People who are new to digital art and not ready to purchase a tablet might not know if they can make digital art without one. I’m here to tell you from experience if you can.
You can make digital art without a tablet. Using a mouse you can create the same great digital art as you would on a tablet in the same programs. A mouse is a tool just like a drawing tablet, you just need to develop the skill to use it.
In this post, I will cover how you can indeed create digital art without a tablet. If your goal is to create digital art you’ll want to go through my comparison between digital art with and without a tablet.
Do You Need a Tablet for Digital Art?
No, as I previously stated you do NOT need a tablet for digital art.
Certain art will simply take more time and control to create.
Drawing tablets may help create digital art and are used by most artists so it may be a great option for you too. However, making digital art without a tablet is totally possible and done every day by designers and artists all over the world.
Using only my mouse I am constantly creating digital art and designs.
A drawing tablet is just a tool and if you have another tool capable of making digital art like a mouse you just have to learn to use it.
A drawing tablet and stylus are simply more intuitive with the way they replicate pencil and paper. This is the reason most artists will choose to use one over their mouse when drawing from scratch.
However, for creating digital art overall a mouse is perfectly adequate as is and actually easier for different parts of digital art.
Vector art, minimal art, geometric art, photo-editing, pixel art, 3D art, programmed art, etc. all of these types of digital art actually are created mostly with a mouse.
You can even create your art traditionally and convert it into digital art by tracing over a scan with a mouse.
Most programs are actually designed with the mouse in mind so that won’t be an issue all you have to do is choose the one you like best.
Programs like Photoshop have amazing tools like the Magic Wand that will select pixels in an image based on shapes or by detecting object edges. Tools like this make it super easy to make digital art without a tablet.
For example, if you wanted to remove the background from a photo you could use the Magic Wand. Instead of manually drawing your selection of the background in the photo, it will automatically do it for you.
Types of Digital Art to Make Without a Tablet
1. Photo Editing & Manipulation
To get yourself started photo editing and manipulation will allow you to explore your creativity as much as you’d like with the endless library of images on the internet.
This is actually easier and better on a mouse for the most part as you will be quickly clicking through layers, tools, and effects rather than manually drawing, coloring, and lighting things.
Using photo-editing alone there are many artists who have developed huge followings on platforms like Instagram but also work professionally on commercial projects.
2. Geometric/Fractal
These are two different types of art however they both do not require a tablet as digital art because of their foundation being lines and shapes.
Lines alone allow you to create some truly magnificent pieces. Every program I know of can create a perfectly straight line all you have to do is pick the points or click and drag.
Adding shapes into the mix you can go even further with beautiful patterns and designs.
Using a mouse allows you to create these types of artworks easily whereas drawing some of these using a tablet would be more time consuming and less accurate.
3.Pixel Art
Pixel art is a fun unique type of art that has risen in popularity with games like Minecraft and more indie titles like Undertale and Stardew Valley.
Luckily this nostalgic genre of art is based on being blocky with pixels. Making pixel art using a mouse is totally doable with everything based on squares.
4. 3D Modeling & Animation
3D art is actually mostly done using a mouse and not a tablet. This is because 3D art is based on using existing 3d objects and modifying them.
You don’t have to worry about manually drawing, shading, and lighting anything 3D as it’s all done using settings.
Professionals looking for an upgrade to their tools actually will go from a regular mouse to a 3d mouse instead of a tablet so that is something you could explore as well.
5. Programmed Art
Using coding and certain programs like Processing which I used in college to create the example above you can actually automate art.
Now it sounds funny and at a basic level may seem like just plugging in different random variables but if you learn a little coding you can actually use this to create some beautiful art.
Not only that but depending on your code this can be code that has an infinite number of resulting art pieces without even needing even a mouse for the most part.
Some programmed art would actually take a ridiculous amount of time to recreate by drawing with a tablet or mouse, even with the result as a reference.
Which is Better for Digital Art: Drawing Tablet vs Mouse
A drawing tablet is better for digital art as a whole. A mouse is better for some 3D art, geometric art, and photo-editing.
Mice can still produce almost all the art a tablet can, it simply takes more time and control to do so.
The specific types of art I mentioned are some examples of art that is better with a mouse.
However, for those of you looking to do drawing, painting, and coloring a drawing tablet is better than a mouse.
Those are the traditional forms of art most people are looking to make. Using a mouse to do so would be grueling, tiresome, and even impossible.
You can bypass using a tablet for this by scanning your traditional art and tracing over it with a mouse. But even tracing certain lines and curves will be difficult and time consuming.
If you’re not going with a flat look for your art you also have to manually shade and color with the mouse.
Tablets without a screen offer much more control than a mouse allowing for more natural drawing. But tablets with screens completely replicate a paper by allowing you to draw directly onto the screen instead of having to look back at your monitor.
This is a HUGE benefit as you can maximize the use of your hand eye coordination with your hands in your view.
Drawing on a screen directly allows you to draw more naturally because you can see where your hand is going as you draw.
Precisely controlling your drawing with this allows your mind to focus on the next steps in your drawing.
With a mouse despite it feeling like second nature from your use of computers, using mice to draw is an entirely different skill.
Your mind is doing much more work to calculate the exact way to move your hand to get the exact lines you are visualizing on the screen.
A drawing tablet with a screen and stylus takes out all that guesswork and visualization of each line allowing you to visualize your next lines instead.
With the tablet and stylus, you can replicate a paper and pencil almost exactly. With pressure and tilt sensitivity along with a screen, they offer complete control in a familiar setting.
Pressure and tilt sensitivity are super important. Pressure is more important, but both contribute to the similar experience a stylus can give compared to a pencil.
Pressure allows you to push harder or less on the pen to change the weight of your lines.
Tilt allows you to tilt your stylus like you would a pencil allowing you to have more of the lead contact the page. By distributing pressure on this bigger surface area you can create a transition from a solid line to a shaded diffused brush stroke.
This is great for shading, coloring, and those who enjoy a more textured diffused look in their art.
Mice are simply pointers meant for navigation not smooth lines and drawing. Mice do NOT have the ability to be with any pressure or tilt sensitivity.
Mice can only draw solid lines or diffused brush strokes. Without pressure sensitivity, you do not have the ability to transition from one to the other gradually without manually doing so step by step.
