Traditional & Photoshop Mix Traditional And Digital Tools

There are many ways to use traditional techniques to enhance your digital artwork. Chantal Horeis goes through her favoured approach

I love the tactile and sometimes random textures that occur when working with traditional tools.

I’m also fascinated by the endless possibilities that digital workflows have to offer, so I never want to choose one over the other.

A couple of years ago I started to experiment with different approaches to drawing and painting. I began creating traditional-digital hybrids and refined my process using custom textures and scanned-in papers. Different textures can be a lot of fun to play around with: they give your artwork a lovely finish. Furthermore, this approach enables you to describe surface textures of specific elements in your artwork, or emphasise certain shapes and objects in your image, making them stand out within the composition.

In this workshop I’m going to show you the process behind one of my illustrations, and explain how I create and preserve textures. For the traditional stages I’m going to use graphite and ink on paper, but you don’t have to follow my lead. Just use your favourite traditional medium and play around with the effects you can create with it. This is really about finding the most enjoyable process for you. The following steps are transferable to graphite, watercolours, oils… you name it! I would love this workshop to provide technical guidance, but also inspire you to experiment with different tools to create your unique painting process.

1 Digitally sketching out the idea

When beginning a new illustration I usually start with a simple sketch that captures the main idea of the artwork, just to check whether it has potential. I do this digitally, because I can make any changes in just a few seconds. Once I’m happy that my idea is worth developing I create a more refined sketch that provides greater details and presents an appealing composition.

2 Transferring the drawing to paper