The New Tools of the Trade

Creatives need an understanding of, and proficiency with, the tools of their chosen art form. In the information age, many of the tools that an artist will use take the form of computer software.

Digital tools have allowed artists to become more prolific. Traditional artists would do well to explore the electronic equivalent to their medium.

Digital speed paintings using software like Corel Painter, Artrage, GIMP and Photoshop have allowed concept artists and illustrators to create impressionistic works in minutes, and in rapid succession. In terms of hardware, tables like the Wacom Intuos allow artists to take the tactile skills of painting and drawing and apply them to digital art.

“Aspen”, a digital painting by the concept artist Lorin Wood. http://lorinwood.com/personal_aspen.html

If sculpture is your chosen field, you may want to research 3D computer modeling. Some software packages for this include Maya, Softimage, 3DS Max, Blender, and Houdini. You may also look at digital sculpting, a complement to modeling. For this, you can use programs like Mudbox and ZBrush.

Graphic and web designers will likely need proficiency with the Adobe Creative Suite. This bundle of programs includes the image manipulation program Photoshop, the art program Illustrator, the web design application Dreamweaver, the graphic design program InDesign, and a host of others. Those seeking a job in this field are often required to have an understanding of several of the programs in this suite.

In addition to your portfolio, you may need a resume for certain jobs (for more information on this see this earlier post). On this resume, you can include your software proficiencies. This may help you in your hunt for employment as a digital artist. Indeed, knowledge of certain software packages is required for most art-related jobs.

It is worth noting that, while many of these software titles are extremely expensive, GIMP and Blender are free under the GNU License. However, they might be somewhat harder to use, and may come with fewer features.

Additional Resources:

A good resource for more information on digital painting and sketching is conceptart.org. In addition to giving its users highly visible online gallery space, the site serves as an artists’ forum and even provides an online art academy.

For more information on 3D modeling, check out cgsociety.org. It has resources similar to those available on conceptart, but with more of an emphasis on 3D art.