[RenaissanceGirl]

After reading a certain thread, it is clear that tracing is poo-pooed around here. Anyway, what is cheating exactly? I don't trace but I do use the lasso tool some times. I use it to isolate areas for highlighting, coloring and shading and I use it to move stuff around (for instance, sometimes an eye is off a couple pixels). Is this cheating? Am I going to be dragged to the town square and stoned to death?

[eyewoo]

I don't recall that tracing was considered to be cheating. I think if you speak with most professionals, you'll find out a general rule of thumb is that there are no rules when it comes to making art. Just look at the very, very broad spectrum that is called the artworld...

My definition of cheating is when an artist is trying to perpetrate a fraud... for example imply that no tracing was used when in fact it was, or ripping off another's work or style. That's cheating.

[DeathJester]

There really isn't any form of cheating when it comes to digital.. Its just how much respect is given for a peice or art. I dont think using the lasso tool to isolate an area is that big of a deal or cut and pasting peices of your work to move an eye.. They are tools that are in the program and thats what they are designed to do.. Its like an artist using a ruler, or elipse guide.. french curve.. etc.. They are tools.. But, if you make something that looks magnificent and you claim you didn't use such tools... and it looks to far fetched you will get flamed... Its all a matter of opinion too..

Anyways that was my 2 cents...

[RenaissanceGirl]

Those are some great replies - thanks guys! You make very good points, and I will definitely keep them in mind.

I'm witnessing a huge discrepancy between attitudes around here. You guys had valid and mature points and here I was worrying about the risk of getting publicly reprimanded for not being a real "arteest" because I need to push some pixels!

[Briareos]

i have this thing about my artwork, where I want it to be %100 mine. in 3d i model from scratch, take my own texture photos, create my own textures, etc, its all original from me. same with drawing, its not that I think its cheating (although I do have less respect for those that use this method) I want to show my drawing and say thats %100 out of my mind (i.e., all my influences to create this piece) I dont wanna have to explain that I painted over a photo of a body, or traced the proportions of a head, id rather it be somewhat wrong then do that. at least this is how i see it, If i use any other material I feel like its not mine. use it if you must, but you dont learn from tracing etc, you learn from drawing them, you learn eye/hand coordination, and you learn how to use the strokes and lines that make the actual image. i think tracing and paint overs dont excel you as an artist, but rather keep you stagnent. IMHO.

[MoleculeMan]

Basically i think cheating is two things (this will prolly sound like a lot of what was already said):
WHen you steal someone elses art and take credit for it.
When you misrepresent the way in which it was made to trick people or garner respect. (like if you traced a photo and told people it was free handed, or using poser to render a model with the draw function like i saw a while back).

Basically it should seem like thre has been a foul when one has occured. I mean if you have to think twice about it it prolly isnt right, you know?

jake

[cartman]

i think that people who trace are cheaters, because they are able to achieve results that go beyond their skill level as an artist. just my not so humble opinion.

[eyewoo]

quote

Quote:

i think that people who trace are cheaters, because they are able to achieve results that go beyond their skill level as an artist. just my not so humble opinion.

Cartman... Then by your definition, I am a cheater... though I do not feel that way because I put so much work and effort into my art after that initial simple tracing technique is used. For the time and effort put into a piece, it may account for 1 or 2 per cent of the time to complete a piece. hmmmm... I just don't feel like I'm cheating...

[dontfallin]

I think tracing is cheating which is also like stealing and stealing is worse than MURDER. which makes tracers worse than murderers. or maybe Im just insane

[-DsD-GiNo-]

Tracing is a form of cheating.. but in the final teh cheaters lack behind just like using easy progs for making big effects.

[Basse_Ex]

There's no such thing as cheating.

(Of course there are exceptions, such as entering a competition where the rules clearly states that there should no tracing, with a traced picture. This is of course cheating).

If you claim that a traced picture is drawn free-hand, you're simply a liar.

I've recently taken up the act of tracing. Never did it before, but now I've started to enjoy it. It's not as easy as it seems to create a good tracing. If people see that it's tracing, which often happens when an accuratly traced drawing is placed besides, or mixed with, a non-traced drawing, they will most of the time dislike the tracing. It disturbs the illusion of a singular version of reality. It hacks up the rhythm. It tears you out of the drawing. Any part of a drawing which makes you wonder how the drawing was done, takes you away from what the drawing is trying to tell, which is fatal when making comic-books(Which is my main focus).
So tracing succesfully requires a certain level of taste and skill.

But... it is a lot quicker than drawing from life, or from your head, which is a great pluss when you're doing comics(Which require that you work quite quickly, both for the sake of deadlines, and for your own mental well-being. Drawing 100 pages, each with 1 to 10 individual panels, of the same story can get you pretty messed up in the head).

I mostly trace backgrounds. The reason for this is that I don't really like drawing straight lines, and creating a good realistic perspective involves a lot of straight lines. If I wanted to draw straight lines I would have become an architect or something.
Now, I consider myself pretty proficient with perspective. I might not be the best with it, not even remarkably good with it, but I know how to set up a 1-point, 2-point, and 3-point perspective, and I know how to do an arch, a sphere, and a spiral in perspective, and I'm learning how to accuratly distort perspective. I mostly draw pretty realistically, so perspective is quite important. I also set many of my stories in the real world, and then I want an accurate representation of locations.
If I had an assistant that could do most of the dirty work with setting up the perspective lines, and counting windows or telephones-wires, I would gladly go out and sketch the locations free-hand, as I enjoy drawing buildings and locations from life(I try to do 1 location sketch from real-life a day, with no pencils and only markers), but since I'm a poor fuck who can't afford that kind of luxury, I find it a lot better to take my digital camera(a cheap, used, 1996 model) and take pictures of the locations.
I often do a lot of photomanipulation to get the look just right for the trace-job, get details in or out, and get the shadows and focus I want. But still it's quicker than doing it from photoreferrence or from real-life(With the accurate perspective).

When doing comics, realistic backgrounds is no more than a storytellling device, and unless you've got an uncanny ability with perspective, it's a waste of valuable time to do it all yourself.
Even John Buscema, one of the technically best artists through comic-book history, traced Jack Kirbys backgrounds when he was forced to do sci-fi, a style Mr.Buscema didn't enjoy.

The problems with tracing, is that if you only trace, you won't learn anything except how to be a good tracer.
But tracing can also be a valuable learning tool.
I remember that when I was 6 or 7 years old, I used to trace the character sheets(Where you'd get a cool picture of the character, pluss his physical attributes, and background history) from G.I.Joe comics. I really think I learned alot from it(I did alot of drawing besides the tracing also).
Half a year ago, I was involved in a now-defunct MOD-project, where the leader wanted me to draw manga-style, something I had never-ever done before. To learn the manga style, I started printing out blue-lines of manga drawings, and doing alot of different versions of them. On some I tried to get down to the bones, and see the basics of the drawings, and on some I tried to get superficial elements in, like line weight, and the speed and rhytm the lines must have been drawn in. I also sketch-copied some drawings(Not tracing), and copied, traced and sketched images by Vincent Van Gogh and Gustav Klimt(Two of the earlist european artist to be fanatically interested in japanese art), Moebius and Frank Miller(Two of the earliest comic-book artists to try to actively introduce manga elements in western comics), and some old japanese paintings and drawings.
Within a week I was able to draw manga-style characters quite effortlessly. Without the tracing it would have taken a lot longer time(I think).

In the end, it's the final product that counts. This doesn't mean that you the process doesn't have any effect, because if you're not extremely good with "cheating", it will show.
Look at movies for instance, with all their special effects.
"Crouching tiger, hidden dragon" may be a damned good movie, but doesn't have as impressive fight scenes as a real-time Jackie Chan or Jet Li movie, because you can see and sense that thet've "cheated" in C.T.H.D.
You can see some the process. It makes you wonder how they done it. It takes you away from the story\action.
Or take the second part of the comic "The Mythology of an Abandoned City", by Jon J. Muth. Muth doesn't trace, doesn't "cheat", but creates these marvelous, almost hyper-realistic, images. I've watched many people read this comic, and the problem is that whenever they get to certain images, they start examining the pictures closely, and ask "Is this a photography?". At that very point, they are out of the story. They are no longer experiencing the story, but trying to figure out the art. Then the story fails, and the comic ultimatly fails.
The same with much of Dave McKean's work. He's a fabulous artist, and his experiments with mixing sculpture, photocollage, and painted art, is exceptionally beautiful. But it doesn't read well. That's why he, with the his own comic "Cages", decided to do most of the art in simple line-work. He used photoreference(I don't know if he traced) for almost every image, but it doesn't show, and the line-work parts are extremely pleasing to read.

The clue is to create a singular vision. If any part of the image\vision seems out of place, then the reader\viewer will be drawn out of the story(or whateve), which is a bad thing.

To end this overly long post, I'd like to quote John Cage, and some modern artist I don't remember the name of, but unfortunatly I can't find these quotes in english on the net, so it will just have to come from my own recollection.

"You can do whatever you want, as long as you don't do anything you'd like"
- Semi-quote from John Cage.

"You can steal from anyone, as long as you don't steal from yourself"
- Semi-quote from some modern artist I don't remember the name of(Perhaps it was Picasso.... or Duchamp).

[cartman]

eyewoo: i checked out your site and i just have a couple of questions for you. why not simply overpaint the photograph? couldn't you achieve basically the same result? or maybe simply apply a filter to the photo and then touch up some areas to hide that you used a filter. there are plenty of filters that produce excellent hand-painted looking results with a little experimentation.

if tracing is a time saving method for you, why not take advantage of other methods that would save time as well?

[ April 06, 2002: Message edited by: cartman ]

[Frog]

Good post Basse Ex, thoughtful and mature. This debate IMO is a little pointless yet it keeps cropping up. In my view the end result is the point, whatever techniques people choose to use is up to them. If you set out to be technically very good at freehand drawing and choose not to trace, good for you. If for whatever reason you do decide to trace, then that's fine too. Art has no rules, the only criteria I would use for judging a piece is wether I like it or not, and that depends on a whole lot of other factors.

[eyewoo]

cartman,

The simple answer to your question is that I enjoy the painting process immensely, but find the drawing to be tedious. I can free hand draw, which I do for drawings sake( see here ), but it always seemed pointless to me to spend hours drawing something that is just going to be covered up with paint or pixels.

I rarely if ever use filters... there's no fun in it for me.

My process is virtually the same as the one Basse_Ex uses. I take my own digital photos and then spend some time manipulating them or combining several photos together to compose an image to work from as a reference. Then I make a simple tracing and begin the painting process. Generally I change the lighting quite a bit and most of the time use my own sense of color rather than the reference photo's color scheme - another reason not to simply overpaint.

For example here is a reference photo... and here is the digital painting that I did using it as reference. The painting..

Another reference photo,

and the painting. In this painting I could have laid out the couch pattern without tracing... but why? It would have been unbelievably unfun... OTOH, painting it using the lasso tool and paintbrushes was a great deal of fun.

Hope I've answered your question and that you have a better or broader understanding.

[ April 06, 2002: Message edited by: eyewoo ]

[Kaete]

quote:

---

Originally posted by dontfallin:
I think tracing is cheating which is also like stealing and stealing is worse than MURDER. which makes tracers worse than murderers. or maybe Im just insane

---

Okaaaay, somebody has their priorities very messed up. I can only hope no one reads your post who has ever had a member of friend or family murdered.

[V Shane]

We're all cheaters hahahahahahahahaha

We all COPY life! Create something that doesn't exhist, or can you? Because once you create it, then it exhists!?!

Oh whats the point, your creating art, enjoy it? That is its value. Who cares what others think. If your good at visual manipulation of physical and digital media, you make money, if not, then you excel to go beyond your own personal hurdles.

Compliments on your work...worthless
Constructive criticism.....priceless

Hidden in my tower

Shane

[quintessential]

by the great water spirit, not the 'cheating' argument again

"the world is full of facsinating objects, the artist need not create, he can simply select, and in the selection lies the artistic process" - Marcel Duchamp

Last time i checked there wasn't a five thousand page book published called "the complete, total and ultimate guide to the rules of art" and if there was, it would be self contradicting.

There are no rules in art people, why don't people get it. art isn't a competition, art isn't there to see who can draw the most accurate version of a south moroccan pigmy marmoisette. i had a really interesting art teacher at school, who insisted that teaching art was simply a part time job he did because he enjoyed it, his primary source of income was selling his oil paintings, he said a (at the time i thought so anyway) bizarre thing in class once: (i cant remember the exact wording) 'art is about finding out who and what we are as human beings, the first intelligent thing mankind ever did, even before they spoke, was to draw on a cave wall. art is the first thing we ever did, and im pretty sure it will be the last thing'

is tracing cheating? no, it cant be, because there is no such thing as cheating.

So someone traced a part of their work, what does that mean?

a) they traced it because they dont have the skills to draw it freehand: that may be, it doesn't make them any less artistic or worthy as artists, it means they cant draw, big deal, Auguste Rodin (i know i spelt it wrong, maybe i got the whole surname wrong) is often called a god of sculpture, he couldn't paint to save his life.

b) they traced it because they have the skill to draw it freehand, they know they have the skill, and they would rather spend their time on more challening or interesting things: good for them.

c) the person is actually not an 'artist' at all, just traced a bunch of stuff so he could claim to be an artist: hate to break it to you, but he is an artist, and his work is art. it might not be art created with a very noble intent, it might not be very profound or deep, but by definition it is still art. you don't like it?

oh, thats nice, the harsh fact is it doesnt matter if you like it! i don't like Dali (gasp), i love Ernst, yet Dali is still the most famous Surrealist. just because you dont like something doesnt mean its not art, if it did then art would cease to exist. so someone claimed they drew something by handwhen they traced it? big deal, they'll lose a bit of respect, they'll be lying to themselves, but it will still be art.

thats just the tracing thing, but the same idea applies to any idea of 'cheating'. the bottom line is simply this: there are no rules in art, therefore there can be no cheating, if you dont like something, (in the words of my 60 year old irish high school maths teacher) "as they say in ireland, TS, hard luck"

rather spend your time on something more worthwhile, personally i think ive wasted way to much on my life on formulating my views and ideas about this particular thing.

peace, war, love, hatred, whatever you want be with you, just dont waste your life

[ April 07, 2002: Message edited by: quintessential ]

[lel]

Smashing picture!

"I made this pic" (everything you see was made by the author from imagination)
"I used a photoref" (ok, looked at a cool photo to get it right)
"I traced it" (couldn't get the proportions right in a reasonable timeframe)
"and picked up the colours from the ref" (I think I'm colourblind)
"also added some filters" (many to hide my errors)

Not as impressive anymore :-)

Just tell us a little how the picture was made and you're fine. It's a bit of the "behind the scenes" feeling of this forum. Which is different from, say a customer who probably don't care how it was done as long as he/she's happy with it(?).

Trying to crit the brush handling of something that turns out to be a filtered photomanip is annoying, if you know what I mean. Usually backfires :-)

[Kaete]

quote:

---

Originally posted by lel:
"and picked up the colours from the ref" (I think I'm colourblind)

---

Actually, my brother really is colour-blind. It runs in the males of my family. (Thank goodness I'm a girl!)

If I'm around, he'll double ask me to check what colours he's using. But he often uses the color-picking tool simply because that's the only way he can get the right color. (Ie, paint a girl pink, and not bright green.)

What say you to that?

[lel]

That, if any, is to me a perfectly valid reason to use the colourpicker. And telling about it would only make me more impressed (even with the picking tool it must be difficult).

Imagine a person with normal vision, but still using the colourpicker from a ref and not telling anyone. We all dig his/her pictures, "Wow, your colours are dead on right, your sense of values is amazing"...

[Loki]

IMHO this discussion is senseless. The only thing that usually offends people, is Threnodizing - when someone smudges over a scan and presents it as a full painting. But those are easy to bust.
Other than that it shouldn't matter - potato print, 3D, PS, painter scans or not - if it's a cool image - oh my. Design is another factor too - if that sits - who cares how you got there ... ???

[Kaete]

quote:

---

Originally posted by RenaissanceGirl:
In other words - are you guys more impressed by artists who used more time consuming methods of producing the final piece? Would I be more validated, as an artist, if I completely erased, for example, my satisfactory (not traced) eye, and redrew it in the right location, instead of lasso-ing it and pushing it to the right spot?

---

Pushing stuff around a few pixels is pretty much a *total* non-issue. Really, on all the art forums I've seen, no one cares if you use a lasso tool to move pieces of your own work around.

What tends to get people's dander up is tracing over a photo or color picking from a photo.

I myself don't really understand the debate. Have you ever seen most traced art? It sucks. You *have* to have talent to make a tracing look good. I've tried it myself to see what everyone was talking about, and it's actually quite hard. Easier to just work with my own sketches. So to my mind, anyone who traces but still makes beautiful art is definitely an artist.

But why does it bother people? It's a human trait to value effort. Heck, it happened even back in the caveman days:

Thag holds up a string of shells. "Look at me, ladies! I've got some beautiful shells! Picked them all from the beach myself!"

Cronk walks up behind him, holding a string of beads. "No, look at this! Beads! They're like shells, but they're really rocks! Took me days and days to make them all!"

The cave-women promptly abandon Thang for Cronk.

[RenaissanceGirl]

In other words - are you guys more impressed by artists who used more time consuming methods of producing the final piece? Would I be more validated, as an artist, if I completely erased, for example, my satisfactory (not traced) eye, and redrew it in the right location, instead of lasso-ing it and pushing it to the right spot?

[lel]

quote:

---

Originally posted by RenaissanceGirl:
In other words - are you guys more impressed by artists who used more time consuming methods of producing the final piece? Would I be more validated, as an artist, if I completely erased, for example, my satisfactory (not traced) eye, and redrew it in the right location, instead of lasso-ing it and pushing it to the right spot?

---

Lasso-ing or not, it's still you doing an active choice to improve the picture. Use the tools available.

Had the position of the eye been traced you wouldn't have trained yourself to see and adjust the error. A major drawback if you ever want to draw from life or from imagination, I guess.

[Basse_Ex]

ummh....

just wanted to show a nice and quick little tracing I finished the other day... it's a self-portrait...(Gawd-dammit I'm handsome)....



web page

And...

... Since somebody mentioned Rodin, I think it's appropriate to mention George Segal(Hope I got his name straight), arguably the greatest sculptor of the last century.
He started as an expressionistic painter, but switched after a while to sculpting.
He casted his models in plaster, which I guess is the sculpting equalent of tracing, and placed the sculptures in real enviroments. By this approach to art he somewhat joined the early pop-art movement, although he was considered far to expressive and "real" by most of the pop-artists.
To get just the look he wanted, he again plastered the plaster, sometimes many times, to get the right details(Or lack of them) and texture.
His sculptures are quite fascinating, actually.

Just thought I'd mention it.

[eyewoo]

Yeah... cool traced self portrait. Good idea... Let's see more. Here's mine:

[Basse_Ex]

Very nice, Eyewoo... love the parts where the feathering runs from being black on white, to being white on black... very cool.

Anyhow... on to some ramblings:

I've been thinking a little bit about this cheating thing, and my mind must have started to mix it up with the "What is religion for anyways?"-thread, because I suddenly thought of the Sermon on the Mount.
Jesus states that "No one can serve two masters", meaning that you should always serve God first.
Now, if all the atheists here put down their swords and exchange the word "God" with the word "Good"(It only one letter apart), we can start to see a connection here.

If you do "art" for the sake of anything other than doing as good as you can(In all respects), you are cheating. Cheating yourself perhaps, but still cheating.
This means that if you for instance create art to gain respect from others, or purely for money, it won't matter if you trace or not, you will be cheating anyhow.
With this I don't mean that you shouldn't work with commercial projects, but if you only think of the money aspect of it, you will start despising the art part of it. The same counts for things done to gain the respect and admirration of others.
You start liking the "rewards" so much you almost have to start disliking the process, and this I believe will always somehow show itself in the art.
Now if you, no matter what you do, just do it for the joy of doing it, then "good", or "God", will find a way to manifest itself in your work. You will only serve one master(Good\God), and that master will reward you properly(Hopefully).

I'm not saying this in a purely religious sense, it can be understood in psychological sense as well. Fame and fortune can perhaps be like drugs, and if you start serving the drugs(Coffe cigarettes and alcohol included), instead of the drugs serving you, then you're pretty fucked. Addiction is a dangerous thing, and it doesn't only happen with drugs. When you HAVE TO watch "The Days of our lives" every day, you should know it's time to throw the TV out the window.

If you're "addicted" to the respect or material goods or whatever you get from your art, then you simply can't continue making good things.
You simply CANNOT serve two masters.

Sorry if I'm somewhat incoherrent here, but my mind is just wandering. Hopefully I'm making some sense. And if I'm making sense, then this all leads to one question:

What the fuck is good, and how do you serve it?

(Actually that's two questions)

[jesusclone]

Basse_Ex : you'd make a great teacher

--------------------


http://www.twigpeople.com/dmo

[Briareos]

yOU CHEATED !!! heh heh heh

[Anthony]

Who gives a flying fuuuu, err who cares?