It depends on what mood you're trying to convey in your painting.

I would have to disagree with the detail being higher in the focal point of the painting. While that is certainly an option, you're not restricted to that. A very common compositional technique to add depth is to put the focal point in the midground (between the foreground and background). However, by common sense, we're aware that obviously there would be more details in the foreground (which is closest to us), but we can keep the midground as the focal point by playing with light/colour/positioning (it will still have less contrast/ less details than the foreground. But because of the other factors, the viewer will immediately read it as the focal point).

Lastly, my own suggestion for you to gain a better understanding of how to paint realistically, and lights/colours, would be for you to do some master studies. Go find some old/new masters that you look up to, see how they approach this problem. Eye out the colours, try to understand their reasons for picking said colour. Recognize their composition choices. Notice how they're handing various edges and so forth. Try recreating a part or all of a painting. These are purely for you, so you can spend as long or as little time on these as you want. These can be messy (and often are). So it's imperative to remember that these will never be finished paintings, they're studies.

Good luck. :)

I used to be exactly like you back in high school. You have the raw talent, now you need to pair that with an education on art fundamentals. These fundamentals exist irregardless of medium, so you can practice with just your doodles. The main fundamentals are anatomy, color and light, perspective, and composition. In your case, I recommend buying a book on proper figure drawing. You have really cool ideas, so you just need to nail the proportions. This was the first book I read on the subject, and I fount it really helpful. If you want more after that, Andrew Loomis and Bridgeman are the some of the other classic figure drawing educators. As for the other fundamentals, ctrlpaint.com is a probably one of the best free resources, and as for books, here's one I would recommend that covers all the essentials. Again, if you want to take your art to the next level, whether it be just doodles or digital art, it's all about dem fundamentals. Best of luck!

No, although the further you recede, the less saturated everything is, including the shadows, but also the highlights. Atmospheric perspective indicates that they start to fade into the color of the sky...but what I meant was (and this happens to everyone starting out) you picked the colors of the sky, mountain, road, as colors that you think each of those elements are. So, grass is green, right? okay I'll pick a shade of green. The road is grey, right? Okay so pick grey for the road...when in reality light is a little more complicated than that, and a pleasant composition requires a cohesive color scheme. It means picking a different color for the road even though you think of it as 'grey' you simulate grey by choosing a less saturated green for example, or blue or whatever you have in your color palette.

This book is a wonderful reference and talks more about it if you're interested. The author made this video that explains a couple exercises you can do that will help.

I have no fear you'll find the videos that suit you best. We generally are resourceful enough when the need calls for it. Best of luck to you on that front.

The most difficult thing I found is the same most difficult thing every person of every new venture finds: sticking with it. I didn't. I started getting used to it, started getting good at it, and then I froze 12 hours (not consecutive) into a fantastic painting and stopped. I still have the file unfinished on my external. Do not make my mistake. I regret it. BUT... I'm making up for lost time and have since restarted learning to use it and my programs again. So, trust me, Pastanro, I'm right there with you.

Consistency! If you practice one thing, practice it hard! Do it for a month, not a day. Nail it into the ground so it will be a useful step to stand on for the next part of your journey. And no cheating! Start from the bottom again. It will not be wasted practice. If you're a master of anatomy, spend time practicing what you've already mastered and it will help you acclimate to this new tool that much easier. Don't take off learning things you don't know just quite yet. Ease into it. Be proud of the starting work you do. In 5 years, you'll look back and be even more proud of it.

The rest - the workflow - is more or less up to you to decide. Which program you enjoy (I use ArtRage; the tools and canvases have actual texture and aren't as stale as a soft round "brush"), which brushes you use (if in a Photoshop-esque program, try playing with the jitter settings, I hear that helps give it more life), to how you hold it (ideally in such a manner that makes using the buttons on the stylus more useful), to how you paint (I don't paint portions of the drawing at a time, I paint full layers: sketch, rough paint, final paint, etc), which keyboard shortcuts you assign to the tablets buttons... these are all things you'll discover for yourself as you evolve with your tool, as it becomes an extension of you.

I also recommend accountability. Setting up a conceptart sketchbook or a deviantart profile (I prefer this) serves as a means of "showing up for work." If you can build an audience or a few friendships, they'll notice when you're being lazy. This makes the process a little less "I'm roaming around in the dark alone"-ish. It also feels fantastic to know you have fans, especially when they stick around and prove they're keeping an eye on you.

None of this is technical advice per se, but that's because I firmly believe the biggest challenge is mental. You're battling far bigger demons at the soul level when you set out to learn something new and follow a dream. Fanning those flames inside you is more important than what you're forging. So if you listen to only one piece of advice I have to give, get a copy of this book: http://www.amazon.com/The-War-Art-Through-Creative/dp/1936891026

If you put yourself out there somewhere on the net, send me a link. I'd like to follow along.

Well it's certainly worth while if you spend countless hours on it over a few years. The thing is thought you're not very experienced in digital art yet so it's hard to say if a purchase that large will pay itself off. You could use it for a few months and decide either the cintiq or digital isn't for you. I would recommend the Huion H610 Pro since it's so cheap. This tablet has the exact same specs as the intuos pro. Then if you really like digital buying a cintiq might be an easier decision since you'll have some experience in digital. You could even check out a cintiq alternative, just know that installing drivers can be difficult with them. I believe all the brands that make much cheaper cintiq alternatives are Bosto, Yiynova, Monoprice and Huion. Many complain that the cintiq's screen is dark and super thick creating a feeling of parallax. If you do go with a cintiq alternative make sure the screen resolution supports 1920x1080. The Yiynova I have has a res of 1440x900 and since you're so close to the screen it's insanely easy to see pixelation. Other then that I have 0 complaints with it after I got the drivers installed.

The size of my 13HD has never been a problem, it's easy to sit down with and draw. The hot keys are easily programmed to help with zooming, the touch would also work nicely.

But really don't. I have not been able to use mine in months because the cord.

The cord is notorious for breaking, and Wacom never has it in stock. It has been out of stock for at least five months, and Wacom is not working with me or helping me get a new one, even though my Cintiq is under warranty for more than another year.

Wacom's customer service is terrible. It takes weeks for them to get back to you.

I'd try for a Huion or Yiynova. I personally haven't tried them but many of my animator friends enjoy theirs and generally have good reviews online.

http://www.amazon.com/Yiynova-MSP19U-Monitor-Windows-Solution/dp/B009QQ7BG0

https://www.huiontablet.com/all-products/pen-tablet-monitor/huion-gt-190.html/

http://www.amazon.com/Huion-Graphic-Tablet-Monitor-Resolution/dp/B010L8OC9K/ref=sr_1_6?s=pc&ie=UTF8&qid=1449379041&sr=1-6&keywords=huion

I've been reading that but I've also stumbled upon this: https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B00GIGGS6A/ref=pd_luc_rh_sbs_01_03_t_ttl_lh?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1

It has significantly better specs I've seen from most wacoms that arent over 200 dollars, good surface area and from what I understand very much desired LPI and pressure sensitivity. And also a lot of amazon reviews that used wacoms recommend this, what do you think?

I just got the Huion H160PRO yesterday, and I absolutely love it! I've been a Wacom user for years, and had the privilege of using Intuos 5 tablets in high school, but this tablet really met my expectations. It's about the same size as the Intous line, and it was delivered in 3 days with free shipping through amazon.

Huion H610PRO Painting Drawing Pen Graphics Tablet https://www.amazon.com/dp/B00GIGGS6A/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_DM1gybWXWNM8E

I mean it's just freaking awesome.

I suggest getting a starter tablet like one of the 2 I linked. Many people don't have issues with offbrand tablets but Wacom is seen as industry standard and is a bit expensive. So that is why the Huion seems to have more for the same price. So yeah, get a cheaper tablet and maybe pay for some software. Good luck!


https://www.amazon.com/Huion-H610-Pro-Graphic-Carrying/dp/B00ZWRSQ4I/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1491776838&sr=8-1-spons&keywords=wacom+drawing+tablet&psc=1


https://www.amazon.com/Wacom-CTL490DW-Digital-Drawing-Graphics/dp/B010LHRFM2/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1491776838&sr=8-3&keywords=wacom+drawing+tablet

It's really about the features you require. Hobbyist digital painters can produce some amazing work with fairly basic gear like the Intuos Draw. But maybe you need more. Maybe you want to be able to change the angle of the brush by rotating the pen, or have your drawing tablet double as a display.

Don't think the Draw is subpar gear, though. I can say Wacom's older base models were pretty garbage, but I've been really impressed with the Draw. It's highly responsive even when moving the pen fairly quickly, something my old Graphire 3 was horrible at. And despite the size, I never feel like I don't have enough tablet real estate as 95% of it is drawing surface.

If you want a more affordable alternative I'd recommend Huion. I have a Huion Giano WH1409 which is a nice large tablet for half the price of a Waccom the same size. It has a ton of customizable buttons and is wireless if you need that.

i got this huin tablet https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B06XH3LC4R/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

at the recommendation of a friend and havnt had any issues.

Well, if you want to save money consider looking at Yiynova tablets. There is a 600 dollar model thats 19 inches at a not too terrible resolution. It's not a companion, but I thought I'd let you know about it.

http://www.amazon.com/Yiynova-MSP19U-Monitor-Windows-Solution/dp/B009QQ7BG0/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1409375434&sr=8-1&keywords=yiynova

What type of art are you aiming for? Theirs plenty of tutorials on youtube that can show you concept art, speed painting, work flow etc. Check out Sinix, Ahmed Aldoori, EverydayJames and Walid Feghali if you want to do concept art. Ctrl-paint is another channel that nearly everyone recommends to learn photoshop. Books on the subject tend to skim over a lot of stuff I purchased Beginner's Guide to Digital Painting in Photoshop by Aleksander, Nykolai and It was pretty useless except for the process photos because I had learned more in depth online.

http://www.amazon.com/Color-Light-Guide-Realist-Painter/dp/0740797719 Read it like 5 times.

Wacom's price entry point is high. If you're looking for a starter tablet there are a lot of comparable products.
EDIT: This bad boy got some good reviews: http://www.amazon.com/Huion-H610-Graphics-Drawing-Tablet/dp/B00GIGGS6A