Making Digital Art

If you’ve been following my blog over at Linda-Matthews.com, then you’ll know that I recently became interested in digital art, using it mainly to print images on fabric using digital grounds.

I often get asked what software I use to make my digital art. For many years I used Paint Shop Pro by Corel, but now I use Photoshop Elements by Adobe which, along with Photoshop, seems to be the industry standard for digital design.

Paint Shop Pro is a program that has similar features to Photoshop but at a budget price. Photoshop Elements is a watered down, although still quite substantial, version of Photoshop. So comparing side by side, Paint Shop Pro is more similar to Photoshop and has more features than Photoshop Elements. For some years I used both programs preferring some of the feature of Paint Shop Pro better than Photoshop Elements, and vice versa. But that just got confusing, particularly when I was teaching and trying to demonstrate a feature, and forgetting which program did what. So I made the decision one day to stop using Paint Shop Pro and use only Photoshop Elements.

I like a lot of the features of Photoshop Elements, and I particularly like that there are so many tutorials and free stuff available for it. Also it isn’t as expensive as Photoshop but you get lots of the same features. Some of the features are hidden a little deeply inside the program and using Photoshop is really not an intuitive process, but with a little practice you can easily become familiar with the program and what it offers.

I’ll be adding some Photoshop Element tutorials here beginning shortly, as well as some tips for how to work with images specifically for printing on fabric. It’s easy .. once you know how