[FallDamage]

I'm new and fairly unskilled to this as a serious hobby, but with that said, I do feel fairly comfortable in the PS7 environment, having toyed with it for a few years now. Last night, I got Painter 9 up and running, but I found it somewhat, initially at least, intimidating. Is painter a preferable (over others like psp and ps7) program for producing digital art, in your opinion(s), or would it be equally beneficial to focus on skills development within photoshop?

Is there anything else that is commonly used or beneficial?

[sweetums]

It depends on the final "look" you want your digital art to have.
If you desire a more textured effect, with brush strokes similar to a somewhat "rough" brush, or similar to chalk or pastel textures, Painter is beyond compare. If you are more into "solid" colors, Photoshop 7.01 is more than adequate for the job.
If you find yourself seeking a more "crisp" type of line, such as that offered by vector illustrations, I would suggest Macromedia's Flash MX. You can do wonderful vector illustrations with the basic painting ease of Photoshop, in addition to the ability to create animations.

No program is "preferable" to another across the board. In the end, it will be an individual choice as to what you are most comfortable using, and the effects you are attempting to achieve. Many people who use Painter (myself included) jump between it and Photoshop, because Painter is still not quite as intuitive or easy to use for some effects (such as image/canvas resizing, clean and solid tapering lines, default new document sizes, or gradient fills). But in the end, with the exception of vectors, it's all pixels.
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[seth1]

I would say Painter, is more like painting with a natrual medium, and adobe photoshop, you can get more creative with your brush and have some what of more power over serten things then in painter, but both photoshop and painter are beneficial to build up your skills in the digital world. I would recomend alot of traditonal painting and drawing those will help you out the most...

Hear are some links to color theroy and Speculars, and radiosity and some digital tutorials
http://itchstudios.com/psg/art_tut.htm ****highly recomend that link

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=17837

http://www.conceptart.org/forums/showthread.php?t=15745

http://www.sumaleth.com/links/la.php?cat=Tutorials&sub=_digital2d&t2=All%20Tutorials&t3=Digital%20Media%202D&page=1

I hope this helps a little...

[two-na]

painter also has a color triangle--that is a major feat over ps. with painter you may find it much more easy to lay down color and get to business. with photoshop you have to deal with less exciting brushes that dull your brain to re-learn. Of course, that is part of the ps learning curve(not exciting).

in bitmap digital art, it's all pixels so why not allow your brain to re-learn exciting new principals?
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