Every Picture Can Potentially Tell a Lie

If You Know Where to Look For The Truth!

Needless to say, I am pregnant and miserable at this particular stage, I was hoping my baby boy would make his way into the world this week, but he seems to have decided that he is quite content in the safety of my womb for now. Being that I am so uncomfortable I spend quite a lot of my time sitting down and relaxing, trying not to think about the discomfort. Anyone who has ever been pregnant knows what I am feeling like!

In an effort to ease my current discomfort I bought a magazine off the rack that I do occasionally like to peruse through. I used to subscribe to this magazine years back but stopped my subscription when the magazine became too predictable and, in my own opinion, appears to market mostly toward “other artists.” It has in my eyes become a magazine where “artists” find inspiration from other artists and not one which draws clients and collectors to their direct market.

I became inspired to discuss digital art once again, after reading an article in this particular magazine about “digital art” and because I was a little baffled by the claim that the artist was digitally painting his/her piece from scratch completely by hand, since this artist didn’t really show his/her digital palette or his/er full reference images, or screen shots. This really bothers me, and I wish this artist would have shown EVERYTHING in his/her repertoire where anyone with expert knowledge in digital arts can clearly see when an artist is using a photograph as the base layer and then using the smudge tool and the “sample all layers” choice selection. I have some major doubts about this particular artist’s claim that his/her work is “all hand done”, especially without showing his/her screen shots and full steps, to prove otherwise. I will not deny the fact that the images this artist creates are in fact gorgeous! I just challenge the claim that this artist "isn't using a photograph as a "base layer".

I didn’t spend 7 years in some of the top art schools in this country being mentored by some of the finest illustrators and artists working in the world today and learning about all the “nifty” tricks of the trade, ins and outs, and the dos and don’ts! I will question any inconsistency I see in someone’s claim or work ethic. My illustration background is rooted deeply in the digital arts realm and can honestly say that many of the programs of today can create amazing works of art without the mess of actual real-life art making products. Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter are my favorites by far and I use both interchangeably with each other to produce the best artworks I can.

The smudge tool with the sample all layers with the photograph on the bottom layer is a process that is the very well-known “secret dirty trick” to digital painting. I have used it, many have used it, and some of the best in the market have used it. It’s really no secret to any of us who do this work for a living. But honesty and integrity still hold their merits and for an artist to call his or her work “completely hand created” but use a photograph as a base layer is simply lying. In my opinion it is no different than printing a drawing or picture directly on canvas and then painting right on top of that! If you are going to do it, be honest be fair, otherwise you are hurting the reputations those who do not employ such tactics!

Call it what it truly is, digitally manipulated and digitally painted FINE ART PHOTOGRAPHY.

You should also know that one must be careful when telling “others” the work is COMPLETELY done from scratch without the use of photograph. And one must also be careful when using such a method. Why? Because whether you are aware of it or not, there are software programs out there that can in fact read the digital encoding of photographic images not matter how cut, spliced, painted, or smudged the original is, even if the image is used on a “bottom” layer and erased later when the final image is complete. These programs can in fact alert the person scanning the image for the presence of any photography used, right down to the make, model number of the camera, the F-stop, the date, and in some cases even the name of the photographer who took the image. These programs can read this no matter how manipulated the final image maybe!
Artists working exclusively in the “digital fine arts market” will most likely be able to get away with cheating techniques because, well let’s face it, the general public oohing and awing over the artworks really do not have the knowledge or expertise to know any better. Though be warned, the younger generations of collectors and clients are technologically savvy now and also have a bit of a clue, so be extra cautious!

Artists and illustrators working in the commercial art market must be very cautious to this. There are many art directors and art editors who will run their “special” programs and if they find the lie within the picture, the artist had better be able to explain himself or herself and provide proper documentation for the” right of use” with any photograph that they have used that is not taken by themselves, or they may find themself in court with some serious copyright infringement laws being enforced and a fine that can potentially cost over 150K.

That is why if you are working in the digital arts realm; keep all working PDF files on every image you have created. I keep a specific portable hard drive just for this purpose. That way if anyone claims you are “cheating” you can send them the proof and you have documentation of all your steps you used in creating your pieces. Though, I keep my files mostly for using them as instructional tools for teaching lessons, and I would also like to add that I am also looking forward to hosting online workshops in the very near future!
In closing you never know when someone will want to see your stages of work progress. There are a lot of skeptics in the digital art world still so be prepared to defend yourself!

A Sample of Digital Steps in a portrait I am doing of my horse Crush, these are done in Adobe Photoshop...

Step 1: The Sketch, first done on paper, then scanned in and tinkered with a bit using the contrast mode to make my pencil lines really dark. Erased and digitally drawn lines added to turn the sketch into a digital line drawing.

Step 2:My horse Crush is a dapple grey and I knew in my mind what my basic color palette would be to better contrast and show off the dapple grey. I chose purples. I made the background layer a gradient layer from dark purple to a medium purple color.

Step 3: I am "priming" my horse for the painting process. I selected the sketch of my horse then filled it with a light lavendar color using the paint bucket. Then I started painting a light priming color using a wet media brush.

Step 4: I am using the same wet media brush and blocking in the dark dark, almost black, primer. I keep the horses shape selected so I "stay in the lines".

Step 5:Now I am moving onto the basic "blocking in" technique I use. I am blocking in the medium tone with what I call the light prime and the dark prime. It looks goofy right now, but it will all come together. Notice, that I still keep the horse selected so I stay in the lines.

Step 6:I created a folder called "horse" where all the intial stages of the horse will be kept. I am preparing to move onto blocking in the background.

Step 7:While the horse is selected I am going to now select the inverse so I anything I do in the background will stay in the background and not on the horse. I am going to start blocking in the lighter purplish white in the background using a dry media brush.

Step 8:I have kept the horse's shape selected and I am still working the light and now the dark into the background using the dry media brush.

Step 9:Here is what it looks like with the horse's folder layers made all visible.

Step 10:I usually used some found reference to use to look at for "color ideas", which is what I show here. These particular images, one of the being a resin horse by Carol Williams, were chosen because I needed goo reference for the dappling effect. I have photographs of my horse spread out on the table next to my computer to help me with his specific coloring.

Step 11:I have set up a folder now for the background and the horse and now I am working on the first "detail" layer where I start using my smudge tool. This is going to smooth out all my painting strokes.

Step 12, 13, 14:These next three steps just to demonstrate the time that goes into blending with the smudge tool and how it evolves.

~to be continued~ It is Kentucky Derby Time so I must leave this entry and demonstrate the remainder of this digital painting next time! Thanks for reading!