Most digital painters favour Corel Painter, but there are other great art programs out there too. ArtRage is one of them and it can be used to great effect, as you can see in this image above by regular Digital Artist contributor Lionel Cutmore (Ferryman, 2011, ArtRage; Digital Artist 25). Here are five reasons why you should consider giving ArtRage a try.

You can use metallic paints. Don’t spend ages on the insanely complicated colour schemes metallic highlights require – whack them straight in by using ArtRage’s Metallic slider on any colour and paint type. You can create everything from subtle sparkle to total bling by increasing or decreasing the amount of Metallic in your paint.

ArtRage offers great impasto effects. They’re easy to use – no worrying about depth or lofting a la Painter – and give fat, luscious strokes of paint that you can almost feel. And you can slide that impasto around with Palette Knives too.

ArtRage for iPad integrates with the desktop edition. There’s some awesome technical trickery going on here. You can start sketching out an image on your iPad using the ArtRage app, then when you want to rez it up and finesse it simply bounce your image over to the desktop version for some high-res love.

There’s a free version! Yes, the f-word is a major attraction here. If you’re unsure whether ArtRage is for you, you can grab a demo of the latest version or a full Starter edition of the classic ArtRage 2 for nothing.

There’s a cat in the Layers panel. Seriously. His name is Tycho, he lives in the ArtRage development studio, and sometimes he’ll pop up to chase your layers when you’re moving them, and occasionally bite your update window.

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Here are our top 10 favourite digital painting brushes. Everyone likes different brushes for different things, so if you’ve got a favourite that we’ve missed, let us know in the Comments or on Facebook. All of these brushes are available by default in the program or app they’re featured in.

• Photoshop’s Hard Round brush – a do-everything workhorse for sketching and colour blocking
• Corel Painter’s Tinting>Basic Round – grainy opaque coverage that’s perfect for glazing
• ArtRage’s Impasto brush – depth, loft and the ability to use Metallic paint makes this a lovely chunky paintbrush
• Photoshop’s Scatter brush – the go-to brush for creating variations in skin tone
• Corel Painter’s Scratchboard tool – an exceptional inking brush
• SketchBook Pro’s Pencil – does exactly what it says on the tin!
• SketchClub’s Sketchy – possibly the best digital pencil in the world ever
• ArtRage’s Gloop Pen – fun inky and marbling effects
• Corel Painter’s Impressionist brush – scattery Divisionist colour that gives a perfect early Modern look
• Zen Brush’s black ink brush – perfect sumi-e strokes every time

Many people ask me which is ‘better’, Corel Painter or Photoshop. The truth is that they’re both incredibly useful and work together remarkably well (especially with the Photoshop integration in Painter 12). Nonetheless each one of them does have some advantages over the other.

• Photoshop has more brushes: It’s easy to make Photoshop brushes so there are thousands of homebrew brush sets out there to download, from traditional styles to contemporary ones
• Painter has better real media brushes: Painter has more real-media emulation, meaning that its range of brushes are better at pretending to be traditional tools
• Photoshop has more layer styles: You can add drop shadows, gradient overlays, adjustment layers and many other effects (which aren’t always compatible with Painter)
• Painter has unique layer styles: Painter has the Gel layer style as well as unique Watercolor and Liquid Ink layer types to give a realistic look and feel
• Photoshop is brilliant at image editing: It’s easy and intuitive to cut, copy and paste, create repeating motifs, group and modify layers and adjust colour
• Painter is brilliant at image creation: Many artists prefer to do their initial sketching, colour blocking and final painting in Painter, making Photoshop edits along the way
• Photoshop has its own file type: PSD keeps layers and effects intact across different programs and is an industry standard
• Painter has its own file type: Painter’s RIFF file type keeps unique Painter effects intact but is incompatible with other programs
• Photoshop has lots of added extras: You can create 3D and even animation in Photoshop and buy plug-ins for specific functions
• Painter has painting-specific extras: You can import textures and patterns to create unique brush effects specifically tailored to your painting or illustration

So which one is your favourite? Do you use Painter and Photoshop together – how and why? Let me know in the comments below or over on Facebook or Twitter. Personally, I like to start off sketching either in pen, pencil or with the Inkling, import my work into Photoshop to adjust the composition with Selection and Transform tools, then bounce into Painter to refine the sketch into line art and start applying values and colour. As I create details I’ll bounce back into Photoshop for some copy-pasting and Liquifying magic (particularly handy when you have a lot of repeating subjects like plants) and then back into Painter to work them up, and I’ll keep doing this until I’m basically happy with the image, when I’ll finally pop back into Photoshop to apply a texture overlay and some adjustment layers for the final tweaks. How about you?

Here’s an interesting article from The Spectator (click here) which compares iPad/iPhone/screen-based art to stained glass windows due to its use of light as an essential part of the composition. It takes in all the stuff you expect: David Hockney, Apple, the mainstream commodification of art. The writer, Gareth Williams, makes some interesting points, although one I’m not particularly fond of is the term he appears to be trying to coin, ‘iArt’. The article also mentions a prohibitively expensive-looking and gimmicky display system – a wall of iPod touches. What are your thoughts on this article? Does it accurately reflect what digital art is and what digital artists do, or do you feel it misunderstands the medium?

To celebrate the company’s 25th anniversary, Corel is running a worldwide digital art competition. Over to them to tell you the details:

“Corel’s Quest for the Best Creativity Challenge is looking to discover and showcase some of the extraordinary and inspiring work made in Corel software every day. Whether you’re someone who makes a living from your creations or you create art for the love of it, you’re invited to enter your best work created using Corel software! If you simply want to enjoy what others have created, just visit the site and vote on your favorites for a chance to win.

“‘With Corel’s Quest for the Best Creativity Challenge, we’re looking to discover and celebrate some of the extraordinary individuals who use Corel software in unique and inspiring ways,’ said Nick Davies, Senior Vice President, Corporate Marketing at Corel. ‘As we celebrate our 25th birthday, it’s the perfect time to shine a spotlight on the talent and skills of our community as we thank them for their loyalty and longstanding support.’

“You are invited to participate in one of two ways:

“1) Design your creation in one of Corel’s products and upload your entry to www.corelquestforthebest.com to have a chance to win one of the great prizes being awarded for the top 25 entries.

“2) Visit www.corelquestforthebest.com to pick your favorite submissions. Just register and vote to enter the contest sweepstakes and have a chance to win one of 10 HP® Mini Netbooks drawn at random.

“Don’t delay! The contest is now open in the US, UK, Canada and Germany. Deadline for participation is 11:59 pm Eastern Standard Time on August 31, 2010.

“Corel’s Quest for the Best prizes include: an HP® Pavilion Elite 390t desktop computer, Wacom® tablets, Nikon® D700™ Digital SLR camera and Nikkor® lens, Nikon® COOLPIX® cameras, Apple® iPad™, Flip UltraHD™ Camcorder, HP® Mini Netbooks and Corel software packages,including CorelDRAW® Graphics Suite X5, Corel® Painter™ 11,
Corel® PaintShop Photo® Pro X3 and Corel® VideoStudio® Pro X3.

“To mark its 25th birthday and thank all of the customers who have supported it through the years, Corel will be launching a series of special promotions and activities through the remainder of 2010. Visit http://www.corel.com/25/uk for more details or follow them as @corelsoftware on Twitter.

“Contest participants can find free trial versions of the latest Corel creative products including CorelDRAW® Graphics Suite X5, Corel® Painter™ 11 and Corel® PaintShop Photo® Pro X3 at  www.corel.com/freetrials.

For full contest details, please visit www.corelquestforthebest.com“

On 19th and 20th May (tomorrow and Thursday), Corel will be offering a bumper bonanza of discounts on its creative software. Get a massive 50% off Corel Creative Suite, which features creative photo and video-editing tools, or 10% off upgrading Paint Shop Pro to version X3.Best of all, you can get 25% off the price of Corel Painter 11, the latest version of Corel’s industry-leading digital painting software. There’s never been a better time to pick it up!

Visit www.corel.com on Wednesday 19th May and Thursday 20th May to take advantage of these fantastic prices – and remember, they’ll only be available for two days, so get your order in quick!