Digital Painting Exercises?

[maemaemae]

I have Photoshop CS5 & a pressure-sensitive tablet (that isn't working at the moment, but will be sometime) that I would like to use in digital painting. I don't have much experience in it yet, but I have watched many tutorials. I've tried it first hand, but I feel as if I'm jumping into it too quickly. What are some simple exercises I can do for practice? With or without a tablet would be great.

[Luwano]

At 10/16/11 11:35 AM, maemaemae wrote: I have Photoshop CS5 & a pressure-sensitive tablet (that isn't working at the moment, but will be sometime) that I would like to use in digital painting. I don't have much experience in it yet, but I have watched many tutorials. I've tried it first hand, but I feel as if I'm jumping into it too quickly. What are some simple exercises I can do for practice? With or without a tablet would be great.

Depends on your skill level, but you could always go far basic shapes. Draw a sphere, a cube and so on. It's good shading exercise and helps with both, your digital and traditional art. As for the tablet, many people not only use it for drawing but also for browsing and other tasks just to get used to it. Maybe that can help you too.

If you would like more detailed advice you could upload something you have drawn so people know how they can help you.

Good luck!

[bigjonny13]

Well, if you want to do digital painting, you can't practice without doing digital painting.
Unfortunately, there isn't as much of a traditional counterpart to it due to all the various settings you use. Your best bet is just to try and keep practicing.
As for the tablet itself though, it will take some time getting used to it. You can just jump in and continually work at it, you just need time. You don't want to jump into colouring before you have a firm grasp on line work. A piece with great colouring can be ruined by mediocre lines.
So I suggest just practice drawing with your tablet for now, and once you feel comfortable, just start practicing colouring.
I know you said you've watched a lot of tutorials, but I recommend checking this one out if you haven't.

[ornery]

Do you know any art basics (shape, line, shading, perspective, etc.)? I would get a relatively good understanding of those first.