Procreate Basics: How to Start With Digital Painting

Digital painting and art have gained a new dimension with iPad’s Procreate. The IoS app is built for high-quality design, animation, drawing, sketching, graphic designing, illustration and painting experience. It is a hit among professionals with its interactive make-up and state-of-the-art tools. But, it has also made digital art easy and approachable for beginners.

We present a short crash course for all you beginners clueless on how to use Procreate.

How to Draw With Procreate?

Our online learning platform is buzzing with digital artists lauding the award-winning app. So here is a brief introduction to the basics of Procreate - its tools and features. 

1. Choosing the Canvas

The very step is to set up a proper canvas to begin your drawing. Tap on the Procreate icon on your home screen to launch the app. You enter the Gallery space, which displays all your current works. On the top extreme right corner, tap on the + sign for a blank canvas. On the canvas, all the tools are segregated on the top right and left panels horizontally and on a left vertical panel. 

As a beginner, you only need to get the hang of these essential gestures and tools:

 2. Procreate Brushes

You can easily view a range of Procreate brushes on the canvas interface by tapping on the brush icon on the canvas toolbar. With more than 100 pre-installed brushes, and the ability to download brushes by other artists, you are offered a diverse selection to pick from.

3. Gestures

One of the reasons that add to the wholesome experience of Procreate app is its gestures. The gestures you are most likely to use as a beginner include:

Undo - with two fingers, tap anywhere on the screen

Redo - with three fingers, tap anywhere on the screen

Clean the canvas - Scrub the canvas with three fingers

4. Erase

Use the erase tool conveniently placed on the top right bar, shaped like an erase, next to the smudge tool.

5. Layers

The layers tool adds to the beauty of the art by allowing you to create isolated layers and modifying them to produce effects. Tap the layers tool next to the eraser and create/select layers.

6. Colour

The colour dot on the extreme right corner of the screen is used to choose a colour. Tap on it to open the colour menu and select the appropriate shade or hue from the disk that opens. Since we are on the topic, choosing the right colours is quintessential for the message your art wants to convey. Apart from artistic purposes, selecting the right colour becomes essential to get the meaning and intention successfully. For this, knowledge of colour psychology comes in handy.  

As a beginner, this crash course will quickly help you make your first masterpiece. Whip out your Procreate app and begin right away.