How to Start with Digital Art: Procreate Tips for Beginners

When I set out to learn how to draw digitally, I remember how overwhelmed I was by all the features and possibilities. Here is a beginner’s guide to digital art based on my experience to help get you started.

What You Need to Get Started

First off, you'll need a graphics tablet. There are several versions available, with some specifically designed for artists, like the Wacom tablets. Personally, I started with a refurbished iPad and the first-generation Apple Pencil.

Later, I upgraded to an iPad Air with more storage. It's important to get an iPad with enough storage—my first one only had 32GB, which wasn't enough for using Procreate and keeping other apps on my device.

Before getting the Apple Pencil, I tried a cheaper alternative. Let’s be honest, the Apple Pencil is quite expensive, but it's worth the investment. It functions like a regular pen, is pressure-sensitive, and allows you to rest your hand on the tablet while drawing without interfering with the pen's performance.

The newer generation of the Apple Pencil also charges in a more practical way, so you won’t lose the adapter.

The last thing you'll need to get started is drawing software. I personally use Procreate, which I bought for just €10 at the time, and it’s only slightly more expensive now. You can transfer the app to a new iPad, and I haven’t felt the need to try any other drawing software.

Many artists use Adobe Illustrator for detailed or vector work, but I haven't tried it yet because it's quite expensive.

While Procreate can be a bit confusing at first, it is still a very user-friendly app that caters to both beginners and advanced artists. You can upgrade your brushes by downloading new brush sets, and the interface feels very intuitive to me.

The layers may take some getting used to, but once you’re familiar with them, they become very helpful to work with.

How to get Started

There are several approaches you can take to starting your digital art journey. You can either watch tutorials and learn techniques or, like I did, learn by doing while intermittently researching how to accomplish specific tasks.

Personally, I can get very overwhelmed by tutorials, so I tend to watch them only occasionally for particular techniques.

Working with layers

A lot of digital art relies on working with layers. Layers let you separate different elements of your artwork, making it easier to edit and refine. With layers, you can work non-destructively and always revert to the original state of your layer.

However, they do take time to get used to. Initially, I didn’t understand their purpose, so I drew everything on a single layer, like on paper. Later, I separated the line art onto one layer and the colors onto others.

Now, I have a bit of layer chaos, using the maximum of 130 layers on my canvas. Which means I still want to improve my layer management skills.

Layer Functions

Layers are not only useful for working non-destructively; they also offer specific features like clipping masks and alpha locks. Here’s a quick rundown of what they mean:

Clipping Masks: Think of clipping masks as a way to “clip” or limit what’s visible on one layer to the shape of another layer underneath it. If you have a layer with a drawing, and you create a clipping mask on top of it, you can paint or add details to the top layer without affecting anything outside the shape of the bottom layer. It’s great for adding colors or textures that only appear within specific areas.
Alpha Lock: Alpha Lock allows you to lock the transparency of a layer, so you can paint or modify only the existing pixels without affecting the transparent parts. It’s useful for shading or adding details to areas where you already have artwork, without accidentally spilling over into transparent regions.
Layer Masks: Layer masks let you hide parts of a layer without permanently deleting them. By painting on the mask with black, you can hide parts of the layer, and painting with white reveals them again. It’s a flexible way to blend and adjust parts of your artwork without making irreversible changes.
Adjustment Layers: These are special layers that apply adjustments, like changing brightness, contrast, or color, to the layers below them without altering the original layers directly. It’s a non-destructive way to tweak your artwork.
Blend Modes: Blend modes control how layers interact with each other. For instance, you can set a layer to “Multiply” to make the colors darker and blend with the layers underneath or “Overlay” to enhance contrast. It’s a way to experiment with how different layers mix and affect each other.

I use Multiply for creating shadows, Overlay to make my colours more vibrant, and Clipping Masks to make my life easier while coloring.

The other functions I am still trying out and most of the time I wing it without actually knowing what I am doing. That is, however, how I got to learn how to use the layer functions.

Using Colors

Procreate offers a range of color options that make it easy to find the perfect shade for your artwork. You can use the color wheel to select colors manually, or you can pick from a wide range of pre-set palettes.

The app also lets you save your favorite colors and create custom palettes for different projects. Plus, you can adjust the opacity and blending of colors to get just the right effect. All these options give you a lot of flexibility and control over your color choices.

Exploring Brushes

In Procreate, the brush options are incredibly versatile. You can choose from a huge variety of pre-made brushes for different effects, like pencils, paints, and textures. If you want to customize your tools, you can tweak brush settings or even create your own brushes from scratch. Plus, you can download new brush sets from other artists.

My advice is to pick your favorite brushes and stick with them, even draw only with one, maximum two brushes.This makes it less complicated, more cohesive and you don’t have to always switch between brushes.

You can always update your brush selection which I highly recommend. I recently got myself a manga-specific-lineart pen and it makes a world of difference in my linework.

Setting Up Your Canvas

Setting up your canvas in Procreate is pretty straightforward. You start by choosing the size of your canvas based on what you need for your artwork. You can either pick from standard sizes or create a custom one.

It’s important to think about the resolution too—higher resolution means better quality, but it can also make your file larger. Once you’ve set your canvas size and resolution, you’re ready to start drawing. It’s important to set this up first as you can change the canvas size later, but not the resolution.

DPI - Dots Per Inch and Why They Matter

DPI stands for dots per inch, and it’s a measure of the resolution of your canvas. Higher DPI means more detail and clarity in your artwork.

300 DPI vs. 72 DPI

For most digital art, a DPI of 300 is standard for print-quality work, while 72 DPI is often recommended for digital screens. If you’re planning to print your art, go with 300 DPI to ensure it looks sharp and professional. I draw everything at 300 DPI in case I decide to print it later.

300 DPI vs 500 DPI

A DPI of 500 is extremely high and is typically used for very detailed artwork or specialized printing needs, such as high-resolution prints, detailed illustrations, or large-format prints.

However, for most printing purposes, 500 DPI is not ideal because it can result in overly large file sizes and may even cause the artwork to appear grainy or overly detailed in a way that doesn’t always translate well to print.

For standard print work, 300 DPI is usually sufficient to ensure clear and crisp results.

Recording Your Process

The video recording function in Procreate is a great feature for capturing your entire drawing process. It automatically records your work from start to finish, so you can create a time-lapse of your art being made.

This is super useful if you want to share your process with others or just look back and see how your piece came together.

You can adjust the settings to control the speed of the playback and export the video to share on social media or keep as a personal record. You can also turn off this function to save on storage.

Important: A lot of artists recommend recording and posting your process in the face of rising AI artworks - it proves you are a real person who created your pieces.

There are a lot more features for Procreate, but these here are enough to get you started and then some! I hope this little guide helps you in mastering digital art.

And remember: Practice makes perfect! You get used to this new medium and will see results just as with any other medium!

If you want to follow along with my creative journey, check out my social media profile @shadowbloom_art for updates, tips, and my latest projects.