The Digital Art and Design (DAAD) program prepares students for an exciting, challenging, yet satisfying career in the digital art and design industry. Students will develop technical and creative skills, including drawing, art production, graphic design, computer animation, and website creation, to create distinctive and engaging projects in the digital realm. DAAD also teaches the traditional elements of drawing, painting, and printmaking, while emphasizing the digital medium. This program is suitable for students who wish to pursue careers in advertising or design and have a desire to enhance their knowledge of the visual arts. DAAD graduates can expect regular full-time employment or the pursuit of graduate degrees in virtually any area of design.
In traditional painting, artists divide the canvas into multiple, often irregularly-sized canvases, and paint on them in layers. They use different brush types, colors, liquids, mediums, and techniques to express their imagination and creativity. With the advent of digital art and printing, the process has been transformed into a collage-like production. Instead of painting with multiple brushes, digital artists work with a single device, that contains many specialized tools for manipulating the painting. These tools allow artists to combine paints, apply shading and highlights, move objects on the canvas, and add text to raster paintings.
In graphic design, images are created using a computer application. Graphic design encompasses a wide range of disciplines, including concept and theme, typography, illustration, photography, printmaking, film production and animation, visual communication, and the promotion and sale of products. Graphic design majors create visual communication concepts and layouts, using a combination of visual elements such as images, text, logos, sketches and illustrations. Graphic designers can specialize in a particular field, such as web design or industrial design. In either case, a degree in graphic design is a must.
The process of drawing with a digital art medium is much faster than traditional drawing. Traditional methods include rough drafts, watercolors, and other drawing media. A graphic designer works with colors, shapes, textures, lines and balance in order to produce an effective drawing. Students learn the basics of drawing by practicing on the computer first, then by studying the more complicated aspects of graphic design on the following semester’s graduation.
The difference between digital art and painting is that digital art does not contain shadows, only digital painting includes lighting and the three-dimensional (spatial) appearance of the subject. Digital art is normally on a computer monitor, while painting is usually done on canvas. The composition of a painting can be viewed on a computer monitor while still being viewed on a canvas. This allows for a painter to change the position of a painting on the canvas while still having the painting remain intact. Painting, on the other hand, usually requires that a painter move furniture, props and other elements in order to change the look of the painting.
Some of the greatest painters who have created revolutionary artwork using computer software include Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein. They mastered the use of computer software in painting and it continues to be the norm for many modern artists. Digital art, through its quick reproduction and versatility of content makes digital painting much more interesting than traditional art. It gives the artist more leeway when it comes to creating unique visual compositions.
