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5 Things I Wish I Knew Before Starting Digital Art

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Even though it’s been a long time since I first picked up my stylus and started making digital art, I don’t think I’ll ever forget the palpable frustration I felt from learning how things worked. I had been doing art for as long as I remembered, why did I feel like a newbie all over again?!

What were all of these settings? How do all of the brushes work? Oh my goodness, I drew on the wrong layer again! 

While the learning curve was steep, I eventually overcame it and fell in love with Procreate and digital art more than I could have imagined.

If you’re getting started with digital art and feel like you’re stuck in the middle of a long learning curve, here are some tips that helped me push through.

1. Follow tutorials from start to finish

I’m the kind of person that doesn’t have the patience to read the instructions. Given that this method has failed me more times than I can count, you would think that I would learn my lesson. But, alas, when I first started to learn Procreate and digital art, I tried to power through without any help. 

Big mistake.

Once I started following tutorials from start to finish, no matter how tedious they were, I actually started learning the technical skills I needed to know.

I started devouring Skillshare and YouTube videos. I also forced myself to complete each tutorial from start to finish – no jumping around to the “fun” parts. 

With this tactic, everything about Procreate started to click. 

digital illustration Procreate skillshare class
This is one of the first classes I took!

I signed up for Skillshare pretty quickly after the frustration of going it alone set in. If I had to do it again though, I would already have my Skillshare subscription set up and ready to go with a few beginning Procreate classes already picked out. 

That way, I’d be able to jump right in. If you haven’t checked out Skillshare yet, you can get a free month using this link!

2. Don’t focus on what your art looks like

In the beginning, your art may look a lot different than you’d want it to. 

Don’t let this discourage you. 

Even if you’ve been an artist for a long time, digital art is a whole new thing. Swapping your pencils for a stylus is a huge change. It often feels like the beginning phases of digital art are more about technical ability than artistic ability. 

Focus on that technical aspect. Make sure you have the technology down before you even start thinking about whether your art looks good or not.

3. Use reference images

Piggy backing off of the last tip, you want the art aspects to take a back seat to the technical learning in the beginning. This is what made a huge difference for me, at least.

In order to ease some of the artistic burden, I relied heavily on reference photos. I love reference photos all of the time, but especially when learning a new technical skill. Your brain is already going to be working hard to learn new technology, don’t force it to be creative at the same time. 

Procreate makes it really easy to add reference photos to your work. Here’s a tutorial on adding reference photos to check out!

procreate dog drawing and reference photo2

4. All of the foundational skills really do matter

Like I mentioned, I don’t have much patience when learning new skills. I get excited and want to be able to move to the fun parts already! 

What I learned was that I wouldn’t be able to gain skills in the “fun” areas if I didn’t have a strong grasp on the foundational skills. I couldn’t just skip learning about Procreate’s layers and expect my art to turn out the way I wanted it to.

As I said in tip #1, it really helped me to go through each tutorial from start to finish without jumping around or skipping sections. Even when the basics seem tedious, they are crucial to master in the long run.

procreate layers panel lemon drawing

5. Appreciate it when it gets easier

I fell in love with Procreate and digital art very quickly. That said, I still got caught up in the trap of failing to recognize my progress. 

As soon as I learned a new skill, I focused on the next one. There was always another skill to learn. 

There are a LOT of awesome things to learn about Procreate and digital art in general. Because of this, it can be easy to focus on the next challenge and skill. While this is great, take a moment to look back and appreciate all of the progress you’ve made. 

Are the things you were struggling with a few months ago still as hard now? What skills come more naturally now?

There will always be new things to learn. Don’t get so caught up in continuing to learn new skills that you forget to appreciate all of the ones you’ve already mastered.

Learning digital art is a fun adventure, even when it has its speed bumps and frustrations. I hope this article has given you some ideas about how to navigate through the beginning phases!

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