nature digital art- butterflies and host plants
Monarch with milkweed, zebra swallowtail with pawpaw tree, and painted lady with aster. Here is my process- I am a very novice artist and idk if what I do is honestly even "true art". I would like to hear if what I am doing is cheating lol. I take a photograph of my subject (the butterfly or host plant). I use the photograph to trace the shapes and get the shadows/highlights/colors. I used Sketchbook iPad app to make these. I make layers of color and shape over the original photograph to match exactly the shading and color I see. I might use the pen tool, brush tool, pencil tool, whatever it takes to achieve what I see in the photo. At the end of the process, I have several digital layers of color. I delete the original photo layer underneath. Then I add the two drawings together (ie monarch and milkweed). If I use the reference photo on this level, am I still technically doing digital art? Or just some sort of tracing? Thanks for any input!