How to start digital painting ( the wonderful 1th guide to get started easily )

Did you ever wonder how to start digital painting ? which software, which graphic tablet, which brushes ? Wonder no more, we cover your back here. 

In this article you'll see

how to start digital painting ( which tablet to choose )

how to start digital painting without choosing a good tablet ? Let's imagine you got the necessary money to buy a tablet. But when you arrive at the shop, you just hesitate in front of thousand of others modals, certain of them are cheap, others a little bit more expansive. Let's be honest : You are confused. What are the exact criterias you should look up to, if you want to buy a graphic tablet ?  Just like drawing aspect, i have to confess that the criterias about choosing a good graphic tablet are around five : The size, the levels of pressure, the resolution, the responsiveness, the pen type. 

Most Well Known Tablet Brands : 

Wacom

Americans have wacom, chinese have huion. It's a well known fact within the universe of artists. Wacom offer a great drawing experience for professional and experienced artist with expansive heavy tablets. You should consider investing in wacom only if you seek to invest into a graphic tablet that would last for 12 to 13 years.

Huion

If you seek an affordable type of graphic tablet, Huion is one of the best brand you can go to. They mainly create tablets made for beginner and intermediary artists, but they also have a certain range for experienced artist. Huion mostly offers battery-powered styluses and tablets with at least 2048 pressure level. ( minimum required for digital painting ) 

XP-Pen

Sturdy and compact, XP-Pen offers a nice mid-range display and non display drawing tablets, if you seek tablets that have a lot of programmable buttons, you are in the right place.  Others brands are also good, you have Ugee, Kenting. Gaemon that is different from huion despite being chinese, for example, during test comparison, i observed that the friction of gaemon is hight unlike Huion. It depend on your preference. Do you want tablet that have a lot of friction ? so that it can move with your hand when you move it ... We recommend for beginners to start with non-display tablet, they are well known for their efficiency to do the job without ruining your budget. 

Key points and specification : 

Pressure sensitivity

Let's take the Huion 430p.If you read the specification, you'll find that levels of pressure are about 4091. Which is pretty decent if you want to draw with it. If you take a medium tablet, you'll find that the levels of pressure are about 8096. If you can invest 20 to 25 dollars more, you'll get a wonderful professional tablet.  Always keep this in mind: Pressure sensitivity define the opacity of your lines. How much the device will respond to the pressure of your hand. The more the levels are high, the more you'll have shades. 

Size : 

There are two factors you can consider when discussing about tablet size : Any professional can talk about it :  

Active area

The area where the pen actually has an effect. 

General dimension

The whole tablet that include the areas where you can't draw with the pen such as the buttons, the side panel etc ...  Only the active area matter. It is completely useless to choose a big tablet if the active area is small. 

The resolution

Resolution is something that describe mainly, how many lines per inch (2.54 centimeter) the tablet can display and how much it can detect from the stylus.  The more larger the tablet is, the more LPI it has. If you choose a small tablet like Huion 430p or a medium one like 1060. I can assure you they have the same LPI resolution, this is definitly something that made me buy Huion for years. 

Responsiveness : 

You can have the biggest screen on the planet, if the response time is mediocre, you'll get nowhere. It's the same thing with tablet. Even if you are a beginner or intermediary and you'll choose tablet without screen. You must watch this criter. (Keep in mind that your personal computer configuration may play a role in the time response of your tablet : CPU, GPU, RAM ) 

Pen type : 

There is three type of pen, but you only have to keep two in mind, they are the most common : Rechargeable styluses : This type need charging just like your phone. And if they die you will have to find a power source to charge it before you can draw your artworks again.  EMR pen : they employ an innovative electromagnetic frequency that transfers power to the pen wirelessly right from the tablet, this is a recent and new type of pen that has been adapted for new tablet generation like the New 1060 plus. There is absolutely no need to charge it, it is the best type of pen you can get. 

Brushes for digital painting ( which one to choose ? )

Your brush is like the complementary foods you can take to optimize your results when you do Gym. They work for 20 percent of your results.  That said. 20 percent of your results is important, especially if you're someone that can't use one hundred percent of his potentiel yet. 

How much brushes you'll need to optimize your rendering ?

Well, to be honest. Not that much. But what most of the people forget to tell you is that you'll end up using three or five Brushes for digital painting at the middle of your professional career, not at the beginning. In the beginning, you have to wittingly go search deep in order to explore things. It is important to be convinced that you explored all the main possibility.  There is more than four thousand brushes in nature and none of them is similar to the other. You have to choose what fits the results you have in your head. 

Where can i download efficient brushes ?

By downloading pack that talk about your specialization. For example. If you are specialized in environment and landscape, it is more appropriate for you to download two or three pack of environment, this way you can be sure that you'll miss nothing.For the rest, download some general brush for digital painting like the pack of Tsaochin in Devian art : Here are my Five pack of Brushes for digital painting ( free and premium ) : 

1. Worya Free PS Brush pack

2. Houston Free Brushes for Portrait Painting

3. Trent kaniuaga brushes 2019 pack
4. Digital painting brushes by Matt heath
5. Digital painting concept art brushes by SoldatNordsken

Conclusion

We hope this quick little guide will help you to answer to the question : how to start digital painting and choose your graphic tablet and some basic brushes.If you want to go further and understand more complex mecanism. Like color and light, perspective, see the links below !

1. how to start digital painting and Painting better ( 21 fundamentals ) 
2. Understanding colors and light
3. Painting better composition