Traditional vs digital art

Hello Charlie, in this blog I will be taking a look at digital art vs traditional art.

All the types of art forms can be divided into two big groups, traditional art and digital art. 

So for me, I would say that traditional art is any art that is done with entirely physical media as all the tools like a pencil, a paint brush, a can of graffiti, etc. Even the final result is on something physical such as a paper, canvas, a piece of wood or a wall.  On the contrary to digital art is done partially with physical media and partially with digital media. It is physical as it's made using physical computers and pens but the drawing software is digital and hence the result is also on the digital plane such as a video or a photo.

The first difference that we can notice right away is the tool that you will have to hold to draw, in traditional art, you will have to buy all sorts of different tools for different types of art such as paint brushes and water colors ( or oil colors, pastel colors, acrylic color, and the list goes on ) for painting, different pencils for sketching with varying levels of hardness, or different color pencils for a colored drawing, and a lot more tools for other art styles. On the contrary, in digital art, all you need is a a stylus, AKA one pen for literally every tool imaginable as long as the software that you installed has it ( of course  you could in theory do it with a mouse but it wouldn't look really good ). A stylus is also more long lasting as they only need a battery charge whereas for traditional art media, you have to buy new tools everything the old ones are finished. With the images below, you can see just how convenient a stylus is compared to traditional art medias.

( A set of 20 paint brushes )

( A set of color pencils )

( A drawing stylus by Wacom )

( Apple pencil [a drawing stylus] )

The next thing that sets them apart is the medium on which the art is drawn. In traditional art, you can draw on a piece of paper for sketches, a canvas for painting or a wall for graffiti ( Basically there are a lot of different things that you can draw on. But for digital art, you need to have a tablet with a screen to directly draw on it or a screen less tablet connected to a computer with a screen. So basically again the same trend, you only need one surface that will last practically forever rather than buying a new one for every new piece of art. 

( A screen less drawing tablet )

( A drawing tablet with a screen )

( A canvas )

Now the actual drawing experience can vary too. In traditional art, you have all the different tools for different textures but still you cannot get every different brush, but with digital art, you can pretty much download all sorts of different brushes for free. Then obviously in traditional art, there is the authentic paper like feeling since there is friction but on a digital tablet it's more like rubbing plastic with glass ( but even this can be countered with frictional stylus tips to screen protectors that make the drawing feel more natural ). In traditional art, there is only one unique copy which can be good, since it cannot be replicated and hence you are the only owner a and bad because it cannot be duplicated easily if need for a poster for example. On the contrary, in digital art, you can make as many copies as you want of your artwork which again has pros and cons, since it can be easily replicated, the work can be stolen more easily but this is also a good thing since you can send it on the internet much more easily if needed. Digital art has a lot more tools depending on the software like symmetry, perspective , perfect shapes and a lot more. But in traditional art, you can use rulers, compasses, protractors, etc to replicate these effects but it is a lot harder. One of the biggest conveniences of digital art is the fact that you can undo anything with the click of a button or erase anything without leaving a trace whereas on traditional art, every time you erase, marks are left behind. Traditional art is also way less portable since you cannot bring an entire set of brushes, a canvas and colors everywhere, but for digital art, all you need is a tablet and a stylus. In terms of cost, obviously digital is expensive at the start since buying a tablet can cost a lot ( almost 350$ ) but you could also buy an iPad and do digital art on it as well as everything else that you can do on a phone but traditional art may seem cheap at the start, but to sustain it over the years, you will probably end up investing much more than a tablet. Although digital art soft ware can cost you but there are loads of free digital art apps that are great such as Skecthbook, Gimp or Krita.

Personally, I would say digital art is better since it is much more convenient to do and I would highly recommend anyone to try it if you already have tablet since you only need a stylus. Or you can buy a screen less tablet if you already have a computer.