Your Opinion on Digital Inking

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Typography is the Debbil!!!

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You aint kidding. My wife's typography teacher at CCAD had never seen Star Wars and didn't know what a Rubick's Cube was. He was a piece of work.

Beautiful, perfect lettering of course. But I can do the same thing in about 3 minutes with a $30 printer that he'd spend hours pouring over.

The people most in need of taking typography are web designers, honestly. Sooooooo many sites out there with fonts that should never be on the same page as each other. SOME FONTS DON'T MIX DON'T YOU KNOW THE RULES OH GOD MY EYES!

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Typography is the Debbil!!!

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I have to take it the next winter quarter of school. Effin JOY.

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I guess that one instructor has never heard of a battery backup?

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If you [general you] cannot create your artwork without a battery backup, this is the very definition of a crutch.

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The very idea of teachers in art is a contradiction. You cannot teach someone how to be an artist. You can however teach them to perform certain skills that can make doing art easier for them. But the longer you teach them a particular skillset, the more likely you are to stunt their experimentation into other mediums.

Art is a very 'out of the box' quality, but in order for most people to become proficient in producing their ideas, they have to go further and further into a box. This does not apply for everyone, as there are some people who are very free spirits as well as some people who have extreme natural talent. But for Joe average, they need someone to teach them the mental and physical skills required to produce finished pieces, yet not confine them into sedimentary thought.

That's the major problem most people face. Teachers aren't generally teaching you how to be good at art. They're teaching you how to be good at a particular skillset. That itself has nothing to do with how good of an artist you will become.

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http://www.virtueverse.net/wiki/Massacre_Melanie -the original Fire/Dark Corruptor -
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=115217
The Guide to BURN

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If you [general you] cannot create your artwork without a battery backup, this is the very definition of a crutch.


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Actually, it's being prepared in case of emergency. I'm assuming your instructor used things like electric lighting while teaching the class? One could always go out and live on an Amish farm if avoiding the crutches of modern living was a priority.

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Blacklisted
"I'AM SATANS FAVORITE CHILD!!"

Er, yeah, I have to go with Frozen Death here. I'd be screwed with a lot of art I do if I was totally bereft of paper, but is paper a crutch? C'mon now. Let's not get so out there with the comparisons. Next thing you know, our hands and eyes will be crutches, too =P

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The Amish are the Debbil !!!

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I had some great art teachers, people who really cared about their jobs. Who cared about us, but I was lucky enough to go to Music & Art 79-83, which is now combined with the Fame School behind Lincoln Center in NYC.

When I went to student teach Art there in 96, Photoshop was a part of the curriculum in the Photography Dept. I can only imagine that now 13 years later that Computer Art is also a part of their classes.

But my Homeroom teacher WAS a Typography teacher... and yes I got lucky enough to take her class. If only I could have peeled my brain from the paint... Though that was nothing compared to the job I had in the late 80s working for a company that made Phonebooks. That work should have been done by prisoners, murderers, mailmen.

Paste up and mechanicals by hand. Using an exacto knife to make an 80 ad quota a day. Now all this work is done by computers and rightly so... but I digress. I think it is possible to teach people to be more artistic, and for those with good visual skills to mold that WITH not only a creative outlook, but an apprentice like "battery" of knowledge.

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(qr)

Neither computers nor paper are a crutch, so please stop arguing either might be.

Learning how to DRAW first is extremely important to having any kind of digital skill. I do in fact pity people who've gotten so good with using tablets and photoshop filters, that very likely cannot put color to paper and get anywhere near the results they want.

Each medium is its own reward and its own set of skills, however they DO all build upon a basic knowledge of artistic style, color theory, and the like.

You cannot - should not - learn how to draw from Comic books. There's an entire crappy generation of Image artists out there who learned directly from comics instead of heading to art school or actually learning by other means. It shows.

But by the same token, you cannot and should not attempt to make comic books without specific training to do so, BECAUSE it is its own medium. It is a storytelling medium that requires far more attention to details than some folks give it credit for. When one portion fails to live up to the others, it shows.

The only thing that is actually outdated, by the way, in producing comic books today, are hand colored separations. That's all.

Everything else is still in use from pencils and erasers and white out, to nibs - rapidographs - brushes - ballpoints - sharpies... The only significant difference is the coloring techniques because going straight to the printer from the computer is possible today. 15-18 years ago it was not. I watched first hand as these changes were made in the industry. I watched as the first *scanners* were used to produce the pages for coloring on the computer. (and you can tell that some early scanners being used were hardly better than fax machines set at a low resolution.) I watched as people grew more and more comfortable with using those electronic tools.

And I mourn the day when someone decides that inking is "not necessary" for comics. Inking *defines* comic style - when you think of a comic, you do NOT think of a sweeping fully-rendered color splash with no "lines". You think of 4-color process with bold black lines and forced perspective thanks to Jack Kirby and friends.

It's good to remember - it's good to KNOW - where we've been. It's nice to see where we CAN go - but like learning how to plough fields, it's something that cannot be replaced if it falls to the wayside. It can never be forgotten, but it can be lost as a skill and that would be a horrible shame.

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Please read my FEAR/Portal/HalfLife Fan Fiction!
Repurposed

Color Separations are the Debbil !!!

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If you [general you] cannot create your artwork without a battery backup, this is the very definition of a crutch.


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Actually, it's being prepared in case of emergency. I'm assuming your instructor used things like electric lighting while teaching the class? One could always go out and live on an Amish farm if avoiding the crutches of modern living was a priority.

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Well, my artwork would not exist without paper, so I am uncertain that this analogy holds; but I for one could, without question, create artwork without benefit of electric light. In fact I often do; nothing clarifies color like light from a north window.

I think qualifying people who don't want to go digital as "Amish" is where we jump the proverbial shark, and where I bow out of the conversation as this little exchange is in danger of devolving into a serious flamewar.

Amish and lovin' it... I guess:
Bad

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I think qualifying people who don't want to go digital as "Amish" is where we jump the proverbial shark, and where I bow out of the conversation as this little exchange is in danger of devolving into a serious flamewar.

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Oh cmon you're missing the point. You characterized the use of a specific tool as a "crutch." At least be fair about it.

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Blacklisted
"I'AM SATANS FAVORITE CHILD!!"

I think it is important to mention that although art is incredibly personal, in effect we artist's become quite protective of our own and the way we create it, We should try to be impersonal when discussing things like this. the last thing we want is personal attack's or criticism of other artist's tools or methods, this is a discussion about our opinion's on the subject and its important to take a good step back and think about what your saying before you post upset or angry. we are all very passionate people obviously so it's expected that you feel strongly about the issues raised, just try to make sure you are taking this for what it is, a discussion, not an argument. and make sure your saying something in a way that is the least insulting for an artist's of different beliefs of your own.

Keep an appropriate distance from this discussion. its nobodies intention here to slam one and another's beliefs so if it feels like some one is pointing fingers at your methods. they don't mean it and it is there opinion.

Don't post mad!

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Every one of you is wrong and only I am right. Discuss. :3

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http://www.virtueverse.net/wiki/Massacre_Melanie -the original Fire/Dark Corruptor -
http://boards.cityofheroes.com/showthread.php?t=115217
The Guide to BURN

Suichiro is the Debbil !!!

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Typography is the Debbil!!!

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You aint kidding. My wife's typography teacher at CCAD had never seen Star Wars and didn't know what a Rubick's Cube was. He was a piece of work.

Beautiful, perfect lettering of course. But I can do the same thing in about 3 minutes with a $30 printer that he'd spend hours pouring over.

The people most in need of taking typography are web designers, honestly. Sooooooo many sites out there with fonts that should never be on the same page as each other. SOME FONTS DON'T MIX DON'T YOU KNOW THE RULES OH GOD MY EYES!

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Sadly, as a rule, some typography just doesn't apply to web design. Part of the problem lies in the web browsers themselves. It is getting better, but the web has a lot a distance to go until it gets to the level of print media.

For the most part we are limited to a very few families of type, without the benefit of such niceties like kerning, needing to know the X-height of a typeface, or having the ability to set the line spacing.

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I'd just like to point out a few misconceptions.

I'll preface this post by saying that my chosen medium is digital. Be it photography, digital illustration, digital imagery, video, or web design. Even my web coding has an artistic side to it, just like any writing it can be as good as high literature or as trashy as a pulp romance.

I have Dysgraphia (and the rest of the Dyslexia family) and my non-digital art suffers from it.

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it is infinitely easier to use a computer for art then traditional means. As bayani touched on about bad habits: Copy, paste, layers, undo are all potential crutches an artist can fall into for quick results.

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Layers are not crutches. In a way they are as essential as mixing just the right color in paint (oil or acrylic). Layers are process, not the end result. Okay maybe they are the end result if you are talking about traditional cel-based animation, but not digital images.

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I want to take a break here and say im not pointing any fingers at anyone at on this forum, I respect and admire everyone on here and i mean EVERYONE for their own style and im not trying to say digital art is what is wrong with the world. the problem is the inclination that you can be lazy and still accomplish your goal, the process of drawing with pencil then screwing up and erasing repetitively is tedious annoying and character building,

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Actually, according to a couple of teachers I know erasing is evil and should never be done. These teachers are anti-digital or, at best, digital novices. The best part for me about this statement is that they are not talking about digital media when they say this. They are talking about pencil and paper. They believe you are using a crutch by using an eraser to correct your pencil mistakes.

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some people don't have the staying power to become artist's because of a lack of patience, practice really does make perfect.

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To be fair I know a number of my fellow students who can't wait to get onto Getty Images and see what they can use for their next project. I personally can't understand why as it is much more satisfying to create my own work than to use work form someone else. Perhaps this is why I'm doomed to be held up as an example that "web developers can design as well" by some of my teachers.

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with the computer you can make more mistakes faster, undo is easier then erasing everything and it leaves no mark on the paper. and when things get tough you have copy paste and a host of other quick fixes to fall back on none of these being helpful towards artistic progression.

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I think you are mistaken. The ability to make more mistakes faster speeds up learning for those who wish to do so.

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Its all well and good if people have the strength of character to avoid using these things but seeing what the rest of the world is like the majority of people will fall into these easy fix traps and wont know what to do when a quick fix isn't good enough. that's when the whole becomes to deep to climb out of and people decide they cant be bothered, its too hard.

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I think this applies to ALL media. You may not like a specific tool, but there is a reason it is there. Like erasers. Are they crutches? Well if you talk to people who use ink as a medium, then they very well may say so. A better way to say it is that every medium has its own time saving tools and methods.

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I like digital art as much as every one of you here but in my opinion a computer is a tool that should be taken into the hands of some experience. easy doesn't build character and you need plenty of it to make it as an artist in this world.

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Art doesn't have to be a character builder. The world can do its share of building character without an artist suffering for his or her art.

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I don't want this to turn into a pissing contest, and the return rebuttal to be as long or longer, I know I dragged on, if you disagree feel free to say it. this is all my opinion, I am entitled to it. I know I may have stepped on toes but try to remember that it's not a personal attack and I don't mean for it to be directed at any of you.

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I think it was an interesting point of view. The main thing that I disagree with is with the "us vs them" (traditional=hard and character building vs digital=easy and servile) reasoning. From my perspective it is counter-productive and unneeded. Art is not the chosen medium, it is the message.

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If you [general you] cannot create your artwork without a battery backup, this is the very definition of a crutch.

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This is completely absurd.

Mad lib time:
If you [general you] cannot create your artwork without _____________, this is the very definition of a crutch. (insert from below)

<ul type="square">[*]a battery backup[*]a pencil[*]a brush[*]pigments[*]body movement[*]chisels[*]canvas[*]paper[*]metal[*]a computer[*]ink[*]typography[*]fabric[*]light[*]a brain[*]eyes[*]limbs[/list]Yup, completely interchangeable and all equally absurd.

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My crutches are music, references to a degree, research to a fault, and or some snacks!

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My crutch is the power of Satan.

Wait a second.... that says Stan.... dangit!

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Mine is the power of Satin.


Mmmm, satin.

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Please read my FEAR/Portal/HalfLife Fan Fiction!
Repurposed

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My crutches are music, references to a degree, research to a fault, and or some snacks!

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We all (everyone) have weaknesses. This is why we have tools in the first place.

My whole point is "Foundations = good, Crutches = tools. Tools are tools. They are neither good or bad."

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Tool are the Debbil !!!

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Mine is the power of Satin.


Mmmm, satin.

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I've met quite a few satin worshipers online. I always ask them if they have satin sheets and such. They usually respond with something like "What? No, that'd be corny, like those kid's sheets with cartoons on them. my sheets are black." or "They make Satin sheets? Where can I get some?".

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@Johnstone & @Johnstone 2
ediblePoly.com
All my characters

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Tool are the Debbil !!!

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Well, I know computers are. On the other hand I don't have to worry as much about toxic ingredients, paints, or disposing my scraps.

I've worked with computers a long time before they became art tools. Even when they started to have glimmers of art they were limited to either a single color or had other serious limitations. Until I find a better medium for my art, I'm going to continue to use it though.

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