Learning Curves

A winter landscape featuring early American buildings in front of trees and a blue and pink sunset.
©2023 Carolyn A Pappas, Christmas by Candlelight at OSV. Digital painting on Procreate.

When I was a young girl and my family got it’s first Windows computer, I remember sitting in front of it for hours making pictures on Microsoft Paint. I remember filling it in pixel by pixel, making incredibly detailed drawings using the mouse. I wish I still had those files to look back on. Ever since then, I have been fascinated with digital art. If the iPad had existed back then, I would have absolutely loved it.

I have had Procreate on my iPad for quite some time but I really haven’t used it to it’s full potential. I have used it several times to make line art which I have printed on paper and used to transfer to watercolor paper to finish with traditional painting. It has come in very handy for that.

This is the first “finished painting” that I have made with Procreate. It is based on a photo I took at Old Sturbridge Village in 2019 during their Christmas by Candlelight event. This was about four months before covid started and I remember that it was so incredibly crowded with people that it was a little too much for me. I remember what I loved about this picture was the pink and blue pastel sunset and how it really felt like I was in a different era.

Some people love drawing on Procreate because they say it is much faster than traditional drawing and painting. But for me, this took much longer because of the constant undoing and redoing and also not being quite sure of what I was doing with the layers and such. I tried to draw this in the same style that I would use if I were working traditionally. I do think that this feels very much like “me,” even if I don’t usually draw architecture. I’m looking forward to making some more digital paintings in the future and sharing them here.