digital chinese brush painting

Digital "Chinese Brush Paintings"
Here are a few of my efforts to paint digital versions of Chinese brush paintings. These are done in PSP8 with a Wacom Intuos Pen and tablet . I don't really have an aptitude for tutorials so this is just kind of a description of how I do this kind of digital painting.

Some of the effects are made by dabbing on color and smudging it into place and some are made by using the waccom pen with PSP8 brush variances.

In Psp 8 and 9 you can set brush variances to blend the foreground and background colors. this lets you apply blends of colors in one stroke.
When you have a graphics pen and tablet you can set your PSP8 brush variances to take advantage of the pens' pressure sensitivity. The color, hue,blends and opacity are set to pressure resulting in a more brush painted effect one can also use pressure for size, and density and other settings.
The pressure setting for opacity simulates the effect of paint running out and also gives an apearance like hand painted work.
The color blend brush variance is set to pressure. Using a gradient or pattern for the background color creates more variation in the painted lines.

The branches below are done with a gradient background.
The flower petals and leaves can be
made by dabbing on a sample of color and smudging the color into the shape you desire. A low density brush helps create the flower center. A subtle texture applied to the finished painting helps give it that brush painted look. A fine silk texture gives a fairly traditional look.

Here the color variation is created with a high step setting and a pressure brush variance.

A major goal in all Chinese Brush painting is to convey a sense of immediateness. The spontaneous style of painting is very nature centered and is always intended to be an expression of the artist’s understanding of the essence of the natural object or creatures being painted. The ink varies from opaque to transparent. These works were not done from models or outside but were done from the memory of observations of nature. Traditional brushstroke forms were inspired by other artwork. Rather than being an effort to capture the actual physical detail of the items being painted the intention was to capture the essence. The elements of chance and spontaneity were highly valued in the Southern style. Chinese brush painting intends to cause you to stop and take notice of nature and of the beauty of flowers rocks and animals and the earth and our connection to it. The underlying principle of energy or “Chi” the life force which permeates all things and Yin and yang the balance of active and passive energies are the most important concepts behind Chinese brush painting. The materials used were the ink and brushes of the calligrapher.
The elements of art and principles of art in the Chinese culture include strong emphasis on the arrangement of objects and the placement of bright and dark, dense and sparse, far and near, full and empty space The art must be full of energy, life and movement.

This one is done with a mouse using fade out and fade in settings in the brush variance pallette. This does not work as well as having a pressure sensitive graphics pen but it does roughly approximate a spontanious Ink and brush effect.

With Thanks, in memory of Bong Wai Chen, a great artist
who encouraged a child and was kind to my grandmother

Peggy Jentoft

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