By: Joshua Gerard Masa
I like to keep it old school using a pencil or pen and ink on paper when it comes to creating illustrations. Sketching and drawing exercises on paper gives me a more organic and tactile feeling of what I’m creating. Although digital drawing pads and tablets are designed to possess a similar drawing experience as drawing on actual paper, there is still nothing like using traditional media as a fundamental skill set to making quality creative work.
The forgiving nature of creating art digitally can make illustrating so much faster and flexible, given the variety of applications, shortcuts, and tools that can be used collectively to create and share art easily. However, without the convenient undo option that digital art has to offer, one can learn and work from his/her mistakes faster with the traditional method. You train yourself to create lesser mistakes and draw lines and strokes more confidently.
Traditional art is not dead. Even in this digital age, I would still prefer make use of traditional mediums and materials for my work. There is something truly special about the grip of a pencil in your hand, gliding along the surface of the paper as you draw. I believe working with traditional art mediums can be more fulfilling than digital as the practice helps artists build a deeper understanding of the creative process and ways to creative problem solving.
Personally, I find it interesting to combine disparate things in every one of my illustrations. While many art pieces today have thought-provoking messages behind them, my artworks are simply made out of pure randomness.
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