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... it seems that art as a personal hand done peice of ones self is dieing bit by bit I went through the top ten artist's in the arena , every last one of them was photoshopped anime , not one was a peice of skill and hand drawn talent , all of them were made by a computer.
Honestly I was biding my time until I had to write this type of reply out again, so next time it comes up I'm just gonna copy and paste this one:
At this point, every time someone posts this same tired argument on Gaia they only make it clear to everyone else just how little they know about using a digital medium. Wanna know how unoriginal this topic is? Even the "when motion pictures came out stage actors didn't consider motion picture actors to be legitimate" reply has been used before. It's been disproven so many times...
Do you even have an idea of how many professional illustrators, graphic designers, animators, comic book artists, etc do their work digitally because it's cost-effective after the initial investment (computer, tablet, program) and a LOT easier to reproduce and print?
Kage mentioned this already, but if you ("you" as in anyone who thinks like this) think that the computer does all of the drawing for you, you obviously don't know what you're talking about and are thus not credible. If that were the case then why is there so much bad/mediocre Photoshop art out there? No tool in Photoshop is going to hide the fact that somebody doesn't know how to draw if they can't. If you can't handle color and don't understand how it works together, if you don't understand how to manipulate values, if your compositions suck, if you don't understand how to observe whatever you're drawing, the program won't help you. It only does what it's told to do. All of the undo commands in the world won't help a lack of knowledge. Bad filters that render clouds and fire patterns, or ridiculous lense flares stick out like a sore, bleeding, infected, gangrene thumb if the rest of the picture isn't up to par.
Artists who cannot carry their weight in traditional media also stand out-- I understand that this is hard for a non-artist or a beginner to recognize, so you'll have to trust me on this. An experienced artist can tell just how well someone will fare in traditional media, in the same way an experienced artist can figure out who copies artwork versus someone who comes up with their own.
Nobody's going to tell me that the same brush strokes that I do -with my hands- are somehow less valid just because it's not on paper or canvas. Nobody's going to convince me that my work is somehow souless and less legitimate just because I can't stick my fingers into it or bleed on it, etc. That's a weak argument-- there are many paintings that have moved me, and I've only seen them in books or online. All I have are my eyes to see them with, and the context of the work if I'm lucky.
To say that digital work is a cheap and easy copout is also ridiculous-- A digital medium may have some very nice advantages, but it also has distinct disadvantages. For one, people often have difficulty drawing on a tablet because they are unable to produce smooth lines when using a plastic tip against a plastic surface. This provides little to no resistance and lineart can often come out wobbly. Also, many people, when first using a tablet draw lopsided pictures because they aren't used to being unable to look directly at what they are drawing. This takes a bit of conditioning to get used to. It also gets very painful to draw with a mouse after extended periods of time.
There should be emphasis on the fact that digital is still just a medium.
There is also a learning curve involved that is not as harsh using any traditional medium. Paint, charcoal, graphite, watercolor, etc. all take getting used to but they are all straightforward when learning how to use them. "Whoops, my stroke is too heavy, I'd better lighten it." "This needs more water, the paint feels too thick." "My nib is dripping, I'd better use less ink." With a digital program you are limited to what you know about the program. If somebody doesn't know how to get their brushstrokes to blend with each other they're not going to progress until they figure it out.
Christ, a notice on this topic -alone- should be stickied at this point. rolleyes
Discussion is at http://www.gaiaonline.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=10237943&page=1
