How did I get my start in Digital Art, you ask? Why, my good old friend MS Paint of course. When I was a teenager, back before I knew what Photoshop was, I would sit there for up to 8 hours at a time in MS Paint creating all different kinds of things. The image at the very bottom here was one of those. A person had a preset human figure and ran a contest based on how much someone could alter it. 8 hours later I emerged with an algae covered fishman with a conch shell on his head. I actually took third place in the contest even though I didn't use Photoshop at all. After I discovered Photoshop and was still clinging to my pixel enthusiast ways, I would roughly create an image in MS Paint and then alter it in Photoshop, as shown with the image above that. I was not very proud of these and felt my interest in sitting there doing things pixel by pixel fade away...and then I got a scanner so I could actually post some of my real hand drawn art, as the pencil and paper are my forte.
Just last week I had an epiphany...what if I went a MS Paint in a bare bones go get 'em fashion? No premade forms, no Photoshop, no anything...just MS Paint. Still without a tablet, I grabbed my mouse and went for it, and created a pouty faced angry looking woman with weepy willowy hair in my own actual artistic style. It felt great to pick up an old tool again, kind of like visiting an old friend, and so I encourage other artists to pick up a medium that they haven't used in a long time and try something new with it. You may be surprised with the results.
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