Digital Watercolor Raven

Art for Art's Sake

I recently purchased a digital watercolor set for Procreate from Digital Art Junky and have been creating different pieces of art with the brushes - it's been a very exciting week for me. I told a friend that I haven't been this excited about a digital download since I was downloading skins for Catz and Dogz in the 1990s. 

The watercolor set came with thirty different brushes, five different paper textures, and some color pallets - very exciting. I love the different paper textures. The lack of paper texture in Procreate has been a quite complaint of mine since I downloaded the app. One of my goals is to try to imply as much texture as possible in my digital artwork. ​I've found myself making more and more digital art after the birth of my son. Moving into my studio with an infant is a lot of work. I have a hard time getting into creative flow when I have to be available for him and he's at a stage where he's very hands on. Most of my creating is done with he's napping and creating on my iPad is honestly much easier for me. I don't have to worry about material drying out, getting new water, finding a place to wipe my brush, having both hands free, etc. I can create everything in one space and I can come back to it as needed. 

I've painted a few different subjects with the new brush set. I worked on a bear, a house cat, and decided last night that I wanted to start working on a crow. This piece was different compared to how I normally work on digital art. Generally, I'll complete the background first (I also do this with physical art). I erase all of the color from my subject and do a base coat of a neutral color instead. Then, I add layer upon layer of color to the piece. With my crow I took a different approach. I didn't remove color from my subject. I kept the black. Instead of adding shadows, I added light. I felt as if I was working backward from the negative or empty space instead of working toward it. This piece was a lesson in light for me - and a challenge (I even found myself waking up in the middle of the night thinking about the need to add green for more definition - and I did. There is a faint, dark green outline all over the bird.). 

I'm pleased with the use of light in this piece overall. It's not the best digital work I've ever done, but it was a lot of fun and it is one of the more detailed and realistic looking birds that I've done (a lot of my work has a more illustrative style). I can't wait to see what comes from continuing to use these brushes!