My Tools

Adobe Creative Cloud

As a Penn State student, I am lucky enough to receive free access to the Adobe Creative Cloud. If you are currently a student at Penn State, or any university, I would highly recommend checking to see if your school allows the same luxury. I am very thankful to be able to have these tools at my disposal.

Illustrator, Photoshop and InDesign

A graphic design expert and one of my favorite teachers, Cathy Benscooter, advised me to focus on gaining proficiency in Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign. These apps are the building blocks for designers. Many professionals find themselves importing their art into each of them in order to complete projects. This is done because each app specializes in different things.

• Illustrator is vector based and is primarily used to create logos
• Photoshop is rastor based and uses pixels
• InDesign is vector based and is primarily used to create master pages and handle multiple pages at once

More information on when to use Photoshop, Illustrator and InDesign can be found in the link below.

https://www.printwand.com/blog/when-to-use-adobe-illustrator-vs-photoshop-vs-indesign

Apple Pencil and iPad Pro

The newest tools that I have added to my arsenal are the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil. As someone who has never owned an iPad before, using it to draw is, in a word, fun. The iPad Pro has an easy to use interface and is not only very light but also very thin. The Apple Pencil attaches to the iPad Pro magnetically, which I find helps me not to lose it.

I think it is necessary to say that I am not a professional designer. Before anyone suggests to me that Wacom is the best brand of drawing tablet, I would like to say that it is not what I am looking for at the moment. I believe that if I do pursue graphic design, using a Wacom Cintiq, for example, would be advantageous. However, the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil are helping me make the transition to digital art. I am able to use it for quick sketches, illustrations and can easily take it with me wherever I go.

Procreate

The best drawing app for the iPad is Procreate. It has been listed in the iPad’s top selling apps for many months, and for good reason. If you can get past the price, $9.99 on the App Store, you’ll surely find that it is an artist’s dream come true.

Procreate 5 is the newest version of Procreate that is coming soon. Powered by Valkyrie, a new cutting-edge graphics system, it is designed to take iPad Pro and Apple Pencil even farther than before. Other features include Brush Studio, Animation Assist and a new interface.