Have you ever wanted to turn a digital photograph in to a digital painting? Have you ever wanted to take a sketch you drew and turned that in to a digital painting? Have you ever just wanted to learn how to paint, sketch, or draw using Adobe Photoshop or Corel Painter? Well, The Photoshop and Painter Artists Tablet Book can show you how to do it. Besides covering these two incredible programs it also covers graphics tablets like the ones from Wacom as well as their accessories like the airbrush Wacom offers as a separate purchase.

 

Combine this book with either software package and a graphics tablet and you too can soon be creating real digital art. The book covers such topics as Photoshop, Painter and graphics tablet basics, assembling brushes and paint, the illusion of volume, tone and modeling, atmosphere and more. It also includes exercises for getting used to using a graphics tablet which can be a big help if you have never used one before. Once your past all of that the book moves in to techniques like starting with a scanned drawing and turning it in a painting or using a photo for a reference and more. The other thing that is nice is these techniques are provided for both Adobe Photoshop and Corel Painter so it doesn't matter which program you use you can learn to work in it.

 

Chapters:

 

Chapter 1: The Digital Art Studio
Chapter 2: Photoshop, Painter, and Tablet Basics for Artists
Chapter 3: Assembling Brushes and Paints
Chapter 4: Drawing and Tablet Exercises
Chapter 5: The Illusion of Volume
Chapter 6: Sensitive Tone and Modeling
Chapter 7: A Sense of Atmosphere
Chapter 8: Starting with a Scanned Drawing
Chapter 9: Using a Photo Reference for Painting
Chapter 10: Defining the Focal Point
Chapter 11: Simulating Paper and Canvas
Chapter 12: Mixing Media
Chapter 13: Retouching, Tinting, and Painting
Chapter 14: Composing from the Imagination

 

This is a very unique book, many books on Adobe Photoshop touch on the natural media tools that it has. There are however very few books for Corel Painter, and none of them deal with taking another source be it a drawing, photograph or something in your mind and turning it in to a painting. They assume that once you know how to use the program that the artistic part, the techniques and know how to use those tools will appear out of the blue. For a lot of people, myself included this just doesn't happen, we need more help and this book provides it. This is a very specific and focused book and I love it. Besides the wonderful topic the book is in full color with lots of sample images and screen shots, the sample images are inspiring at the very least. It is easy to read and understand, though I think at least a basic understanding of either of the two programs you choose to use is a plus, but it isn't required.

 

This is a must have book for anyone that wants to learn to be a digital artist. With techniques for using photos or scanned line drawings as your starting point you really don't have to be able to paint or draw. Though some talent will make things easier you can still do just fine without it. Digital painting and art creation isn't all that hard but it is a lot of fun.