For years I was obsessed with digital art, and finding the “perfect” digital drawing program. I tried many different apps before learning about Procreate, which labeled itself an app perfect for both professional and beginner artists. 

You may be asking yourself, “How is an app suitable for both beginners and professionals?” And the answer to that is, it’s not. That’s not to say an app can never be both, but in the case of Procreate, it’s not. 

A professional artist might be able to use a beginner app with ease but a beginner cannot use a professional app with ease. That will be the criteria I use to dissect this marketing campaign Procreate uses to promote itself.

There are many great apps for beginners: Sketchbook (formally Sketchbook Autodesk), Krita, Medibang, FireAlpaca, and Ibis Paint to name a few. These are all beginner or semi-beginner apps, their layouts are simple and straightforward, there are limited layers, low size and DPI limits, lack rulers/guides, and most have limited color editing options. In sum: they’re easy to figure out and use within a few hours. You (probably) don’t need a YouTube tutorial to figure most features out. 

Professional apps on the other hand like, Clip Studio Paint, Photoshop, Illustrator, and Blender aren’t apps a beginner can easily figure out in a few hours. There are layers to them. You can’t just boot these apps up and expect to understand how they work, they aren’t meant for beginners, they aren’t marketed towards beginners. They have unlimited layers (or as many as your computer can handle), high DPI and canvas sizes, rulers and guides, and color editing options. 

Procreate on the other hand is actively marketing itself as a beginner and professional app. This is, quite frankly, not possible. As someone that has been doing digital art for many years now I can quite confidently say, Procreate is a beginner app dressed as a professional app. It may have the underlying outline of a professional app, but it’s quite easy to use and lacks a lot of the features I’ve (and many others) grown accustomed to using apps such as Blender, Clip Studio, etc. 

Now, none of this is to say “if it’s complicated to use, it’s meant for professionals” or “if it’s easy to use it’s meant for beginners.” What I mean by all this is: Procreate, Sketchbook, Krita, Medibang, Ibis Paint, and FireAlpaca all lack a lot of helpful tools. Sketchbook doesn’t have a time lapse feature or color editing options beyond the basics, FireAlpaca is pretty bareboned and looks to be imitating Clip Studio to an extent, and Ibis is pretty unusable unless you spend money or watch ads to unlock brushes. These are beginner apps. Simple, straightforward, you won’t get “lost” trying to use these apps. 

Procreate is a great app for artists to utilize, especially on-the-go artists or iPad users. Being a professional or beginner app only matters if you’re looking to enter the art world in a professional capacity or are new to digital drawing software’s. Experimenting, and finding what apps working for you is what will really help you grow and develop as an artist.