Procreate Tutorial for Beginners - Tips I Wish I Knew Sooner

Hey artists, I'm going to teach you 11 tips you need to know as a beginner that will save you hours in mistakes. First up, we have using reference layers for clean coloring. Instead of dragging color into every little section of your drawing and hoping that it doesn't spill everywhere, you can use a reference layer. All you have to do is go to the layer that you have your lineart and select reference. Now create your new layers underneath and you can just drag colors into your shape so much easier. This way, Procreate will use your lineart layer as a boundary even though you're on a completely different layer. Tip number two, quick shape is your best friend. If you've ever struggled to draw straight lines or perfect circles, all you have to do is draw your shape and keep your stylus on the screen not moving for a second and the shape will turn into a perfect version. You can even tap edit shape at the top to make it a perfect circle, square, triangle, or straight line just how you want it to be. Tip number three, instead of hunting for an undo, redo button, use two fingers and tap on the screen for undo and tap three fingers on the screen for redo. Tip number four, alpha lock saves so much time. Just click on the layer you want to lock, click on alpha lock. Now anything that you put on that specific layer will only show up where there was already something previously. Tip number five, clipping masks are even better. You're going to create a layer above your current one, tap on the preview of the layer, and click clipping mask. Now everything on that new layer only appears where your artwork exists and the best part, it's completely separate from the original layer which makes editing way easier. Tip number six, rename your layers. There's nothing worse than opening a project and seeing chaos and random numbers on the layer menu. Please take time to rename your layers. Even just starting with simple names like line art, colors, shading, and background are so helpful to keep things organized. Tip number seven, use drawing guides. Just go to actions, canvas, and click on drawing guide. You can create and edit multiple options like grids, perspective lines, and symmetry guides. Tip number eight, learn gesture controls. Just go to actions, preferences, and click gesture controls. Seriously, it's worth it to spend a few minutes going through this menu. You can customize how different gestures work and set up shortcuts that match your style. Tip number nine, duplicate before experimenting. Before doing anything new, including making major layer changes, trying a different color palette, trying a new shading style, adding effects you're not too sure of, or anything that you don't feel completely sure of, please duplicate your layers first. Tip number ten, don't obsess over the brushes. When I first started using Procreate, I thought I needed hundreds of different brushes to make good artwork. I downloaded a ton of free brush packs, thinking the more I had, the better I'd be. But the truth is, most professional artists use a surprisingly small amount of brushes. For example, I only used four to five in most of my drawings just because I found my favorite ones. Tip number eleven, Gaussian blur is one of the best. If you've never used Gaussian blur before, it's a quick way to soften or blend parts of your artwork and create depth. Here's how to use it. Select the layer menu on where you want to blur. Tap the wand icon on the top left, choose Gaussian blur, and just slide right or left. Be sure to like and subscribe for more art content, and I'll see you in the next one. Bye!