Digital painting vs. Illustration

[Cothull]

illustration is art, but art is not necessarily illustration. Illustration is art that "clarifies or explains" an idea or a story.

Drawing and painting are techniques. They can be used to create art or illustration.

[clojster]

So why, for example on gfxartist.com, are 2 different categories - digital painting and illustration? Why are there these categories when digital painting is technique and illustration is art?

[Jinbrown]

Hi,

The only place where I see these categories at gfxartist.com, Illustration and Digital Painting, is in the Member Gallery.

How about asking the folks who run gfxartist.com what their reasoning was when setting up these categories? I think only they would know why, and we can only guess.

Illustration does not need to be done only by painting. It can also be both traditional and digital drawing, collage, cut paper, and many other techniques.

Painting can be used in illustration, fine art, web art, graphic art, etc.

Again, ask the folks at gfxartist and I'm sure they can give you the appropriate answer for their site.

[Lunatique]

I moved the thread here because it's not a Painter specific question.

[Leaters]

illustration is a commercial art. digital painting is a medium (possible to make illustrations)

[clojster]

Ok, tkanks to you all!
-jakub

[LeeC]

To me, a digital painting is a painting created with a digital medium rather than actual paint and in this sense, a digital painting can also be an illustration. An illustration is a graphical representation of a theory, concept, idea etc... but you could easily produce a digital painting to illustrate an idea.

You could also consider these terms as something you DO as well. You can DO an illustration and you can DO a digital painting. I think at this point, their meaning differs. If you were DOing an illustration, you would be conveying an existing idea in a visual sense (you can also illustrate with sounds etc...) whereas if you were doing a digital painting, you could easily be creating that idea as you paint.

Effectively, they all boil down to transfering an idea into a pictorial medium for other people to look at. It's like music where you compose or write and you can perform or play. Different ways of expressing a similar idea.

[clojster]

Thanks LeeC!

I went to the gfxartist.com forums and on the first page I found topic "Digital painting vs. Illustration... blablabla" ;). Even on their forums no member knew why they have these 2 categories and no admin had replied. Everyone who posted their explanations concurs with each other that DP is technique and Illustration is an image which illustrates some moment of action or whatever. And that anybody can call his/her image as he/she wish and noone is allowed to converse...

Someone wrote that under word "Illustration" he imagine some painting made for cover of comic book...

Well, for me I always imagined Illustration as some quick drawing with pencil... some simple sketch. Therefore I considered Illustration as something inferior. But I've changed my mind when I saw some great paintings called illustration ;)

[mmiller]

Originally posted by Cothull
illustration is art, but art is not necessarily illustration. Illustration is art that "clarifies or explains" an idea or a story.

Drawing and painting are techniques. They can be used to create art or illustration.
The original question here is kind of silly as there is no comparison between "painting" and "illustration"
They are different things altogether.

But, I'm surprised that the "illustration is art" comment did not stir up any conflicting opinions.
I seem to run into these "is it art" questions everywhere

Illustration vs art
CG vs art
aviation art vs aviation illustration

Personaly, I like the definition given above
"Illustration is art that clarifies or explains"
Mind if I use that? ;-)
Mark

[clojster]

Originally posted by mmiller
The original question here is kind of silly as there is no comparison between "painting" and "illustration"
They are different things altogether.

Yes, I know that. I asked this question because of gfxartist.com and their categories where you can pick one (DP or Illust.) for your image...

And when I saw it there I thought I'm missing something so I asked here...

[jggibz]

leec finally got it right :)

[Mastakojo]

Maybe i can give my 2 cents in this

About "illustration is art" thingy, i have some other opinion on that. Actually, im goin to a fine art college right now, and i had this conversation with a professor there , about whether my drawing was an illustration or a piece of art? At that time, i didnt exactly know what was the difference. An illustration is something that display or show an idea, a story, a concept in a particular setting, and most importantly, i think i looked on the dictionnary for that one, it is commissioned by someone, therefore commercial. I think thats the biggest difference.

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