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Digital Drawings with the Apple Pencil

Up until last summer I had been using a mouse to do my digital drawings. Over the years I did try various inexpensive options from cheap stylus for an old ipad to a drawing tablet attached to my computer. Neither option was of any help to me as I would just prefer to draw on paper with a pencil and then ink the drawing and scan it in to photoshop and clean it up there. It felt as if I was just repeating a lot of steps. Simple illustrations seemed to take forever.

So, last summer, while I was working in Busan, I finally took the leap and bought a new Ipad Air with the Apple Pencil and it has been fantastic. It has cut out a lot of the in between work so now I can get projects done a lot quicker and most cleaning up is just easily done after inking on the ipad by just deleting a background layer. I have my eye on a cintiq in the future but for now an affordable alternative is the ipad Air (cheaper than the Ipad Pro) and apple pencil.

This was a sketch I did directly on my Ipad Air with the apple pencil using the free drawing software Procreate.
Using layers I was able to continue coloring in Procreate on the ipad using the apple pencil.

Procreate has a large selection of drawing, painting and coloring tools, but what I like most about it is the smudge tool as it is great for blending and feels like I am working with pastel on paper in many ways.

This little red robin was also done in procreate using the Ipad Air and apple pencil. I used the smudging tool quite a lot here.

While a cintiq would be a dream drawing tool, it doesn’t have the mobility of drawing on a tablet. Being able to step away from the desk and computer and sit out in the garden or a coffee shop, or just anywhere you can find that creative inspiration, is a treat with the tablet. Now with the apple pencil and some practice it is like you are carrying your art pad and a whole lot of art tools with you but without the mess.

Another drawing I completed in Procreate. The smudge tool is probably a lot more obvious here. The ability to mix lots of different media from pastels to ink to oils and then highlight with the fantastic light brushes for that extra pop is amazing.