19 Resources to Help You Get More Productive at Art (One is Truly Superb)

22

“You are, in fact, a mashup of what you choose to let into your life.” – Austin Kleon.

That is precisely the reason why I love Austin Kleon’s books. That’s why his books are life changing for many artists.

You are a mashup of what you see, feel and use in your art.

Here are 19 super useful resources that will help you to become a MORE productive mashup… I mean artist.

You will find some of them to be pretty obvious (who said Zbrush?).

And you will find some gems as well. I guarantee.

Casey Neistat. Austin Kleon.

I’m so freakin’ inspired by them.

After reading this list you will be inspired too.

art resources

HERE ARE MY 19 HAND-PICKED ART RESOURCES

Social Media Marketing

Casey Neistat – YouTuber that loves meritocracy, democracy and indie filmmaking. Lives in New York City and loves direct connection between creator and audience. 100% authentic and I can’t stop watching Casey broadcasting his life.

Austin Kleon – a writer of Steal Like an Artist book and an artist with exceptional personality and a keen eye for typography.

Darren Rowse – Darren shares his advice for aspiring bloggers and social media enthusiasts. Must read for those who want to make living with her or his blog.

steal_like_an_artist_01
After reading “Steal like an artist” you won’t be the same. It will literally change how you perceive the creative process.

Books

Steal Like an Artist by Austin Kleon – the life-changing book for many artists whose ideas and creations are inspired by ideas of other people. This book makes you accept the cultural influences and not be ashamed by it.

Passive Income and Monetization

Patreon – basically, this is a service that lets you support the creators you love by donating money to them.

As much as I love everything crowdfunding, Patreon makes it right.

Free and Open Source Software for Artists

Sculptris – it’s like a younger sister of Zbrush. But free and easy peasy to learn. Features dynamic tesselation, or so called digital clay.

Alchemy – unconventional project that explores the new ways of generating shapes in 2D. Think of it as a Rorschach inkblots generator. Super useful for creating concept art.

recommend_01_1
art resources creative shrimp
Don’t know where to start in digital art? See what other artists do.

Artists

Classy Dog Films – James makes weird (but extraordinary) videos for internet. I’m a huge fan of his sense of humor, and I enjoy watching how his projects are developing. Subscribe to support his work!

Manu Jarvinen – top-notch artist, illustrator and modeller that loves open-source software. Look at his artworks! So damn stylish and also… efficient? Can’t find the appropriate word. Love it though.

Greg Zaal – visit Greg Zaal’s blog to learn some very intricate Blender tricks, and to download free goodies like panoramic interior HDRi. Greg, thank you so much!

Paid Software for Artists

Zbrush – I guess that Zbrush doesn’t need introduction, hmm? The best (most responsive, innovative, optimized) digital sculpting tool for artists. Get it now.

Photoscan – almost magical way to create 3D models from photos.

Photogrammetry is becoming more and more popular, so jump into that boat.

Maybe your photography skills will take your 3D stuff to the new level. Recommend.

Free CG Assets

Archive 3D – huge archive with free architectural models. As simple as it sounds, no hidden shit. Though, most of the models are in 3DS and GSM formats, so you will need to convert them to OBJ (if you want to bring them into Blender).

Architectural Visualisation

Ronen Bekerman – if you are into architectural visualization, this website is just what you need to get ahead in archviz. Ronen is constantly posting top-notch making ofs, case studies and architectural renders.

art resources
You can’t get wrong with learning the new tools. MORE!

Blender Assets

BlenderMarket – this is THE place to sell your products for Blender. Built by the Blender community, for community.

awesome art links

Online Galleries

3DTotal – online gallery, tutorials for artists, downloadable magazine and much more. 

Deviant Art – the place where you can share your deviations. See? You are not alone, there are many artists that sublimate their fears/desires into art.

Drawcrowd – perhaps, too involved in sexual objectification of women, but incredible gallery otherwise.

Podcast Software

Bandicam – nice and very fast screen capture software that I use for recording my video tutorials.

Want to see more useful links? Check my personal ultimate list of useful resources for artists. Including – of course, my friend – Open Lighting Book.

blender websites blogs
Click to read the comprehensive list of Blender-related websites, blogs and much more.

YOUR TURN

Leave your comment and share your favorite resources with me. Magazines? Galleries? Something else?

Tell me. And please share this article by clicking huge sharing buttons.

I appreciate you.

    Gleb Alexandrov

    22 comments

    2. Gleb Alexandrov

      Yes, awesome! That I was hoping that you’ll do. Thanks for sharing the links, Alex.

      1

    3. ronenbekerman

      Hey Gleb 😉 Thanks for the mention here! Sure which more Blendernauts will lurk around ArchVIZ land…

      1

    4. Niranjan Raghu

      Great resources, Gleb! =) You mentioned DrawCrowd; what do you think of DethJunkie and Otaku Gangsta? Less sexualised/more varied, or do you have a reason for not including those?

      Bluntly, I use DethJunkie’s work in some variation, be it lighting, texture, ideation, concept, and so on. His/Her curation is just too good.

      1

      • Gleb Alexandrov

        Niranjan, I haven’t heard about DethJunkie before, thanks for sharing!

        1

        • Niranjan Raghu

          No problem! =)

          1

    5. Reynante M. Martinez

      Thanks for sharing these, Gleb. I, too, am a huge Austin Kleon fan. His insights has had a huge impact on how I think about art and expression.

      Great to see @ronenbekerman:disqus on the list as well. I’m always mind-blown by his stuff; and inspired greatly.

      Drawcrowd is just, well, too sexy. 😉

      And hey, DeviantART was where I started my journey as a digital artist. I still visit the community from time to time. The daily devs are very motivating.

      Everything is awesome!

      Reyn

      1

      • Gleb Alexandrov

        Heh, our top-10 resources seem to overlap and that means that we’re on the right track.

        1

    6. Mats Lemmens

      Free and opensource casting software: OBS (Open Broadcast Software). Primarily made for streaming and live-casts (games for example), but you can als record with this.

      http://www.obsproject.com

      1

    7. Paul Stein

      Thanks this and all the other inspiring insights you have shared . I must try and get involved with the creator audience aspect. Show the process of a sculpture, modelled in Blender, then to the sudio floor, and the process of making the real life sculpture etc.

      1

      • Gleb Alexandrov

        Paul, I’m looking forward to your making of or tutorial then! 🙂

        1

    8. Dominik Liss

      Thanks for the list 🙂
      And as always … awesome thumbnail if you call it ‘thumbnail’ on a blog 😛
      Check out the http://www.creativecrash.com if You haven’t already

      they have a lot of free stuff and .obj files
      no section for blender though :-/

      Dominik

      1

    9. Kai Neumann

      Nice list! Since you praised the book “Steal like an Artist” so much I’ll go and buy it! I’m really looking forward to reading it. ^^

      I also tried alchemy. It’s fun! I’m sure it can help a lot to get inspiration.

      Oh and about Archive3D. I never know if I should use any third party models in my Images. It sure speeds up the whole process, but I somehow always feel like I’m loosing some uniqueness of my images. Sure it’s not only the modeling skills that make a good image, but I cant get rid of that feeling. ^^”

      Kai

      1

      • Gleb Alexandrov

        Kai, I understand what you feel when you use the third party models. We all want to keep our projects unique 🙂 But when I overcame that feeling and tried to incorporate Blendswap or Archive3d models to speed up the process, I saw that in the end the image is unique anyway! 🙂 It’s like the context transforms every single object into the cohesive whole.

        1

        • Kai Neumann

          Thanks Gleb! I guess you’re right. I’ll try using some models from Archive3d in my next project. 🙂

          1

    10. Classy Dog

      Thanks for the mention, Gleb! It’s always an honor to be recommended by you!
      For my own little recommendation, I recently found out about episcura.com, which has a lot of nice textures, as well as some HDR maps. I downloaded about two pictures before my daily quota ran out (I have a free account), but boy were they worth it!

      1

    11. Nahuel Belich

      if i may add to the screen captura and broadcast software, open broadcaster
      https://obsproject.com
      really powerfull, great compression and can brodcast directly to youtube, twitch and others or save a file on the hard disc or both, also a great customization options for the place of cameras monitors text and so.
      And to other map uses also awesome bump, http://awesomebump.besaba.com more used for pbr but it could be usefull to get free normal maps, cavity, displace or tiled textures.

      1

      • Gleb Alexandrov

        Nahuel, thanks for the link. I will test it in the next few days. But already it seems to be cool! 🙂

        1

    Comments are closed.