PCO member Bill Stott writes; The 74/26 German split in favour of digital art, written about by Andy Davey, is today's glimpse of the obvious.
I'll probably never use a computer to make cartoons - notwithstanding Wacom board and magic pens etc. I'm too old. The irritating language of computers makes me very tired. Boot up = Switch On. Groan. I won't join their gang. I don't have a Tesco clubcard either. I like there being nothing between me and the picture. I make the marks.
But that doesn't make computers any more or less than a way of making pictures.That I don't like digital perfection - and I really don't - is irrelevant. A digitally produced cartoon is as valid as one produced using a sharpened vole on buckskin.
Verification of originality lies in a signature, always assuming that those artists completely reliant on computerised whizz-bangery can still write their own names.
(The editor says click S for Stott to see Bill's resolutely non-digital, watercolour cartoons.)
So Long, and thanks for all the fish…
5 years ago
2 comments:
It's good to see this attitude from a dedicated-dipper like Bill. I must, however, comment on the phrase, 'digital perfection.'
It's easy to understand how this view of digital art came about, given the early applications which gave one little leeway beyond the constant-width black line and the solid colour fills. Indeed, some cartoonists deliberately pursued (and still do) this perfection, even to the point of using ruler-straight lines.
Software has come a long way since those days, though, and it is now perfectly possible to emulate, faithfully, almost any medium, from the soft line of charcoal or pastel, to the subtle washes of watercolour and the thick textured application of oil.
I have no doubt at all that Bill, should he so wish, could execute, digitally, his exquisite line and wash art, and never again have to worry about the three-o-clock-n-the-morning knock on the door from the RSPCA Vole Squad. The key-phrase, here, is should he so wish, and that is all that matters in the end.
I draw my cartoons the old fashioned way, and add my signature with the computer!
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