Hello, hello my creative friends!
Today I’d like to talk about a few tips and tricks I’ve picked up in the past few months while using Procreate.
I must say the more I use this app, the more I like it; it’s different from Adobe Fresco, which offers the incredible live brushes (I talked about this topic in my previous blog in case you missed it) but I still like it for other features that are not present in the other app.
A few days ago I followed a class on Skillshare (I promise you they don’t pay me to talk about Skillshare all the time, I just love this site and I can’t get enough of it!), and I learned a couple of tips and tricks that I found really useful. The class was “Digital Illustration Workflow Hacks” by The Artmother (AKA Alexandra Gabor) in case you’d like to take the class too.
I made this little cutie on the right, and it was so much fun! But the tips I’ve learn were fantastic!
For example, have you ever employed the technique of using a mirror to look at a painting you’ve been working on? You take a mirror, give your back to the painting and look at your painting through the mirror. This will give you the possibility to look at your painting from a new point of view and it will help you noticing imperfections and imbalances in the composition. No, I’m not saying to look at your iPad through a mirror, that would be way too much work! Instead, once you’ve done your sketch, select it with the selection tool and then click “flip horizontally” and voila’ your painting will appear as if you look at it through a mirror!
Another trick that for me was a real game changer, is to have, in a corner of your workspace, the colors laid out as if you had real colors on a palette. I know right, why didn’t I think of this before? This makes the workflow so much smoother, you don’t had to keep going back to the color wheel to chose the next color, you can simpli pick the color from your palette just by holding your finger down on one of the colors. Genius!!
One more thing I’ve learned the hard way is work in layers. Layers are there, they are free to use, use them!
I still forget sometimes to switch to a new layer and end up coloring on the same layer where my final drawing is only to realise, when I erase something, that I’m erasing the line drawing too.
I also strongly advise to use a different layer for every color (or at least every element) of your painting. This is extremely useful if you realise that there is a color you really don’t want there anymore and you’d like to change it. If the color is on his own layer you can just select that layer, go to Adjustments; Hue, Saturation, Brightness and play with the settings to your heart’s content. If the colors are all on the same layer you’d be changing all of them at the same time.
One interesting thing I’ve learned about the slider used to change the brush size is that if you slide it using your pencil, say to around 40%, and then without lifting the pencil move it to the right past the grey rectangle that appears and displays the brush size you will then be able to fine tune the brush size with greater precision. The further away to the right you move the pencil the smaller and more precise the change in brush size.
Here is a quick tip for you, if you are working in a color then change to another then would like to go back to the previous color, just tap and hold the color wheel and that will give you the previous color. This only works with the previous color used though.
Tell me, does it annoy you that when you work on a painting you keep accidentally drawing marks with your finger when you try for example to enlarge or move the canvas? Well I have the solution to that! Go to Actions, Preferences, Gesture controls and in the panel turn on the Disable Touch Actions. Now you won’t be able to paint with your fingers, only with the pencil.
If you do have lots of layers and for some reason you would like to see just one of them, you don’t have to uncheck every layer one by one, you can just tap and hold on the checkbox of the layer you want to see and the other layers will be hidden all at the same time. Tap and hold again on the same check box and all of the layers will be visible again.