WEEK12 On-line Essay

Digital Art and the Implications Faced by Professionals

Digital media is often used to refer to computer-based applications or any other media that is encoded electronically as binary digits or bits (Birkin, 2005). Professional individuals once used their creative skills obtain through years of experience and practice, however, in recent times amateur artists are able to produce sufficient content with little or no experience, due to advancements in technology and the internet. Digital art changes the perception of what art is and as technological expression has developed as a new language, there is concern indicating the degree to which society understands the technology (Prince, 1995). Available though the internet, high quality digital art software and free on-line tutorials, digital art galleries and museums, social media and social networking sites, all encourage self-taught amateur artists to create and publish art at either little or no cost. This immediate availability diminishes the time once associated with learning and acquiring new skills obtained by professional artists. This essay will analyse digital art as one area of creativity within digital media and will discuss the implications of advancement in technology on professional practitioners as a result of the rise in easily accessible amateur art.

Previously, computer art software was purchased and used by skilled, arts educated professionals to create images and art for respective clients. Professional computer illustration studio, Digital Art (n.d) runs a variety of software, including Adobe Photoshop, Illustrator, Freehand, Form Z, Strata Studio Pro, Bryce 3D, Poser, and Painter 5 to produce high quality content. However in recent times, numerous websites have enabled amateur artists to download and run professional software and copious amounts of lesser quality digital art software for free or at little cost. Sites such as art.eonworks.com and freeartsoftware.com, provide free art software for anyone to download and use at their own will. Art.eonworks.com is a basic guide for the beginner artist to the less expensive, but quality 2D and 3D tools on the market today (Michalczyk, 2009). This availability, once thought to only be used by professionals has enabled amateurs to produce standard content as it puts art tools of production directly into the hands of these artists hindering the potential success for professionals.

Hatanaka (2007) suggests many professionals in the digital art and design industry emphasize the importance of classical art skills and knowledge as a foundation for creating digital art. Similarly, Hertlein (1977) proposed that formal education increased the ability to produce quickly and spontaneously alternatives in designing, programming, writing, material development and emphasis on inventiveness as a natural gift or quality enhances skill. With the introduction of free on-line tutorials outlining detailed steps and procedures on how to use digital art software, there is less importance focused on art education and fine art skills previously obtained by professionals. Sites such as 5min.com and digitalarttutorials.com present simple, easy to understand video tutorials on how to use popular art software including Adobe Photoshop used by professionals. Digital Art Tutorials (2009) was created with the goal of bringing industry-proven, professional digital art techniques to the masses by leaving out no secrets and issuing instruction in real time, giving unprecedented access into the thought process behind each stroke of the stylus. These tutorials allow aspiring amateur artists to self-teach digital techniques as knowledge of software is acquired.

While professional artists struggle to compete with the influx of amateur artists, digital art galleries and museums initiate further challenges to their financial success. Digitalart.org (2009) allows thousands of artists from all over the world, with a goals to present the finest gallery of digital artwork on the internet and to provide artists with a place to share their digital creations, receive feedback, grow their talent, and interact with other artists and visitors. Similarily, deviantart.com (2009) aims to create an outlet for unknown artists and to represents a breakthrough for the promotion and exposure of otherwise stranded artists. Deviant Art allows amateurs artists to sell their art on-line. Visitors to the site are able to view art and make a purchase if desired. In turn, this allows amateurs to become popular and make a name for themselves by selling their creations. However, this challenges the financial success of that of professional digital artists as clients and admires are able to purchase art on-line and at a fraction of the cost.

Further hindering the success of professional digital artists is the attractiveness of employing the use of social media and social networking sites to showcase art, ultimately increasing the status and popularity to that of unknown artists. Regarding digital art, some of the generic social media sites provide special categories for art content or special groups, including “Digital Art and Mixed Media” and “Art Directory” (Christodoulou & Styliaras, 2008). Moreover, Christodoulou and Styliaras (2008) suggests there are specific sites, which are part the social network category, however, are developed particularly for artists which are termed as online artistic communities or a place for artists to exhibit, get feedback and discus their works. Creatist.com (2009) encourages creation, viewing and discussion of digital art, especially encouraging amateur and first-time artists to submit their works on-line.

Society will change and the art world will change as computers make it possible to create works easily, though easy art is not appreciated as much as art that uses the essence of the machines in innovative expression (Prince, 1995). Modern times have allowed many amateur artist vast amounts of popularity and followers as their art works are published on-line. Through the use of easily acquirable software, tutorials on how to use this software, digital art galleries, museums and social media networking sites, little known artist are able to cut the time of formal art education using self-taught methods to produce creations of standard quality. The internet has put the tools of digital art into the hands of the everyday computer user, disregarding the formal knowledge and skills once taught to professional artists in the industry. This advancement in technology has permitted amateurs to enter the field, thus challenging professional artists at their craft and hindering financial success and popular status.

Reference List

Alt, T. (n.d). What we are. Retrieved October14, 2009, from http://www.digitalart.com/whatweare.html

Birkin, G. (2005). Art, digitality and consciousness. C&C’05, 1, 279-282.

Christodoulou, S. P. & Styliaras, G. D. (2008). Digital art 2.0: art meets web 2.0 trend. DIMEA’08, 349, 158-165.

DeviantART. (2009). Prints shop. Retrieved October15, 2009, from http://shop.deviantart.com/wallart/?qh=__in:digitalart

Digital Art Organisation. (2009). About digitalart.org. Retrieved October17, 2009, from http://digitalart.org/info.about.php

Digital Art Tutorials. (2009). About us. Retrieved October16, 2009, from http://digitalarttutorials.com/

Free Art Software. (n.d). Digital art- graphic design software. Retrieved October 15, 2009, from http://freeartsoftware.com/

Hatanaka, T. (2007). Integrating digital art practice and art history studies. ACM, 10, 1-4.

Hertlein, G. C. (1977). Computer art for computer people- a syllabus. ACM Siggraph Computer Graphics, 11(2), 249-254.

Michalczyk, D. (2009). Digital art tools for beginners. Retrieved October14, 2009, from http://art.eonworks.com/articles/digital_art_tools_for_beginners.html

Prince, P. D. (1995). Digital art: the new literacy, a personal view of the evolution of art issues. ACM Siggraph Computer Graphics, 29(1), 30-31.

The Creatist Digital Art Gallery. (2009). Welcome to the creatist digital art gallery. Retrieved October 16, 2009, from http://www.creatist.com/

Art Work

Ariman, T. (2009). Beauty spirit. Retrieved October20, 2009, from http://www.behance.net/Gallery/Beauty-Spirit/55702

Brussels, D. (2009). Scotchgard. Retrieved October20, 2009, from http://thedesigninspiration.com/photos/scotchgard/

Seveso, A. (2009). The three graces. Retrieved October21, 2009, from http://www.behance.net/Gallery/Grazia-Graziella-e-Grazie-al-Cazzo/92789

Stallaert, K. (2009). Fashion for walls. Retrieved October20, 2009, from http://thedesigninspiration.com/photos/fashion-for-walls/

Rationale for WK12 Essay

For this assesment item I have chosen to investigate topic 3:

3. Digital media put the tools of production into the hands of the everyday computer user making it incredibly easy to produce content. These creative skills used to be something that people worked to develop. Now it appears that amateurs can produce content of a fair standard within a relatively short period of time. Where does this leave 'professionals' and highly-skilled artists? Choose one area of creativity and discuss some of the challenges facing practitioners vs amateurs in producing digitalcontent.


For the purpose of the essay I have chose digital art as one area of creativity to disscuss.

Week12 On-line Essay

Assesment item 3 (on-line essay)

The requirements of the assesment is to post the essay into my blog, although I am not quite sure how easy it is to view the formal formatting. As a result, I have uploaded a pdf file of my essay onto google documents.

Here's the link: http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5jdBs2TpYz5ZjQ4ZjU3MDMtNmQ1My00ZWE2LTgxZTMtN2RmM2YwN2U1NTFi&hl=en
Hopefully the link works, fingers crossed.

Week 10 Lecture

Gaming?? I'm really sorry, but I have little to no interest in this topic, despise it being hugly popular. It just dosn't appeal to me. I don't consider it wasting time, more like each to their own lol. That is why I was suprised to hear that 41% of Pc gamers are actually women. For some reason this does not seem right but who knows what people do with their free time, a lot of girls might be closet gamers.

In short, it was hard to stay focused and into it, but I can appreciate what this technology does for other people.

Course Evaluation

New Communication Technologies was not exactly what I had expected. I just came out of a year and a half of doing a bachelor of psychology, so to come into a course like this, it was a dramatic change that's for sure. I was so used to having rigid and strict criteria to follow, whereby I knew exactly what was needed and what was expected by me as a student.

So to come into tutes everyweek I found it different and at first very hard to adjust to. I was so used to being lectured by a tutor, telling exactly what was needed (as psychology is more science and maths based). So there was nothing arbitrary about it. Going to class and having to 'feel out' and 'self learn' was definately something I needed to get used to. I felt so silly sometimes having to constantly ask for help in tutes as I could see everyone around me busily working away.

As for the lectures, there was a lot of content to get through and a lot of readings (which isn't a bad thing at all, I don't mind reading for some strange reason). Sometimes it seemed like it was a lot of content for one week, then it jumped to a completely new topic the next. I can understand the rationale though, as it is new communication technologies, whereby everything changes about every second. It's good to see how educational institutions, like the university, understand that things are forever changing and try to adapt to the demands from the world.

All in all, I believe I have learnt things, even though at times I just wanted to give up and delete y blog, that will remain with me for a long time. Like blogging for instances, I never thought that in a million years I would write a blog. It was just never something that I ahd been interested in. But having done it as part of the course, I have a new appreciation for people who do this type of work as a living. It is so tedious and time consuming and an easy trigger for frustration.

I believe that the teaching team really know their craft and enjoy their work. They seem passionate, which shows when they are lecturing. I have sat through so many lectures where the lecturer just reads from their slide show. So it seems these guys really know what they are on about, and it makes it so much easy to learn.

"Clean-Feed'

What is the 'Clean Feed'?

"The Australian Federal Government is pushing forward with a plan to force Internet Service Providers [ISPs] to censor the Internet for all Australians. This plan will waste tens of millions of taxpayer dollars and slow down Internet access.
Despite being almost universally condemned by the public, ISPs, State Governments, Media and censorship experts, Communications Minister Stephen Conroy is determined to force this filter into your home." (ref: http://nocleanfeed.com/)

From what I can gather, the govt has pretty much kept the details under wraps about how they will proceed with this notion. So it seems a lot of people feel like they are being left in the dark about the technicalities of it all. People are in uproar as there seem to be more than a few issues with clean feed. Including, technical issues (where they will draw the line), free speech concerns and its bad policy.

Honestly, I believe like most things, they have got it wrong. It might seem great on paper, but when put into action, I don't believe it will be effective. Nor will the govt be able to implement it completely (ie. hackers will get smarter and will only bypass it). It will never be 100% effective. Yes, it is a good idea, to keep children from harms way, but they are not just talking about children, more like the entire population. So where will it end? How old do you have to reach before you can fully have your freedom and the right to do so as you please?


What place does censorship have in democracy???
It has no place, democracy is the right for everyone to have a say. If the government censored the biggest information provider in the world, it would be a huge hypocracy.

I believe censorship is hard in a democratice society. I understand the reason in which some people think that it is a major benefit, in keeping children safe from what they are able to see online, but it's not really realistic. There are already parental monitoring programs available for parents to download or purchase and install on their home computers for their families safety. To me, the things that people do, write, produce for online material, is personal expression. To take aaway that right is not a democracy at all.

Cencorship has always been a problem in the past. For example books. There are a number of well written amazing books which have been banned in schools around the world as the education systems deem then to be inappropriate. But I've read the list and half the books on that list are not even that bad. Some of my favourite books I had read in my own time when I was in high school are on the list of the top100 banned books in America for the school system.

So while I do think that censorhip has its place, it only really works in theory. Like a lot of things, I mean communism, in theory, seems like the best way to run a country whereby all individuals are equal. But when applied to real life, eg. Russia and China, the theory fails dramatically. You can not account for people, their own individualism and corruption. It's just too hard and too broad. Censorship will always have its critics.

few topics