What is a digital collage painting?

I define a digital collage painting (DCP) as…

• Transferring something from the digital realm (typically a drawing) to a material used for creating art (watercolour paper, primed canvas for oils, board, etc) and then beginning the physical act of creating an artwork (painting, drawing, etc) by hand.

Introduction

Welcome to my post about my digital collage painting technique. I hope you find it useful…

This post aims to summarises what I have learned since 2020 as a result of experimenting with my “Digital Collage Painting” technique. I am still exploring new ways of working with it and as such, this post will be updated. I firmly recommend you visit it again and encourage others to do likewise.

I will detail my conclusions later in this post. Hopefully, you will agree with them. At the bottom of this post you will some useful tips to start creating DCPs.

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Here are some case studies to help you visualise some of the things I have done with my DCP technique

Case study number 1

• The left image on the far left is not mine. It is an Internet resource. It is a depiction of Anu, the Mesopotamian sky god
• I started to edit it digitally. I used the “warp” tool to distort the figure and make the drawing in the middle.
• I transferred the drawing to paper and changed the rest by hand. I created the painting on the right

Case Study number 2

• The left image is not mine. It is an Internet resource. It is a photograph of a Lý Dynasty sculpture of a “Dragon-head”
• I started to edit it digitally, I changed it to a line drawing, flipped it horizontally, edited a few bits and then transferred my drawing to paper to create the painting on the right.

Case study number 3

• This Digital collage painting is called “Black and White magic”. It was based on two faces I found on the internet. The left side was based on a cartoon of Jafar; the fictional character in the Prince of Persia movie franchise. The right side was based on a photograph of a man practising “black” magic. I found it on the internet. The idea was to challenge notions of what constitutes black and white magic
• I used “select” tools to slice the heads vertically in half.
• I used “warp” tools to match the sizes of the nose, eyes, and other features
• I merged the two halves together
• I used warp tools again to make it a bit more twisted (because I do not believe in magic) and then transferred some of the drawing to paper 

Case study number 4

Here are 3 paintings from my “Spirals series”. These all explore spiral shaped landscapes/horizons. 

• The first Digital collage painting (top left) is “Event Horizon” where the spiral inside heads to oblivion. There is a second landscape underneath conforming to an upside down arc, as if were teetering on the edge of the event horizon…The world on the far left has not been ripped apart by the event horizon
• The second digital collage painting (top right) has two very extreme spiral landscapes. It is called “Heaven and Hell”. The heaven is the nature on the left…
• The third digital collage painting is a landscape on an infinite spiral

Here are two more spiral universes

• The first Digital collage painting is “Animal Galaxy” where I combined spirals, landscapes that conform to arcs within the spiral and other animal-like elements
• The second digital collage painting is “Snapshots in time”. I used the spiral structure to create a wormhole into the universe and a route that goes back and forth into it. I was able to incorporate elements in all rotations and sizes within each section…
• You don’t necessarily need a computer to do any of the above artworks. I chose to use a computer to create precisely shaped spirals. The precision helps you see the space more clearly

Case study number 5

Here are 3 animal paintings

• The first Digital collage painting is “Walking Seahorse” from my “Spirals” series. I primarily used “warp tools to create a “N” shaped seahorse as you see. I created an internal space inside the seahorse with a park of trees that rotate in all directions.
• The second digital collage painting is “Ammonite City”. I used a spiral structure to flip houses in both directions rotating around the spiral.
• The third digital collage painting is the Vietnamese’s “Legend of Ông Tao”. I used warp tools to curve the carp into an arc shape to create the feeling that the carp is flying (the legend says he could ride the carp to heaven) 
• You don’t necessarily need a computer to do any of the above artworks. I chose to use a computer to create precisely shaped spirals. The precision helps you see the space more clearly

Case study number 6

The top two paintings are from my “Sacred Cow” series. This is where my DCP technique was born back in 2019/2020. I quickly realised I had opened up a whole world of possibilities. The first painting was exhibited at the 9th Beijing International Art Biennale in 2022.

• It all started because I wanted to create artworks that visually challenged daft beliefs such as the Elvis Presley God, etc. In these artworks, you will see inverting horizons, rotated elements, distorted elements, elements in differing scales next to each other and so on. Some beliefs are too entrenched, dangerous or difficult to change verbally; so this could be a way to challenge them subconsciously.
• The third digital collage painting shows a water buffalo on the wall of china with wall elements rotating inside. This picture is a statement of just how incredible the wall is. It appears to defy physics…
• I used a computer to rotate, invert, distort, crop and many other tasks…

Case study number 7

Using my DCP technique to create places I loved…

Using my DCP technique to do a cross-over

• In both paintings I have combined reality with imagination.
• In the first painting, I used the yellow boats to create a turtle shape (Turtles are sacred animals)
• In the second painting, I created a God like entity with the bridge at Ba Na Hills…
• I used a computer to get the precision (size, placement, accuracy of the places, etc). I used freehand elsewhere

Case study number 8

Experimenting with Collage…

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• The painting on the left has a distorted letter “P” (based on Old English Manuscript letters), a depiction of Piers the ploughman (From Medieval English art), a skull and was then painted freely
• The second painting has elements from many places. The structure of the artwork is based on an old English manuscript. The island on its side in top left is based on medieval art. The skull is based on Day of the Dead art. There are elements from the digital realm and my imagination, etc.
• The Internet gives us access to any kind of art available. We can combine them in any way we want. We do NOT need to collate physical resources. We collate virtual resources instead. You can change any internet resource in any way you want with graphics editing software and print off your resource, if you wish. This would make physical collages much easier to do, less time consuming, and easier to change, etc

Case Study number 9

• To create the painting on the left I started by researching the internet for a :Lý Dynasty tablet”. I found a photograph I liked and imported it into Photopea. I changed it to a line drawing and transferred it paper. However, my drawing felt static and I wasn’t comfortable with it. So I began working spontaneously. I decided to change the whole entire purpose of the artwork. I decided to turn it into a “Tree of Life”. I used some of the lines I had created from my tablet drawing and disregarded many others. This was a  spontaneous artwork
• The second artwork started off with me surfing “google images”. I found images of a pickup truck and a building by Friedensreich Hundertwasser that I liked. I decided to merge them graphically. I transferred the drawing to paper and changed the drawing as I went

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Conclusions

Graphics editing programs such as Photoshop have a vast number of functions available. Working digitally lets me work in ways i can’t by hand. At the click of a button or very quickly, I can…

• Work with any internet resource I can find (clip art, photographs, brass rubbings and so on)
• Change a photo into a line drawing
• Distort it, Resize it, Rotate it, Flip it horizontally…
• Add or subtract any elements
• Apply a vast number of graphical functions (contrast, recolouring, brightness, etc)
• Apply a vast number of styles (Van Gogh style etc)
• Create bitmap, vector graphics or combine them
• Create file types for differing purposes (JPEG, PNG, GIF, PSD, etc)
• And so on…

Case study one is like an introduction to my DCP method and showcases a task that can easily be done digitally (warping a drawing, for example). This task would be very hard to do by hand. It would take a very long time. Case studies 8 and 9 show that you can work very spontaneously too.

The process of creating a DCP can thus be as open or as closed as you want. You can create something very planned, then go to the other extreme and work spontaneously. You may for example create a digital drawing, transfer it to paper and then decide to take another path. This could include ignoring the drawing altogether and/or incorporating just a few parts of it at any stage of the artwork.

By combining digital and physical ways of working, I am able to do things not easily done any other way.  This includes

• Create new spatial ideas such as my spiral spaces (Universes and animals, etc)
• Warp animals such as the carp In the Legend of Ong Tao
• You can do highly planned work, very spontaneous work and combine them both in any way
• Create split images to contrast two different halves such as “Black and White magic”. The vast majority of my “Oddities” series are based on this idea
• Interpretations of folklore and places, etc
• Being subversive. Distortion and rotation can be used to challenge ideas/beliefs such as my Sacred Cow series
• Create coded or symbolic artworks. This can be important if you are afraid of persecution, etc. This is useful for LGBTQ+ artists that want to send secret safe messages in public that only their chosen audience will understand, etc.
• Create any kind of collage
• Plan complexity
• Create artworks for a vast number of purposes (websites, festivals, teaching resources, etc)

The latest Apple IPad mini 7 is small, light, powerful and has a screen that can be used to draw on. It is good enough to work for professionals like myself to use. It’s form factor means I can put in in a rucksack with clothes and other essentials, hire a motorbike and travel to a very remote place. When I arrive, I will be able to take photographs, create digital art, teach, translate, and probably, stay connected to the internet (if it is available there). Combine this with my DCP method and a printer, and you literally open up new ways of working too.

With some development, my DCP technique could quite literally be used to help disabled people or people that have difficulties drawing. For example

• imagine a blind person using Siri to give a graphics program instructions and then printing the result
• Imagine someone that find drawing difficult for any reason. My DCP technique can help them overcome their problems. This has wide implications. I can’t do many of my artworks without my DCP technique.

If you like this post, please take a look at my digital artworks. I am a qualified ICT teacher with over 15 years of International teaching. I have spent all of my life combining art and technology. So, please do contact me if you need some help. I am on Instagram,,,

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This next section is more subjective – which is why it is here at the end…

Here are, what I consider to be good practices before you start creating a digital collage painting…

• Use the internet to get some ideas and resources
• Familiarise yourself with the tools of Photopea. Here is a video on YouTube that detail them.
• Understand bitmap and vector graphics. Understand different graphic file types (J{PEG, GIF, PNG, PSD, etc)
• Why use Photopea? It is free to use!
• Make sure you have a powerful computer with good RAM
• Clean your internet browsing history  and delete your activity on google to clean up your cache
• I recommend creating a Canvas sized proportional to an A4 piece of paper. I use 2100 * 2970 pixels. It makes printing easy (A4 paper is 210 * 297 mm) and I have an A4 printer
• Use layers and export your work as a PSD file regularly, so you don’t lose work
• Use the duplicate layers tool and the “eye” tool to create a copy of a “good” layer, hide it and then experiment with the visible layer. This way you can always go back to the hidden layer and will not have lost anything
• Use “undo” to go back one or more steps. Again, this means you can keep a good stage…

This is how I transfer a digital drawing to paper to begin a Digital collage painting

You can probably think of a better way to do this. This is my method. I think there are benefits to having a long method like this – It gives me more opportunities to make changes en-route…

• I export the PSD file as a JPEG to flatten it and use it in word processing software
• I float the image on a blank document. This allows me to print beyond the standard margins 
• I enlarge the image to make it the exact size of the paper I am drawing on
• I stretch the image according to its shortest side and rotate the paper to be either “Portrait” or “Landscape” to suit its layout. A portrait image requires landscape printing and vice versa to ensure best match to ymy paper
• I use print preview to make sure the size and placement of the image are exact before printing 
• I repeat this step for every section I need and print each one
• I should end up with a few A4 pieces of paper that can be put together to make a much larger image. In my case – 56 * 76 cm
• I then use the A4 prints as stencils. 

This method lets me get the size I want, the placement I want, any elements of drawing, all rotated the way I want, and even merged together in a collage-like manner, etc – all be “right”, before I even start to draw on paper! I actively choose not to do colour by numbers… I keep my process open.

I use scissors to cut the A4 prints to make stencils. Cutting lets me make more changes. I then draw around the stencils and make more changes to the drawing on the paper

Working by hand can gave an artwork a very different feel – especially, if the process of painting is kept open and the paper has some mess on it. The head section in my “Lady Horsefish” Digital collage painting was inspired by mess on the paper that had been blotted from another artwork…

I use gouache, marker pens and pastels; which let me contrast opaque vs shimmering sections, etc